[LINK] A Coalition NBN

[stephen at melbpc.org.au]

"NBN can win private funds: report"

Major private infrastructure investors such as the Future Fund, 
AustralianSuper and Ontario Teachers Pension Plan could be attracted to 
invest in a revamped national broadband network in the first term of a 
Coalition government, research claims..

<http://www.afr.com/p/national/nbn_can_win_private_funds_report_hEmb83TxLw
QxZnpGiaZ67N> PUBLISHED: 16 hours AGO | UPDATE: 3 hours 47 MINUTES AGO 

--

"What is the future for the NBN under the Coalition?"

"As the Coalition reportedly prepares to release details of its 
alternative National Broadband Network plan, what is at stake for the 
network if Labor loses the election?"

By Stephanie McDonald (Computerworld) 12 March, 2013 14:00
<http://www.computerworld.com.au/article/456056/what_future_nbn_under_coal
ition_/?fp=4&fpid=78268965>


NBN Co has a 10-year plan for Australia’s high-speed broadband future, 
but a change in government after September’s federal election – with the 
latest Newspoll showing the Coalition with a lead of 52 per cent to 
Labor’s 48 per cent on a two-party preferred basis – has created 
uncertainty about the project’s future.

Shadow broadband minister Malcolm Turnbull has made it clear he plans to 
do things differently with the National Broadband Network (NBN), which is 
Australia’s largest ever public infrastructure project.

NBN Co has also thrown the doors open to a potential change in the roll 
out of the network, with NBN Co CEO Mike Quigley recently calling for a 
study from the Communications Alliance to decide what is the best 
technology to use to roll it out.

 [ Receive up-to-the-minute news on telcos in Computerworld's Telecoms 
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However, little is know about the Coalition's NBN policy other than it 
would employ fibre-to-the-node (FTTN) for large parts of the network, 
rolling out fibre to cabinets in the street and using copper for ‘last 
mile’ connection from the cabinet to premises.

The shadow minister has said that fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) would still be 
rolled out to new housing estates (greenfields developments).

This compares to the Federal Government's roll out of the NBN utilising 
FTTH, which delivers fibre to the doorstop of premises, for 93 per cent 
of Australia.

Turnbull has also said he would retain Telstra and Optus’ HFC networks, 
which are based on a combination of copper and optical fibre, in order to 
remove “barriers to competition” with the NBN.

If the Coalition wins the election it won’t be the first time an incoming 
government has been tasked with completing an already in-progress 
infrastructure project, and Nick Economou, senior lecturer in politics 
and social inquiry at Monash University, said there may be limits to how 
much a new government could change the direction of the NBN.

One example is the construction of a desalination plant in Victoria, 
which was announced by John Brumby’s Labor government in late 2007 and 
includes a 30-year contract with the AquaSure consortium.

The Liberal Party's Ted Baillieu became premier in Victoria at the end of 
2010 and said the Liberal government was stuck “with a very expensive 
white elephant” because it would have cost too much to extricate itself 
from the project’s contracts.

“The opposition went bananas over [the desalination plant] and pilloried 
it every waking moment of their existence. But upon coming to government, 
when confronted with the cost of extracting itself from all those 
contracts, it said ‘no, no, we’re more or less tied in’,” Economou said.

He expects the same will happen with the NBN if the Coalition wins the 
election.

“I wouldn’t be at all surprised if there were only minor alterations to 
the direction of NBN policy after the election [under the Coalition],” he 
said. 

However, independent MP Rob Oakeshott has said it is still possible for 
the NBN plan to be changed, but “the worst thing that could happen now is 
a complete change of direction”.


NBN Co’s future under the Coalition


Economou said it is possible that Turnbull might try to dismantle NBN Co 
and create a new organisation in its place. 

The shadow minister has been a staunch critic of the NBN wholesaler, 
blaming the company for not having a “transparent approach to 
information” and making it difficult for the Coalition to carry out a 
costed analysis of its alternative NBN plan.

“It’s a statutory authority,” Economou said. “Now of course statutory 
authorities have a certain degree of autonomy from ministers, so what 
presumably the Coalition government will do is they will go back to the 
enabling legislation, redraft it, alter its charter of operation and I 
dare say it will then move to get rid of whoever’s running it at the 
moment.” 

In order to replace NBN Co, a Coalition government would need to pass new 
legislation. 

“If the Coalition did not control the Senate, this could prove to be 
tricky,” Economou said. 


What will a Coalition NBN look like?


In 2010 the Coalition said it would demolish the NBN. Since then, the 
Coalition has changed its tack, indicating it won’t demolish the network 
but roll it out faster and cheaper.

Turnbull recently stated the Coalition would honour existing NBN 
contracts, which include the $11 billion Telstra contract and the $800 
million Optus agreement and suggested it might introduce a plan where 
users could pay to have fibre extended to their premises.

However, rolling out FTTN instead of FTTH would require altering existing 
contracts, something which Telstra’s CEO, David Thodey, told the 
Australian is out of the question if the contract’s dollar figure is 
changed.

While speeds up to 100Mbps are achievable on the FTTH NBN, Turnbull has 
said most people would be able to achieve speeds of 50Mbps on a FTTN-
based network, while those farthest away from the node will experience 
speeds of 25Mbps and a third of people will achieve speeds of 80Mbps. 

This assumption is based on the experience in the UK, Turnbull has said, 
and he has refused to confirm what speeds Australian consumers would be 
able to access under the Coalition’s NBN.

Turnbull also has refused to provide figures on how much sooner or 
cheaper the Coalition would be able to roll out the NBN, telling ABC 
Radio’s AM program it is unable to produce a costed analysis of its NBN 
plan as it is unaware of the “extent to which [NBN Co] have made 
commitments”.

Regardless of what road the Coalition takes, Economou said it will have 
several challenges ahead.

“On one hand there will be the principles that they set out when in 
opposition about the need to find a more cost-effective way of doing 
things,” he said. 

“On the other hand I think they’ll be under enormous pressure from rural 
constituents, who are usually quite strong supporters of the Coalition, 
to go ahead with the aspects of the broadband rollout.”

Australia needs a ubiquitous NBN: former ACCAN chairman


Michael Fraser, director – Communications Law Centre at UTS and former 
chairman of ACCAN, believes in order for Australia to achieve its full 
potential in a global digital economy the country needs to roll out 
ubiquitous high-speed broadband. 

“I think that the approach that the government is taking is a visionary 
approach. It is a ‘build it and they will come’ sort of approach, but I 
think it has an important element to recommend it,” he said. 

[ Receive up-to-the-minute news on telcos in Computerworld's Telecoms 
newsletter ]
 
Under the current Labor plan, most Australians will potentially have 
access to 100Mbps.

This type of ubiquitous high-speed broadband network will allow other 
services to be rolled out off the back of it, such as education, 
healthcare and social services, Fraser said. 

“Whether you agree with [Labor’s] vision or not depends on your view 
about whether those services will indeed develop, that if you build such 
a physical infrastructure, new businesses, new social services [and] 
community services will populate the network,” he said. 

“I think there’s a great capacity to build those kinds of services once 
you have the infrastructure in place.”

Fraser called the Coalition’s approach an incremental one and doesn’t 
believe it will deliver the same opportunities as Labor’s FTTH plan – in 
order to provide national healthcare services or education, everybody 
needs to have access to the same infrastructure. If they don’t, changes 
would take longer to penetrate throughout a community and the rest of the 
country, he said. 

Fraser pointed to the example of Apple’s approach to rolling out new 
products. 

“If they had gone out into the market and said … ‘do you need an iPod?’ 
or ‘do you need an iPad?’, not many consumers would have said that they 
needed it, but [Apple] had the courage to build these new technologies,” 
he said. 

“So sometimes you have to make a strategic step-change and use 
technologies in imaginative new ways and I think the NBN is an example of 
that … An incremental approach doesn’t achieve that network effect.”

However, Fraser conceded it will be some time until this kind of 
creativity emerges from the NBN and it won’t be until the rollout reaches 
30 to 40 per cent that such a transformation will occur. 


Election 2013


Despite being one of the most highly contested topics in the tech 
industry, Economou said the NBN will not play a major role in the broader 
public debate during the federal election.

Instead, it is likely to be overshadowed by other issues, such as the 
mining tax, the carbon tax and apparent leadership problems in the Labor 
party, he said. 

And despite the Coalition leading by just 4 per cent in the recent poll, 
Economou believes there will be a clear winner come September.

“I don’t think [the NBN] will [be a big election issue] because I think 
the next federal election will be a landslide defeat of the government 
and a whole range of policy issues will be pushed aside because it will 
really be about the competence of the government,” he said. 

“I think [Labor will] be defeated really badly.”

Follow Stephanie McDonald on Twitter: @stephmcdonald0

Follow Computerworld Australia on Twitter: @ComputerworldAU
==

Cheers,
Stephen