JOURNALIST:
Have you read the legislation?
TONY SMITH:
The draft legislation released yesterday has raised serious concerns in the industry that Labor has broken their election pledge to keep the NBN as a wholesale only entity. It was released yesterday, like so many things the Minister does it wasn’t outlined in his press release but certainly in the detail of the draft bill and the explanatory memorandum it has serious concerns being raised in industry. If the Minister can’t be straight about this the public can rightly think why should we trust him to do anything on the NBN, particularly given his last two years of chaos with the NBN I tender.
JOURNALIST:
How do you think Telstra will view this?
TONY SMITH:
Well Telstra obviously will examine the legislation, I think they’re saying that today. There’s plenty of analysts out there questioning the Minister’s discretion, questioning the fact that the goalposts appear to be moving and the only certainly with Stephen Conroy is chaos and uncertainty and we’ve seen that again today.
JOURNALIST:
What are your concerns in particular?
TONY SMITH:
Well the concern is that the Minister appears to have discretion to be able to allow NBN Co to conduct retail services. That was never the plan. The scope is certainly possible there in the legislation. But once again with everything this Minister does there are more questions than answers. You’ve got respected telecommunications experts asking questions about this today and with everything this Minister releases there’s always a trick, there’s always a movement and again it’s raised serious uncertainty about exactly what it is he’s trying to do. And it’s legitimate for the public to rightly think that so much was promised by this Government before the last election, after two years and $17 million of government money down the drain on NBN Tender I, not one new broadband service under their NBN plans. Lots of talk, no action and now they’re shifting the goalposts and just creating mass uncertainty in the industry.
JOURNALIST:
So you’re saying the Government could go it alone (inaudible)….
TONY SMITH: What the legislation states or the explanatory memorandum states is that NBN Co can get an exemption from the Minister to engage in retail services. But like so many other things there are questions about exactly why that would be the case and the extent of it. The Minister is silent on it in his press release. But today we see in print telecommunications commentators rightly raising the question about why this is so, what it means and why the Minister has done it. These are questions he has to answer. With every statement he makes there is always some trick, there is always some issue and he’s created mass uncertainty which is why this issue is on the front page of The Australian and the Financial Review.
JOURNALIST:
There seems to be some sort of movement within the Government to actually stop Stephen Conroy filtering the internet.
TONY SMITH:
The point we’ve made all along is that we in the Coalition will support workable and sensible measures to protect children from inappropriate material online. But we’ve also made the point that what the Government’s proposing has a number of serious questions about it. We are yet to be convinced that their plan will be either workable or effective. Having said that we are waiting for the legislation to see exactly what their final plan is. When that legislation comes forward the party room will of course consider it in the normal way.
-ends-
