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Abbott and Hockey electorates named in FttN phase of NBN rollout

The suburb of North Manly in the prime minister's electorate of Warringah is among the next included in the rollout of the National Broadband Network.
Written by Josh Taylor, Contributor

Prime Minister Tony Abbott's electorate of Warringah and Treasurer Joe Hockey's electorate of North Sydney will be among the first in the nation to receive fibre to the node as NBN ramps up its rollout of the so-called multi-technology mix.

NBN on Thursday released its quarterly construction update, adding 200,000 premises to the planned rollout. These 200,000 premises will have construction under way or planned by the end of December 2016.

North Manly in Abbott's electorate and North Sydney in Hockey's electorate were named in the announcement, along with Margaret River, Kalgoorlie, Buderim, Springfield in Brisbane, Port Macquarie, Ryde, Portsea, Mornington Peninsula, and Beaconsfield in Melbourne.

More than 1 million premises in Australia can now order a service on the NBN, and Thursday's rollout announcement represents some of the first suburbs to be included in the multi-technology mix rollout, according to the company's chief operating officer Greg Adcock.

"The expansion of the rollout reflects the company's new multi-technology approach and is an important step toward reaching our goal of connecting 8 million premises to the NBN network by 2020," he said in a statement.

"Today, around one in 10 homes and businesses can connect to the NBN network. Our recently renegotiated construction contracts give us the confidence to schedule more than double that amount to start construction over the next 18 months.

"Across the country, more than a million families and businesses are already able to experience fast broadband by connecting to Australia's broadband network."

NBN announced in June that Visionstream had won a five-year construction contract with NBN, along with Downer, Transfield, Fulton Hogan, and WBHO.

The government-owned company has attempted to overhaul the project management under the multi-technology mix rollout so that contracts are awarded based on performance.

This change led to Visionstream announcing on Wednesday that it would sack 60 workers in Tasmania.

NBN also revealed on Wednesday that its timing for launching hybrid fibre-coaxial (HFC) cable products on the NBN had slipped until the second quarter of 2016.

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