Turnbull still confident of Telstra-NBN deal change
Summary: Australian Shadow Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull is confident that Telstra would be willing to renegotiate its AU$11 billion deal for the NBN should there be a change of government in September.
On Monday, The Australian reported that Telstra CEO David Thodey said the company would still look to get the same AU$11 billion amount under a Coalition government as it is slated to get under its current deal with NBN Co to lease its pits and ducts, and shift customers from the copper network to the NBN.
Turnbull, who has yet to release his policy in full, has suggested that the AU$37.4 billion fibre-to-the-premise rollout could be scaled back to a fibre-to-the-node VDSL network, which would utilise Telstra's existing copper network from the node to each premise.
Speaking on radio station 2GB today, Turnbull said that Telstra would be flexible to a change.
"They're not going to renegotiate a contract which results in their shareholders getting a haircut, obviously. They're not mugs and I can't un-write bad deals that [Communications Minister Stephen] Conroy and [Prime Minister Julia] Gillard have written. I mean, we're stuck with that," he said.
"But we can change, for example, [what] we can do. We can use their copper, we can do fibre-to-the-node rather than fibre-to-the-premise, as long as Telstra shareholders are not worse off financially, and that is very manageable."
While Conroy yesterday suggested that a similar deal was possible under a Coalition government, he also said that Telstra shareholders would keep the same value of the deal, but Australians would be worse off.
"Where you're at now is you can get the best network in the world for the value of the Telstra contract ... or Telstra will receive the same payment and help Malcolm Turnbull build a second-rate network," he said.
Last week, NBN Co CEO Mike Quigley called for an analysis by industry group Communications Alliance into the alternative NBN policies, including fibre-to-the-node. The announcement was not met with praise from the industry, and the Communications Alliance has yet to confirm whether it will undertake such a study.
Conroy said yesterday that he was "very relaxed" at the possibility of any such study going ahead.
"Any serious test will show that fibre-to-the-home is the best long term solution," he said.
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Talkback
Why is Connroy Relaxed?
Off to the UN
Why?
Its private investment for the most part, with SOME Government money forming part of the capital expense. With a plan to get that money repaid, there is no taxpayer money considered to be spent, as per global accounting practices.
If you choose otherwise, its you that is wrong.
But just out of curiosity, even if there IS $50b being spent, how is that worse than the $30b the Liberals will spend, with no plan to recoup the expenditure? $50b for infrastructure that could last a century versus $30b for infrastructure that will be past its due date by the time its completed.
You may note
Pretty much all of those subscribers are taxpayers, so in a sense yes, it will be paid for by taxpayers. Note also that Conroy wants us all to pay the same, even if we have no use for the bandwidth available. 100Mb to every house is completely unnecessary, though I'm sure media companies are rubbing their hands with glee at being able to push their content over the internet at zero infrastructure cost and very much higher prices than their current distribution media (cable, broadcast, DVD, etc.).
The NBN also obsoletes all the (supposedly future proof) fibre that was run for cable TV just a few years ago, so why is Conroy so convinced that his fibre won't be obsoleted by something else in a few years too?
School excursion
Ingested too much bran?
I resent that
The Real Sultan
Turnbull, do you think Telstra are stupid?
Telstra knows an opportunity
So far, Telstra has been relieved of breathing life back into the network that has been allowed to languish, why would they take that responsibility back on without their palms being loaded with silver? How much of the existing network in VDSL ready? No one volunteers or answers this question.
Turnbull is wrong.
Pot calls kettle black
I'd actually expect everyone to say that. Doesn't take a genius to come to this conclusion so if your current BT CEO can't figure out what a "failed CTO" can I'd say that would be very concerning for BT... perhaps listening to sound advice should be the first step though.
Job loss?
It's important to keep their clueless bogan voters happy, the ones that believe more speed wont be needed and that believe some magical star trek wireless technology will make fibre obsolete... even though we dont need more speed according to them. As you can see they are not only very clueless but also very confused :-)
Why cant you?
Hmmm
But not only that, readily accept everything MT says without question:/
For some reason I think that the NBN should be destroyed and everyone should vote liberal.