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NBN fight enters a new era · The Front

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  Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Kristin Amiot.
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  Speaker 1: It's Tuesday, January fourteenth. Plans for the Prime Minister's first
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  Speaker 1: face to face meeting with President elect Donald Trump have
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  Speaker 1: yet to firm up, but Anthony Alberizi says an upcoming
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  Speaker 1: COUD meeting between Australia, India, Japan and the United States
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  Speaker 1: could provide the perfect opportunity.
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  Speaker 2: When I had discussion with the incoming president, we discussed
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  Speaker 2: the quad. We had a discussion there about those details,
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  Speaker 2: but they occur diplomatically and we will get that organized appropriately.
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  Speaker 1: Items from Barry Humphreys private collection will be sold at
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  Speaker 1: auction in London next month. The comedian's late son, Oscar
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  Speaker 1: Humphries says his father lovingly built the collection, which includes
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  Speaker 1: the iconic gloves as he donned as Dame Edna Everidge
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  Speaker 1: over seven decades. You can read that story right now
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  Speaker 1: at the Australian dot com dot au. Anthony Albanezi contends
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  Speaker 1: he can sol Australia's economic woes through a cash splash,
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  Speaker 1: and he's starting with the National Broadband Network. The Prime
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  Speaker 1: Minister announced the government will spend three billion dollars on
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  Speaker 1: the NBN to finish the project started by his labor predecessors.
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  Speaker 1: But will it win an election? That's today's episode. If
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  Speaker 1: you're an Australian of a certain age, this sound is
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  Speaker 1: probably equal parts nostalgic and annoying. It was a simpler
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  Speaker 1: time on the Internet, when your mum had to hound
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  Speaker 1: you off the computer in order to make a phone
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  Speaker 1: call from the family landline, when websites were pixelated and
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  Speaker 1: finite in a way that feels quaint compared with today's
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  Speaker 1: World Wide Web, and when you could quite literally ask
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  Speaker 1: the government to remove offensive content.
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  Speaker 3: Since the legislation came into effect on January one this year,
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  Speaker 3: the government body charged with applying the legislation through an
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  Speaker 3: online complaint hotline, has received only ninety complaints, leading to
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  Speaker 3: twenty seven takedown notices.
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  Speaker 4: I think I was in grade six and we got
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  Speaker 4: internet and it was very exciting.
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  Speaker 1: Greg Brown is the Australian's Canberra Bureau chief.
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  Speaker 4: I think I tried to look up some cricket scores
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  Speaker 4: or something like that, and the dial up took a
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  Speaker 4: long time to get any information, let alone watching videos
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  Speaker 4: or anything that was impossible. So I think when you
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  Speaker 4: look back on what the Internet was like all those
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  Speaker 4: years ago in the nineteen nineties, it's hard to imagine
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  Speaker 4: that it's so fast these days and it's just pull
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  Speaker 4: out your phone and you can google anything.
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  Speaker 1: Fast forward to two thousand and seven, when the whole
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  Speaker 1: world was online. Fledgling social networks, global travel and international
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  Speaker 1: business dealings demanded faster and more powerful Internet connections. It
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  Speaker 1: was then, following a federal election victory, that the Rudd
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  Speaker 1: government pledged to get Australia literally up to speed.
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  Speaker 3: Ask anyone in the IT industry what faster broadband would
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  Speaker 3: mean for Australia and they'll tell you it would change everything.
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  Speaker 5: It's going to change the way we've worked, live, play.
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  Speaker 1: And learn, And thus the National Broadband Network was born.
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  Speaker 1: Labour's plan was to have ninety three percent of Australian
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  Speaker 1: households connected to the Internet via a national Fiber to
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  Speaker 1: the Premises network or FTTP by the middle of twenty
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  Speaker 1: twenty one. Basically, that means most households would be tethered
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  Speaker 1: to the Internet via fiber optic cables, which can carry
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  Speaker 1: a lot more data a lot faster over long distances
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  Speaker 1: than traditional copper wires. The first customers were connected in
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  Speaker 1: Tasmania in twenty ten, in a rollout The Australian later
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  Speaker 1: described as shambolic and abysmal.
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  Speaker 3: A devastating strategic review found cost blowouts and delays had
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  Speaker 3: plagued the nation's biggest infrastructure project, with significant cues in
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  Speaker 3: connections and disputes over construction related contracts for a.
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  Speaker 1: Whole lot of reasons we'll get into later. That twenty
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  Speaker 1: twenty one deadline came and went with about ninety percent
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  Speaker 1: of Australian premises connected to the NBN, and now the
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  Speaker 1: Labor government has pledged to get it over the finish line.
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  Speaker 2: Labour created the Nation Broadband Network and only Labor will
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  Speaker 2: finish the NBN and importantly keep the NBN in public hands.
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  Speaker 2: Today we're announcing an equity injection of three billion dollars
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  Speaker 2: into the NBN. The NBN CO will contribute more than
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  Speaker 2: eight hundred million dollars to this project.
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  Speaker 4: So they're going to bring nearly all the remaining premises,
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  Speaker 4: homes and businesses that don't have the fiber all the
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  Speaker 4: way to their door. So it's basically going to be
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  Speaker 4: fiber for I think ninety five percent of the network
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  Speaker 4: which was the original dream of Kevin Rudd. Obviously this
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  Speaker 4: change under the former coalition government. Initially it was cheaper
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  Speaker 4: to have fiber to the node and then copper going
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  Speaker 4: out to each individual home and business. But now they're
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  Speaker 4: saying that the government will put more money into it
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  Speaker 4: so that every household as the fastest possible ambient experience.
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  Speaker 1: On Monday, Communications Minister Michelle Roland claimed this multi billion
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  Speaker 1: dollar equity injection into Australia's biggest ever infrastructure project would
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  Speaker 1: keep internet plans affordable, but she didn't really say how Now.
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  Speaker 5: It is the case that many Australians are choosing to
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  Speaker 5: use five G networks and that is their choice. But
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  Speaker 5: the absolute truth is this that fiber is regarded across
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  Speaker 5: the world and certainly by MBNCO, as the standard when
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  Speaker 5: it comes to ensuring the highest quality broadband services. And
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  Speaker 5: that is because nothing is faster than the speed of light.
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  Speaker 1: With a federal election just around the corner, both the
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  Speaker 1: major parties are making their pitch to Australians struggling under
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  Speaker 1: a cost of living crisis, so could cheaper internet plans
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  Speaker 1: get labor over the line.
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  Speaker 4: This goes very much into the philosophical economic debate that
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  Speaker 4: we're seeing in the very early stages of this it's
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  Speaker 4: not even election campaign yet, but Alberanzi and Dunton have
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  Speaker 4: both been out campaigning. So Anthony alberanzi key slogan is
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  Speaker 4: building Australia's future and it's very much about government spending.
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  Speaker 4: He was in Queensland and Western Australia and the Northern
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  Speaker 4: Territory last week. There was a seven billion dollar announcement
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  Speaker 4: to upgrade the Bruce Highway. There was packages in all
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  Speaker 4: the little towns. He went about government money for housing
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  Speaker 4: and smaller infrastructure projects, and the point really being is
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  Speaker 4: that government under his vision has a big role to play,
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  Speaker 4: whereas in Peter Dutton he was saying in his first
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  Speaker 4: speech over the weekend that it would be private enterprise
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  Speaker 4: that needs to lead the economic recovery in the future.
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  Speaker 4: So Peter Dunnen on the one hand, is saying we
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  Speaker 4: want government to get out of the way and have
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  Speaker 4: the right settings for private enterprise. But Alberanezi is saying
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  Speaker 4: there is an active role for government to play and
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  Speaker 4: I think we're seeing that with this NBN announcement that
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  Speaker 4: the government is committing three billion dollars more to a
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  Speaker 4: public entity and a big part of this as well
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  Speaker 4: as they are warning that the Coalition has a secret
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  Speaker 4: plan to privatize the NBN. Now there's no evidence for that,
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  Speaker 4: but Labor is saying that they will be the only
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  Speaker 4: ones that will keep it in public hands and therefore
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  Speaker 4: they will keep prices down.
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  Speaker 1: Coming up inside the fight for the Internet in Australia.
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  Speaker 1: When the Right government first announced it would embark upon
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  Speaker 1: the biggest end arguably one of the most ambitious infrastructure
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  Speaker 1: projects in Australia's history, it wasn't necessarily in it for
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  Speaker 1: the long run. Following an initial investment of about forty
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  Speaker 1: billion dollars from the government and private stakeholders, the Treasury
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  Speaker 1: estimated the NBN would start paying for itself by that
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  Speaker 1: twenty twenty one deadline, with Labour's thirty billion dollar investment
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  Speaker 1: paid off by the mid twenty thirties. Then it said
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  Speaker 1: it would sell off the NBN within five years of
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  Speaker 1: its completion. But this is where the current Labor government's
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  Speaker 1: plan diverges now.
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  Speaker 2: Last year in the House of Representatives, we had a
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  Speaker 2: vote in the Parliament to keep the NBN in public
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  Speaker 2: cans and Peter Darton and the Coalition opposed that vote.
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  Speaker 2: When the Senate sits again next time, they will have
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  Speaker 2: a choice of whether they do support the NBN staying
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  Speaker 2: in public hands or whether they will again vote to
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  Speaker 2: allow for the NBN to be flogged off to private interests.
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  Speaker 1: The Productivity Commission estimates the NBN is worth about twenty
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  Speaker 1: billion dollars, significantly less than the thirty five billion that's
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  Speaker 1: been splashed on its rollout since two thousand and eight.
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  Speaker 1: So how will labor foot the bill if it gets
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  Speaker 1: up at the next election. Here's Greg Brown.
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  Speaker 4: This is another increase in spending that what they say
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  Speaker 4: is goes off budget, so it's not reflected in the
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  Speaker 4: forward estimates, but it still leads to overall national debt.
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  Speaker 4: The answer, the broader answer to you question, though, is
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  Speaker 4: that neither side is showing signs that they will be
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  Speaker 4: putting up revenue measures to be able to pay off
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  Speaker 4: debt at a faster rate. And so Anthony Alberzi has
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  Speaker 4: been out in making more than he's made more than
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  Speaker 4: ten billion dollars of space announcements this year alone, and
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  Speaker 4: when I actually asked him on the road last week
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  Speaker 4: what revenue measures he would have to offset this, he
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  Speaker 4: didn't have an answer, and I think the answer is
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  Speaker 4: that bracket creep is really the key to bringing the
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  Speaker 4: budget back into balance, and that's not forecast to happen
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  Speaker 4: for another decade. So the old era of both sides
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  Speaker 4: of politics being fiscally prudent, which was the case for
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  Speaker 4: so really most of the twentieth century, or certainly the
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  Speaker 4: latter half of the twentieth century, that that's really eroding
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  Speaker 4: at the moment.
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  Speaker 1: The political arjibarji over ownership is just another stop on
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  Speaker 1: the NBN's long road to fruition. In twenty ten, then
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  Speaker 1: Opposition leader Tony Abbott vowed to demolish the NBN if
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  Speaker 1: and when the Coalition won government. He wouldn't get his
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  Speaker 1: chance until twenty thirteen. And while the Coalition didn't exactly
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  Speaker 1: go around ripping up cables, it did make some significant
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  Speaker 1: changes to the NBN. Most notably, former Communications Minister Malcolm
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  Speaker 1: Turnbull chucked out the existing NBN board and implemented a
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  Speaker 1: new technology mix that would take the focus off FTTP
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  Speaker 1: costs blew out, as did the delivery timeline. When he
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  Speaker 1: became PM, Turnbull blamed the Rudd and Gillard governments for
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  Speaker 1: the delays and now Anthony Alberizi says the job would
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  Speaker 1: have been done if the Coalition just stuck with the plan.
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  Speaker 2: They didn't understand that the NBN is about productivity. It's
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  Speaker 2: absolutely critical to the way that a modern economy and
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  Speaker 2: a modern society functions.
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  Speaker 4: I just think a lot of Australians have not had
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  Speaker 4: a positive experience from using the NBN, and a lot
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  Speaker 4: of people think it's been one big waste of money.
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  Speaker 4: It is interesting that the government is is really putting
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  Speaker 4: so much political capital in this because clearly they think
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  Speaker 4: they're onto a winner. But I think people have mixed
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  Speaker 4: views about it. Increasingly people are using five G and
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  Speaker 4: while Labor might say the reason you've had a bad
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  Speaker 4: experience with the NBN is because the Coalition didn't do
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  Speaker 4: it properly, I just think people in a broader sense
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  Speaker 4: think NBN and it's no good. They're not thinking about
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  Speaker 4: whether the Coalition or Labor delivered it poorly. You know,
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  Speaker 4: they just didn't have a good experience of it. So
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  Speaker 4: I'm sure the research is telling them that people don't
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  Speaker 4: want the NBN to be privatized, and that's why they're
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  Speaker 4: ramping up this fear campaign. On us. I'm not convinced
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  Speaker 4: it will be a vote winner for them.
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  Speaker 1: Greg Brown is the Australian's camera bureau chief. You can
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  Speaker 1: read that story, as well as all the nation's best news, sport,
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: politics and business right now at the Australian dot com
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  Speaker 1: dot au