No matter what we need, it seems we'll get what Rupert and Gina approve.
Confidential briefing: NBN unlikely to meet Coalition's deadline
November 29, 2013 - 12:01AM
David Braue
Cheaper, faster NBN unlikely to meet 2016 deadline according to confidential briefing papers. Photo: Louie Douvis
The Coalition’s national broadband network model will prove inadequate for many businesses, is poorly planned and is unlikely to be completed on time, according to NBN Co’s internal analysis for the incoming Abbott government.
Obtained by Fairfax Media, the analysis casts doubts over the timing and cost-effectiveness of the government’s proposed fibre-to-the-node model, highlighting numerous legislative, construction and technical challenges likely to blow out the Coalition’s 2016 and 2019 delivery deadlines.
The draft document also slashes revenue projections important for the project’s commercial viability by up to 30 per cent by 2021.
Dr Ziggy Switkowski, executive chairman of NBN Co, during Budget Estimates at Parliament House. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
Under the Coalition policy, fibre optic cables would be installed to nodes, or street cabinets. From there, existing copper wires would complete the connection to homes and businesses.
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Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull promised this would give households broadband that was “fast, affordable, sooner” than Labor’s fibre-to-the-home model.
On Friday, Mr Turnbull dismissed the document during an interview with Channel Nine.
"This document is a) out of date, b) it is defending a failed project. It has no credibility, absolutely none," he said.
"The truth is, that we will know what is actually going on the NBN very soon, because there is a big strategic review underway at the moment ...It's a very objective study."
The advice prepared as part of the material contained in the “blue book” – to brief the incoming government – suggests the Coalition’s model faces a plethora of technical and legislative obstacles and is unlikely to be completed by 2016.
Mr Turnbull had promised to deliver 25 megabits per second (Mbps) broadband services to all homes by then, and to upgrade 90 per cent of premises to 50Mbps by 2019.
“There are a number of conditions that will impact on NBN Co’s ability to undertake a volume [fibre-to-the-node] network rollout,” the report warns. “Given the complexity of these conditions, it is unlikely that NBN Co will meet the 2016 deadline to upgrade the fixed network to enable Australians to have minimum download speeds of 25Mbps.”
NBN Co’s technical advice says completion of the second stage of the rollout by 2019 ‘‘could be achievable’’ but could slide past 2019 if there was not significant progress on 12 issues soon.
The conditions include “significant” remediation of Telstra’s copper network, council planning and approval for the installation of what independent assessments suggest will be about 60,000 street cabinets, the need to recruit and retrain a large workforce on fibre-to-the-node technology, the introduction of complementary legislation and competition watchdog approval.
Most of these issues need to be resolved before large-scale rollout can begin, the document says.
The analysis also:
- warns that some medium-sized businesses and all large enterprises would need to buy their own fibre internet connections as the cheaper NBN alternative would be unable to support many business-class features offered under Labor’s fibre-to-the-home model. Even small businesses with a “high design and or knowledge-worker component” would find the Coalition model only partly covered their needs.
- criticises Mr Turnbull’s proposed two-stage rollout of 25Mbps and 50Mbps, noting that it would require trucks to visit each premises in the country twice. The report’s authors advise: “There is no need to delay a deployment ... NBN Co should deploy the best available technology in the [fibre-to-the-node] network from the start of the rollout.”
- finds that broadband providers would not be able to offer as many high-end packages. “This may cause concerns in the community, especially for people wanting higher broadband speeds,’’ it says.
The revelations in the document came to light on Thursday as a Senate committee heard that
officials expected the government to make less money from the NBN under the Coalition model because it would offer slower speeds and users were likely to download and upload less data than otherwise would be expected, and because it would face competition from companies offering other technologies.
Proposed by Labor before the 2010 election, the $37.4 billion NBN has come under fire from opponents for its expense and for missing rollout targets.
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