A plea to the independents on rural broadband: Gottliebsen

I am not sure whether Bob Katter, Rob Oakeshott and Tony Windsor are among my regular readers, so I am relying on rural Australia to forward the following message from the business leaders assembled at the ADC Australian Leadership Retreat.

Memo: Messrs Katter, Oakeshott and Windsor

Copy : Barnaby Joyce

From ADC Australian Leadership Retreat, Hayman

Dear, Bob, Rob and Tony (plus Barnaby),

No three people (yes that means you – Katter, Oakeshott and Windsor) will ever get the chance again to ensure that rural Australia is transformed by broadband. And you can do it via Julia Gillard or within Tony Abbott’s guidelines.

Its sad the Coalition telecommunications spokesman did not make it to Hayman because he could have sorted out a new broadband policy. And for Gillard, had she listened to telecommunication minister Stephen Conroy and ignored the professional mindlessness of the NSW right she would now be Prime Minister without requiring independent support.

It’s true that the national broadband network started off as a $43 billion uncosted punt which was more about Conroy’s sense of national pride than any cost benefit analysis.

And that’s the situation that Abbott rightly attacks.

But the whole exercise changed when the “in principle” deal was done with Telstra. This deal made the fibre roll out to all Australian capitals and major regional centres ( Newcastle Wollongong Bathurst, Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast, Ballarat Geelong, Latrobe valley etc) an infrastructure investment that will return between 10 and 15%. Australia’s self managed funds will jump at it.

If the detailed figures had been brought to Australian Leadership Retreat on Hayman Island we could have confirmed the estimate from sources close to the NBN that the city section of the project could have been funded ‘in principle’ four times over.

If we had followed that plan we would be looking at a government outlay in the vicinity of $10 billion give or take a billion or two instead of a $43 billion government funded investment.

It’s true this rural investment is uneconomic but the precedents for funding rural communities in Australia are well established – we did it with power, trains road etc which were usually totally uneconomic in rural areas.

In the old days you funded this investment totally out of the government purse. Today there is private money available, and national networks are possible – provided the government injects the money to make the rural economic. Accordingly, the rural tender can be based on who will accept the lowest subsidy.

We had a number of global communication experts at Hayman and they made it clear that the ability to have face-to-face contact via broadband will transform global business and government communication plus create population shifts to rural centres.

Bob, Rob, Tony and Barnaby, you have all devoted your lives to this objective for the rural community. The opportunity to achieve this is now within your grasp – through a compromise with Gillard or (if he wakes up) from Abbott.

The independents and the National Party must not let rural Australia down.

This article first appeared on Business Spectator.