The NBN: how a national infrastructure dream fell short
Telecommunications infrastructure is the backbone of the fast-growing digital economy and raises important questions about the early NBN rollout and pork barrel politics in Australia, writes Dr Tooran ALizadeh.
Eight years into the National Broadband Network (NBN) project, Australia has an that lags – , writes Dr Tooran Alizadeh.
Ongoing , a project that’s likely to , makes it impossible for the public in most cases to know when and what quality service they will receive. Further, new research shows the NBN rollout was and from the beginning.
It is perhaps time to remind ourselves of the ups and downs of the project that was once announced as a dream national infrastructure project for the 21st century. This requires a ten-year journey back in time, before we can figure out what needs to be done next.
The ups
In November 2007, after 11 years of Coalition government, Labor was elected on a policy platform that .
The in April 2009 to provide terrestrial fibre network coverage for 93% of Australian premises by the end of 2020. Fixed wireless and satellite coverage would serve the remaining 7%.
Looking back, it’s hard to deny the influence the NBN has had on Australian politics. Perhaps the peak influence was when three independent MPs cited the NBN as why they supported a Labor government over the Coalition when the 2010 federal election produced a hung parliament.
The final 60 were then announced. The plan was for the first stage of the large-scale rollout to follow, connecting by mid-2015.
The downs
The early NBN rollout experienced significant delays. This attracted a great deal of “” media coverage. Public opinion polls reflected growing dissatisfaction with the national project.
This dissatisfaction and the September 2013 federal election result . In 2013, the new Coalition government suspended the first stage of the large-scale fibre-to-premises NBN rollout to reassess the scale of the project.
In 2014, the government that the NBN rollout would change from a primarily fibre-to-premises model to a multi-technology-mix model. The technology to be used would be determined on an area-by-area basis.
This change of direction resulted in a prolonged state of uncertainty . As it was rolled out, the NBN was widely criticised for being .
Current state of play
in the construction of the Coalition’s NBN. What can only be described as a downgrade of the original national project is now seriously .
In September 2016, a of parliament was established to inquire into the NBN rollout. The inquiry is continuing.
The bleak status quo only gets worse when the on-the-ground reality of the NBN rollout is considered. While fibre-to-premises rollout is supposed to be limited in the Coalition’s NBN, disturbing examples of misconduct in the NBN installations are highly concerning.
The image below shows one example of many in which heritage-listed buildings (in this case also public housing) are disrespected to the point that suggests an absolute lack of communication between NBN contractors, local government, or heritage agencies.
One heritage-listed house with two NBN installations (Judge Street, Woolloomooloo, NSW). Photo: Stacey Miers.
Who misses out?
In the Coalition’s NBN, the provision of universal high-speed capacity – as envisioned in the original NBN – has been transformed into a . This leads to an important question about equity. It also puts the 60 early rollout locations in the spotlight as these could potentially be the only ones across the nation that enjoy fibre-to-premises NBN.
My points to the political motivations in the selection of these lucky 60 sites. Voting patterns in these locations were compared with all electorates in the federal elections from 2007 to 2013. The analysis shows the selections were skewed for potential political gain.
ALP-held seats were the main beneficiaries of the early NBN rollout; safe Coalition-held seats were the least likely to receive the infrastructure.
Tony Windsor, one of the three influential independent MPs in 2010, famously said of the NBN:
He secured priority access for his regional electorate to the early NBN.
However, most regional localities were not that lucky. Indeed, research on the shows the limited share of regional Australia.
What to do?
It is convenient to blame one political party for the state of chaos that the NBN is in right now. However, politicisation of the project has been part of the problem since day one.
Instead, we call for telecommunication infrastructure to be considered for what it really is: the backbone of the fast-growing digital economy; the foundation for innovation in the age of smart cities and big data; and a key pillar of social equity and spatial justice.
In reality, however, in the age of big data and open data, the around the NBN is shocking. In in March 2017, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission expressed concern about the lack of transparency on NBN performance.
Policing the is not going to clean up the mess. Quite the opposite: the Australian government needs to share the NBN data, so the exact nature and scale of the problems can be determined. Only then can we talk about finding a way forward in this long journey.
First published on by , Senior Lecturer and Director of Urban Design in the University of Sydney’s .
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