Conroy blasts shock jocks for anti NBN sentiment in NSW

Stan Beer
Thursday, 31 March 2011 14:17

IT Policy - Government Tech Policy

Broadband minister Stephen Conroy has issued a broadside at four Sydney radio hosts for promoting what he claims is an anti-NBN bias in NSW. Fresh from the Labor Government's disastrous NSW election loss, Senator Conroy responded to a question from the floor at the Cisco Live conference in Melbourne asking whether overcoming negative sentiment in NSW will be problem for the NBN rollout going forward.

Referring to the radio hosts as shock jocks, Senator Conroy blamed them for constant anti-NBN messages.

"Sydney is a unique  situation because they have Alan Jones, Ray Hadley, Michael Smith and Chris Smith," Senator Conroy said. "Those four attacked the NBN 158 times."

"There has been a constant Sydney drum beat from these shock jocks attacking the NBN. However, we're reaching critical mass  and when people see the compelling evidence the debate is fading away."

Later at a journalists' doorstop, Senator Conroy answered public criticism from Internode CEO Simon Hackett, who has publicly criticised the 122 access nodes of the NBN saying that it will make providing service economically unviable for service providers with less than 250,000 customers.

Senator Conroy said that start-up service providers would most likely need to use the services of wholesale aggregators (rather than buying direct from the NBN).

"A new market could well be created," he said.

"Simon makes a number of assumptions. For instance, a start-up may not want to target the whole country but start out by servicing a local market."

Senator Conroy also stressed that having the larger numbers of access points was not the Government's preferred option but the determination of the ACCC.

When asked if having aggregators provide wholesale services to smaller ISPs would add another layer of cost, Senator Conroy said: "It will be up to the aggregators to provide a competitive service."

Senator Conroy also indicated that Government through NBN Co will be embarking on an advertising campaign to sell the benefits of the NBN.

"Intel don't sell anything to anybody but they do a lot of advertising to promote their brand," he said.