Atug calls for Government funded alternative network

Stuart Corner
Wednesday, 22 February 2006 14:07

IT Policy - Regulation

The Australian Telecommunications Users Group (Atug) has called on the Government to fund a telecoms network as the only solution to what it says are intractable problems resulting from Telstra's ownership of the current access network.

In its weekly opinion column, Atug says: "The Government should use its funds, in conjunction with State Governments, funders and industry...to create infrastructure competition at the wholesale level."

It says the outcome of this approach would be "a national, open access, network company which sees access seekers as customers, not competitors."

Describing the plan as "bold and imaginative" Atug says: "more of the same is not going to work. The government will be playing cat and mouse with a company [Telstra] determined not to be regulated and consumers and businesses not getting the telecommunications services and prices they ought to be after 15 years of competition."