Stuart Corner
Thursday, 13 March 2008 11:48
Opinion and Analysis
Page 3 of 4
- "We have not run into a market yet where a whole new fibre network cannot be built and operated and services run over it within the current spend of the end customer. Everyone of these markets has a no-conflict ownership model. There are no examples of successful NGNs where this has not happened."
- "You could connect every community in Australia with fibre for $2 billion."
So we come back to the dilemma which has bedevilled the issue of next generation broadband in Australia for years: how to get it without on the one hand costly duplication of existing infrastructure or two handing even more power to the former monopoly and trying to rein that in with regulation.
The answer of course is structural separation of Telstra. As the Australian newspapers' City Beat columnist observed this week reflecting on the appointment of investment banker, Lazard Carnegie Wyllie chief John Wylie to the government's FTTN expert panel. "There are plenty of financial types out there who believe that a structural separation [of Telstra] into a retail and networks part is a no-brainer."
One group is in no doubt that this is the way to go. Commenting on the recent High Court judgement against Telstra (Telstra had claimed that regulated access to its local loop was unconstitutional as it represent acquistion of property by the Commonwealth Government on terms that were unjust) the Competitive Carriers' Coalition said: "Telstra will continue to go to court and lose, because the act of dragging so many matters before the courts in itself achieves an end for Telstra."
CCC executive director David Forman said "Every time Telstra drags its competitors, the regulator, and the Government into court it diverts resources, creates uncertainty and raises costs for the rest of the industry and for the regulator. Until Telstra is separated into independent wholesale and retail businesses, it will continue to do everything it can to make it difficult for any other retail telecommunications company to do business, including taking serial court actions with little or no merit...Only the Government can end this cycle by structurally separating Telstra."
CONTINUED
