Rudd's FTTP NBN, a rerun of the FTTN version?

Stuart Corner
Wednesday, 15 April 2009 06:59

Opinion and Analysis

If you accept the views of couple of telecoms commentators there are remarkable similarities between The FTTN and FTTP versions of the ALP's NBN: the end game for both being to have Telstra accept certain conditions and build the thing. Plan A came badly unstuck, what about Plan B?

Even superficially there are remarkable similarities between the two versions and as last week's announcement has sunk in I have been struck with an increasing sense of déjà vu.

First, both were bold, 'big picture' solutions to Australia's broadband 'problem'. Second, both required the Government to pump in large sums of money: $4.7b for Plan A and an unspecified but much larger amount for the much more ambitious Plan B.

Third, there was very little indication in either Plan that the Government had done its homework thoroughly to arrive at its cost estimates. Fourth, both Plan A and Plan B were greeted initially with rapturous enthusiasm by most of the telecoms industry for the breadth and decisiveness of their vision.

Despite the lack of detail in Plan A one observer saw in it a devilishly smart plan. Paul Fletcher is the former director of corporate and regulatory affairs at Optus and author of the just published "Wired Brown Land? Telstra's Battle for Broadband". In the book he describes the ALP's March 2007 NBN policy as "a clever piece of work", and "good policy", tapping into the growing public appetite for broadband. He too noted that "by the standards of business planning it was very thin," but said: "if assessed for its political effectiveness [the policy] was a screaming success."

Later after the Rudd Government had sought to implement that policy through the NBN RFP, Fletcher commented on Telstra's last minute bid to be included (with its Clayton's response) and its subsequent exclusion (for its failure to include an SME plan in its response) by saying: "Conroy was not going to get his dream outcome: Telstra voluntarily building the network he wanted on the open access terms he wanted. He hoped that the threat of the contract being awarded to a competitor would be enough to scare Telstra into co-operating. It had not worked."