Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Friday, 02 May 2008 08:46
Opinion and Analysis
Page 1 of 3
In the biggest non-surprise of 2008, the Government of Australia’s most
populous state, New South Wales, has backpedalled on an election
promise that would have seen CBDs of major cities in the state,
including Sydney, receive free Wi-Fi.
Way back on the 30th of November, 2006, I wrote an
article questioning the NSW Government’s pre-election promise of free Wi-Fi, and suggesting it was one of the dumbest ideas I’d heard of in a long, long time, especially as it was obvious it would never happen anyway.
Promised for delivery in 2007, and now 5 months into 2008, it should come as no surprise to anyone that the NSW Government has now confirmed those thoughts.
Let’s see what I said back in November: “Especially around election times, with the NSW Government due for an election in 2007, governments like to make bold promises or launch stunning initiatives which are either disregarded after an election win, or scaled back to become something else.”
Now, the perennially smarmy looking NSW Minister for Commerce, Eric Roozendaal, has wussed out of what was a flaky proposal to start with anyway by saying it would be too expensive – one of the very reasons why I thought it would never fly in the first place.
Roozendall is quoted in an
article by AAP, and printed in The Age, as saying in a statement that: "What's clear from the EOI is that the market believes the delivery of free wireless broadband is not practical for the government at this current time, based on technical and financial grounds.”
In a clear sign of the complete inefficiency of Government, and their desire to hide bad news, I’ve scoured the NSW Department of Commerce website, and that of the NSW Government, and this statement is nowhere to be found.
Instead, at the Department of Commerce
site, there is some gumpf, amongst a lot of other gumpf, about some kind of ‘People First’ plan, and also a link to ‘report a scam’. I really felt like reporting the NSW Government itself to the ‘Report a scam’ site, but I clearly see the futility in taking that action.
Please read onto page 2.
