If either the NBN Company or Alcatel-Lucent were looking to make a splash with the news that the French telecommunications equipment provider had won a contract worth $70 million for the initial supply of network electronics, they sure picked a bad day.

After being hung out to dry by the GFC triggered downturn, demand for IT skills is on the march, and with NBN Co predicted to enter the recruitment market in earnest from May, salaries are tipped to rise too.

Shadow Attorney General George Brandis has stepped up Opposition attacks over the appointment of a former Labor political staffer to a $450,000-a-year role within the NBN Company, calling it a "rolled-gold example of jobs for the boys."

Can you believe the crazy amounts of money being paid to employees of the NBN Co, where the top dog gets a whopping $1.95 million and one of his lieutenants, shamed in a vote rorting scandal, gets nearly half a million dollars per year?

The NBN Company has defended its recruitment practices in the wake of the Mike Kaiser 'Labor Mates' row that erupted from a Senate hearing yesterday, and says its employment processess are based on "merit not mates."

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has conceded he suggested to the NBN Company that it look at possibly hiring Queensland Premier Anna Bligh's former chief of staff Mike Kaiser – the man now at the centre of a $450,000-a-year 'Labor Mates' row.

Queensland Liberal frontbencher George Brandis has stepped up Opposition attacks on Government over the $450,000-a-year appointment of former Labor staffer Mike Kaiser to the NBN Company, labelling the decision "disgraceful."

The senior Queensland Labor government staffer hired by the NBN Co to run its external relations program – and who is at the centre of a growing 'Labor mates' controversy – is being paid $450,000, according to documents filed with the Senate this afternoon.

The Government says it will comply with a Senate motion seeking information on the circumstances in which senior Queensland Labor staffer Mike Kaiser was hired by the NBN Company.

The Coalition has raised the stakes in its campaign against the appointment of Queensland Premier Anna Bligh’s chief of staff Mike Kaiser to the NBN Company, filing a Senate motion to clarify whether any Ministers assisted the hiring process.