Telecom New Zealand has secured an extension the deadlines for separating its IT systems, required as part of the operational separation undertakings given to the New Zealand Government.

Most of Australia's tier 2 carriers have bandied together to issue a joint statement calling on all members of Parliament and senators to support the passage of the telecoms reform legislation and not to delay considering it.

ACCAN is proposing an amendment to the telecoms legislation that would be "truly historic for enhancing end-user welfare, both for consumers and business, and in so doing strengthen the development of a networked information economy."

The CEOs of seven of Telstra's fixed line competitors - Netspace; Macquarie Telecom; Optus; iiNet; Primus; Internode and TransACT - have written to ACCC chairman, Graeme Samuel, warning that the ACCC's recently published indicative prices for fixed line services, if implemented, would lead to a significant increase in prices of services to end users.

The Australian Government has published more than 30 submissions received in response to its call for industry input on the legislative framework for the National Broadband Network.

The new consumers telecommunications body, ACCAN is proposing to expand its scope to cover broadcasting and to demand legislation requiring that the government formally respond when presented with evidence of systemic failures in the telecoms and broadcasting markets. Also on the table is a proposal that it lobby for "The abandonment or reform of self-regulation to a best practice system that better delivers consumer outcomes, and is more technology neutral."

Optus has released its submission to the government's review of telecommunications regulation, calling for Telstra to be broken up into separate network-owning and retail service providing entities and for it to be forced to divest its 50 percent stake in Foxtel.

Following the incorporation of the state-owned NBN Company last week, a CEO is now required.

The Government has foreshadowed the biggest reform of telecommunications regulation in more than a decade as part of its revised plans for the national broadband network, and has set out a series of radical proposals in a discussion paper.

Australians may look enviously at the USA where AT&T has just announced plans to expand its FTTN/H network to 30 million homes and to offer femtocells along with a host of other upgrades, but, according to one expert a series of regulatory failures has destroyed competition and left US telecoms consumers at the mercy of megacorporates like AT&T.