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  • Australian comms minister dismisses talk of special NBN pricing

    Australian communications minister Stephen Conroy has dismissed concerns held by independent Senator Nick Xenophon that the current National Broadband Network (NBN) legislation may allow the NBN Co to offer special pricing to major players such as Telstra.
    During a media conference following the passing of the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer Safeguards) Bill 2010 today, Conroy hosed down suggestions that NBN Co would offer Telstra volume discounts on the NBN.
    “What is set out in that bill is that if the NBN want to give say a volume discount it has to go and get approval from the ACCC," he said. "The NBN can’t just go off and give a volume discount to anybody or make new pricing arrangements.
    “[NBN Co chief executive Mike] Quigley has said that the policy of the company is not to give volume discounts. So there is both Mr Quigley on the record and if you read the relevant legislation it is very specific: it can only be done if the ACCC gives it the tick.”
    According to Conroy, giving NBN Co the power to offer volume discounting was to provide a “degree of flexibility” in the legislation.
    “Let’s be clear: it has to be done with the ACCC’s approval,” he said. “This is a bill which will now work its way through all the committee stages.
    “We will listen to the committees, we will listen to the other members of parliament and we will consider that some time in the first half of next year but I imagine this will be at least a six-month process we are going through.”
    The comments follow a statement from Xenophon today that he would not be supporting the NBN legislation due to be voted on in the Senate in February because it currently allowed for a special deals for major telco providers.
    "Last week I voted for the structural separation of Telstra, because I believed it would increase competition and help consumers," he said. "But allowing for preferential pricing on the NBN for certain companies will hurt competition and in turn hurt consumers. I will not be supporting those Bills unless every provider gets the same deal, regardless of their size or power.”
    According to Xenophon, as the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (National Broadband Network Measures – Access Arrangements) Bill 2010 currently stood, NBN Co is allowed to ignore non-discrimination measures if this aided efficiency".
    Xenophon also claimed the Explanatory Memorandum of the Bill gave scope for NBN Co to favour certain providers based on their size and the revenue they may provide.

  • Australian minister mistakenly reveals Telstra report

    Australian Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has accidentally released a confidential report containing potentially damaging and embarrassing details about Telstra.
    Analysts say the leak could put Telstra on the back foot in negotiations around the upcoming A$43 billion National Broadband Network.
    And in a further gaffe, the most sensitive information in the 252-page document is highlighted in yellow. This was presumably to make it easier to censor the information but instead has allowed Telstra's competitors and detractors to skip to the juiciest details.
    Furthermore, many of the pages in the leaked report are labelled "confidential" and are meant only for individuals with "National Broadband Network probity clearance".
    "How on earth can Australian taxpayers trust this bloke to deliver a A$43 billion National Broadband Network?" Opposition communications spokesman Nick Minchin said.
    "This information goes to the heart of confidential negotiations and Senator Conroy has released terms of those negotiations in the public arena further jeopardising this entire process."
    A spokesman for Senator Conroy said the commercially sensitive information was "tabled by mistake and the Government regrets the error".
    The report, written by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and dated January 2009, is an assessment of proposals for building the next-generation broadband network.
    It contains highly detailed information about the value of Telstra's existing copper network assets (between A$8 billion and A$33 billion), extensive financial details including its cost of capital, network access prices and an analysis of funding uneconomic services in the bush.
    Telecommunications analyst Paul Budde said this information was critical to negotiations between Telstra and the Government over how large a share — if any — Telstra should have in the NBN and the amount of assets it needs to hand over to obtain that share.
    "This should not have happened. The Government should have been far more careful. It has breached trust and that's not a good thing," Budde said.
    "It could indirectly damage Telstra in its negotiating position ... it allows competitors to meddle in the whole discussion by commenting on this report and in that way undermining Telstra's position."
    But Budde noted that some of the confidential information revealed in the report was already known to industry figures, although not in such detail.
    Detailed appendix information about providing broadband services to commercially unviable areas would allow critics to test Telstra's public claims with the reality.
    "That particular appendix would give ammunition to people who have been arguing that there will be other ways to skin the cat if you don't leave it up to Telstra and give it to other players in the market," Budde said.
    Other appendixes in the report, such as one examining whether Telstra should be structurally separated to improve competition, could be used "to suss out how genuine Telstra is in its approach", Budde said.
    "Telstra was saying you don't have to structurally separate us to get the outcome you want, so this document could be used to say Telstra is right or wrong," he said.
    But if Telstra is upset about the Government's mistake, it is not showing it publicly. The telco refused to comment on the matter.

  • Dengate Thrush slates Aussie web filter plan

    The chairman of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers says the Australian government will “embarrass itself” if it pushes ahead with plans to install a national Internet content filter.

  • Opposition hits back at Aussie internet censorship

    The newly appointed Australian shadow broadband minister, Senator Nick Minchin, says he is appalled that a member of communications minister Senator Stephen Conroy's office had tried to curb severely critical comments made by Internode network engineer Mark Newton regarding the government's internet content filtering scheme.

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