Lower prices are BAD FOR CONSUMERS, says Turnbull Communications minister Malcolm Turnbull has intervened in an Australian Consumer And Competition Commission (ACCC) inquiry, warning Australia's competition regulator not to cut the wholesale price of fixed line services. The letter, co-signed by finance minister Matthias Cormann, warns the ACCC that varying the price of …
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"The letter, co-signed by finance minister Matthias Cormann, warns the ACCC that varying the price of Telstra wholesale services puts the government's NBN model at risk"
This would suggest that there is a problem with the government's NBN model, since it seems to depend on pacifying Telstra at the expense of the consumer.
I'm not saying Conroy's wholesale model was better, but didn't it depend on taking Telstra out of the wholesale business, and shifting it to NBNCo, so that such double-dipping wouldn't happen?
Conroy's model was far worse in that NBNCo became a monolith with zero competition and a Corporate Plan that relied in significant revenue growth (ARPU > $100/month)
The last significant change in Australia was the installation of ADSL2+ DSLAMs by Internode followed by others where speeds became uncapped. This was only possible because Internode could connect directly the copper and avoid Telstra's wholesale charges. NBNCo have returned Australia to paying a premium faster speeds and also data charges.
The NBN-lite schmozzle seems to roll on and on, with the current plan missing in action. But I remember that we'll have minimum 25Mb/s before this election cycle is out. Or maybe that was just a lie and should be added to the others.
"...Matthias Cormann, warns the ACCC that varying the price of Telstra wholesale services puts the government's NBN model at risk"
Code for
"The ACCC, in standing up for the consumer, is putting the entire governent's plan to limit the breadth of the NBN at risk"
Clearly the finance minister sees nothing wrong with barely managing an unmaintained network of oxidised copper where many consumers get <5M speeds.
What are these idiots thinking?
- 'It wasn't us, Telstra screwed it, let them fix it.'?
It was them, Alston, Howard, Coonan and now another lawyer is in there having a go. They should all go back to law school- they might just be more productive there than they are managing life and death of the core infrastructure, out here in the wild.
"Vulture South has noted previously that the government's multi-technology model puts its entire broadband policy at the mercy of Telstra's goodwill, because the VDSL portion of the network can only exist with co-operation from Telstra.
The incumbent has no incentive to play nice, however, and has in the past stated that it won't play along with the multi-technology model if it can't get the full value of its agreement with NBN Co and the government for its shareholders."
However the Government can also get shitty with Telstra if it wants. As such there is a fine line to be walked by both sides. If Telstra wants to play the belligerent tough guy role it could easily find itself split into two separate companies like BT with suitable legislation to prevent abuse. Then it is long-term f*cked as its wholesale business has value but the retail section isn't worth much at all on the grounds of what a shite service it offers.
I've always wondered why the whole market in Australia wasn't opened up to competition for backbone services by either government. Everyone has had more than enough of Telstra (a virtual monopoly) but wants to go down the same path with the NBN Co, owned by the government. The government owns most of Telstra already, so it seems that they wanted to give us the illusion of choice, without having any. It also has the added bonus of being easier to monitor what's happening on the internet, as the government owns the entire backbone.
The government should get out of the comms business and let people who know how to build the infrastructure get on with it.
Your visions of a competitive marketplace ever happening in Australia are sadly misplaced. Please stop reading those stories from other countries with competition and dreaming your frivolous dreams. You have 4 banks, 2 supermarkets (that also own most general retailers, the DIY stores and the boozers) and 1 telecoms company. What more could you want?
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