Senator the Hon Helen Coonan was Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts from 18 July 2004 to 3 December 2007. This site is available for archival purposes only.

Senator Stephen Conroy is the current Minister for the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy

28/07 Tuesday 27 March 2007

Broadband services for regional South Australia guaranteed

The Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, Senator Helen Coonan, today rejected claims by South Australia’s new Minister for Science and Information Economy, the Hon Paul Caica MP that the transition from the Broadband Connect subsidy program into the new Australian Broadband Guarantee will affect broadband access for consumers in some parts of regional South Australia.

“The new South Australian Minister is obviously looking to boost his profile with a local scare campaign and I want to assure all South Australians that their access to broadband is now actually guaranteed under the new program, the $162.5 million Australian Broadband Guarantee announced by the Prime Minister two weeks ago.

“ Australia is now one of only a handful of countries to guarantee broadband access to all citizens, regardless of where they live.

The previous Broadband Connect subsidy program has been responsible for providing over 1 million Australian households with access to an affordable broadband service. In fact, the success of Broadband Connect meant that it’s funding was actually extended.

The Australian Government made a decision in mid 2006 that the remaining $600 million from the $1.1 billion Connect Australia package would be directed towards the roll-out of an open access infrastructure network capable of being ‘scaled up’ to ensure increasing capacity to deliver consumer demands for fast broadband.

“As a consequence, all registered Broadband Connect providers were informed on a number of occasions during 2006 that there were finite funds available for incentive payments in 2006-07,” Senator Coonan said.

“Indeed I personally wrote to the then Minister Ms Karlene Maywald, Mr Caica’s predecessor, on 10 January 2007 and restated the Australian Government’s intention to end the subsidy program as previously announced on 21 September 2006.

“I also noted in my correspondence that the Australian Government would provide appropriate transitional arrangements between programs and this is what I have done with the release of draft guidelines last Friday for the Australian Broadband Guarantee.

“However, rather than provide broadband users with information about the new Australian Broadband Guarantee or indeed the transitional arrangements, the South Australian Labor Government is predictably playing politics,” said the Minister.

Draft guidelines for the transition period from 2 April until 30 June 2007, were released to registered Broadband Connect providers for comment on Friday 23 March 2007.

The transitional arrangements will allow registered providers to recoup the costs of infrastructure that was recently installed under the Broadband Connect incentive program.

The Australian Broadband Guarantee will commence on 2 April and providers will be able to claim incentive payments for connecting customers to newly installed infrastructure as soon as they have signed a funding agreement with the Australian Government.

Senator Coonan also said today that if providers are able to demonstrate there has been no reasonable opportunity to connect their planned number of customers to recently installed infrastructure, then it will be considered for inclusion under the Australian Broadband Guarantee on a case by case basis.

“Since the beginning of the HiBIS program in April 2004, it has always been clear that the purpose of the subsidies is to improve the business case for providers to extend their networks and provide broadband services in previously non-commercial regional areas,” Senator Coonan said.

“However, it has never been intended that providers be reliant on subsidies under the HiBIS and Broadband Connect programs for the ongoing viability of their businesses and indeed, it is a contractual requirement and a condition of receiving subsidies that all projects must be sustainable and long-term, Senator Coonan said.

“I am confident that these transitional arrangements will provide a commonsense way to transition between the highly successful Broadband Connect program and the new Australian Broadband Guarantee which now ensures an affordable broadband service to every Australian, regardless of where they live,” Senator Coonan said.

Media Contact: Fiona Telford 02 6277 7480