MEDIA RELEASE - FOURTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE DAY MALCOLM TURNBULL FLEECED A NATION - 9 APRIL 2017

08 April 2017

Four years ago today, Malcolm Turnbull stood up with his then leader, Tony Abbott, to promise that all Australians would have access to minimum speeds on the National Broadband Network by the end of 2016.

What a hoax that turned out to be. We’re 99 days into 2017 and 7 million households and businesses are still waiting.

Malcolm Turnbull promised that under his watch, the NBN would be faster, cheaper and more affordable. He’s failed on every measure: 

  • The cost of the NBN has blown out from $29.5 billion to $50 billion. 
  • He’s already missed the promised timeline of every Australian having access by the end of 2016.
  • At the end of the rollout, over 5 million premises will be left with a slower, second rate copper-based NBN.

It’s no wonder Australia recently dropped to 51st in the world for average internet speeds. There’s nothing innovative or agile about that.

For all his broken promises on headline figures, the consequences of Malcolm Turnbull’s NBN failures are now taking their toll on Australian households and small businesses.

Many Australians now connected to the second-rate NBN are having to endure an unacceptable and unfair customer experience.

The copper network is wreaking havoc with unreliable services, dropouts and slow speeds.

A huge number of consumers aren’t getting the quality of broadband, or even the minimum speeds they are paying for, with complaints to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (TIO) about the NBN increasing by almost 150% last year. The vast majority of postcodes that recorded the most complaints are suffering through Malcolm Turnbull’s copper NBN.

Frustrated customers are being passed back and forth between NBN Co and their retail service provider when something goes wrong.

Who is taking responsibility? Certainly not the Turnbull Government.  

Malcolm Turnbull’s promises on the NBN have proven to be like the Sonny Bill hologram at his policy launch in 2013 - nothing of substance.

Malcolm Turnbull needs to fess up. He knew he never could deliver on his NBN promises, but he made them anyway. He fleeced the nation for his own political gain.

The NBN is a shocking indictment on Malcolm Turnbull’s record as an arrogant and out of touch leader.

Malcolm Turnbull deserves the blame for deceiving Australians about his second-rate copper NBN four years ago, and the poor quality broadband he has lumped on millions of Australians.