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| Labor lays into Turnbull over 'second-rate' NBN – question time live | Labor lays into Turnbull over 'second-rate' NBN – question time live |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| 4.54am BST | |
| 04:54 | |
| Another dixer on energy, with Christopher Pyne deemed the latest salesman. Most of it is the same of what we have heard over the last week and a bit, but Pyne adds his own flourish at the end: | |
| The Australian public are not interested in politics. They aren’t interested in the Labor Party wanting to play the old politics of negativity and division. What they want is to see at COAG in November is the state and Territory governments getting on board with this government’s attempt at solving one of the most significant issues facing households and businesses everyday. We don’t want the snake oil salesman... the Leader of the Opposition, pretending to be bipartisan when all he wants is a political fight. The Labor Party needs to support the households and businesses of Australia this time.” | |
| 4.50am BST | |
| 04:50 | |
| That reminds me – still no word from the high court. | |
| Updated | |
| at 4.52am BST | |
| 4.49am BST | |
| 04:49 | |
| Tony Abbott continues his recent form of wandering into QT a little late. | |
| 4.45am BST | |
| 04:45 | |
| Australian Border Force has been without a commissioner since July | |
| Ben Doherty | |
| It’s only early, but we are getting into strange territory with the department of immigration and border protection before senate estimates. | |
| The Australian Border Force - not an organisation unused to controversy and scandal - has been without a commissioner since the man who held that job, the married Roman Quaedvlieg, stood aside in July pending an external investigation into allegations he had used his position to help his girlfriend get a job with the organisation. | |
| However, later that month, while he was on leave, Quaedvlieg’s official commissioner twitter account ‘liked’ a black-and-white (I know, classy right) pornographic video on twitter. | |
| Department staff - professional obfuscationists who give up pieces of information to senators like they were teeth being pulled from their heads - conceded eventually that the department has been conducting an “investigation” into the incident. | |
| It has been, apparently, terribly comprehensive. They asked Quaedvlieg if he did it. He said no. So then they asked some other people. | |
| First assistant secretary Cheryl-Anne Moy: “There were approximately six staff who had authorisation to use the account.” | |
| Senator Kim Carr: “And they all said they didn’t.” | |
| Moy: “That’s correct”. | |
| Quaedvlieg has been on paid leave - his salary is $731,000 - since July. It is not known when, if at all, he will return. | |
| 4.44am BST | |
| 04:44 | |
| Paul Karp | |
| Dipping out of QT for a moment... | |
| Labor’s Penny Wong has been quizzing David Gruen, a deputy secretary in the department of prime minister and cabinet, about the National Energy Guarantee - trying to get him to say the obligation for emissions reduction amounts to a carbon price.Gruen says the government “imposes a trajectory for low emissions” and then the market, through retailers’ contracts with generators, meets that obligation.Wong asks if the Neg “ascribes a value profile” to both energy reliability and emissions reduction, and Gruen accepts that “there is a symmetry between the two obligations”.Does it ascribe a value to a low emissions profile?Gruen: | |
| “It depends on whether the system left to itself achieves the required emissions intensity or not. If it did, there would be no value. If it didn’t, there would be a value.” | |
| The obligation to meet a low emissions intensity profile will be “reflected in the value of the contracts” and will be set “through supply, demand and competition”, he said. | |
| 4.44am BST | |
| 04:44 | |
| Justine Keay has the next NBN question and she is talking fast enough to rival a race caller. | |
| And no wonder, she just ran out of time before getting it all out. This is the problem with trying to include all of your attacks in one question. | |
| “Is the Prime Minister aware because of his incompetent handling of the NBN the business has been allocated a satellite connection when its neighbours 650m away can get fibre, given we are in the Prime Minister’s fifth year of mismanagement of the NBN, isn’t it clear...” | |
| This is the funniest thing the Coalition has allegedly ever seen, given the gaffaws which come from that side of the chamber, but given the standard of debate in this place lately, I guess the bar is low. | |
| Tanya Plibersek comes to the rescue by pointing out the question included “is the Prime Minsiter aware” which counts as a question in Speaker Tony Smith’s world and Malcolm Turnbull is called to the box. | |
| “...What is very clear about the NBN is that we inherited a complete mess from the Labor Party,just as we did on energy policy I might add. As with energy policy we are fixing it and turning it around and cleaning it up. With the NBN, the honorable member raises a particular case and we will take note of that and we will make sure that BNP and...” | |
| Lisa Chesters gets thrown out for heckling and Turnbull decides he has concluded his answer. | |
| 4.38am BST | |
| 04:38 | |
| Barnaby Joyce gets the next dixer, which is something about energy reliability and agriculture, but is really just an excuse for Joyce to continue his attack line which he really grabbed onto last week, about Labor turning its back on blue collar workers. No Dewdrop or Moonbeam this time. In fact, no real nicknames or references to basket weavers at all. Once again, his heart doesn’t seem in it. | |
| 4.35am BST | |
| 04:35 | |
| Michelle Rowland asks the prime minister another question about the NBN and the prime minister once again flicks it to Paul Fletcher. | |
| Rowland: | |
| The prime minister promised Australians that is second-rate copper in the end would be fast, affordable and soon. Given that we now know it is slower than that of Labor, has doubled in cost and has not delivered what was promised, when will the prime minister take responsibility for the fact that the NBN is slower, more expensive and late? | |
| Brace yourself for a lot of numbers. A lot. Fletcher: | |
| I am pleased to have the opportunity to look further into the comparative records of the Labor party and the Coalition. When it comes to rolling out the NBN. It is extraordinary that Labor keeps hitting their head against a brick wall on this topic. I think it is instructive to have a look, I think it is instructive to have a loyal and what Labor promised in the first NBN corporate plan, 2011-13. By 30 June 2011 they were to be 223,000 premises past. Actual number? 10,575. That is less than 10%. By 30 June, 2012 there were to be 496,000 premises asked. Actual premises, 95,799. By 30 June 2013 there were to be 1.7m premises past. They were building confidence. Actually, 292,000 ... | |
| On any assessment that is a dismal record of rank in incompetents. It is also instructive to look at what the NBN committed to when the Coalition came to power and what has been delivered. Because what was committed by 30 June 2015 was 1.93m. What was delivered was 1.165m. By June 30, 2016, what was committed was 2.632m. What was delivered was 2.893m. June 30, 2017, what was committed, 5.442m premises past or covered. Actually delivered, 5. 713m premises. So a very consistent record under the Coalition government of consistently delivering what has been committed to. Compared to the record under Labor of consistently and by a very wide margin, failing to deliver on what was in the business plan. Very few people on this side have worked in business but many of us over here have. If you saw that kind of performance in a business world you would be out, fact, gone, and that is what you all deserve when it comes to the NBN. | |
| Updated | |
| at 4.53am BST | |
| 4.32am BST | |
| 04:32 | |
| Another energy dixer, from Brisbane’s Trevor Evans. That gives Josh Frydenberg a chance to talk about the Labor Queensland government. You know, the one that didn’t sell its electricity network. | |
| I know that he and his constituents have been paying the high price of the Palaszczuk government’s electricity tax because it has been the government-owned generators in Queensland that have been bidding artificially high prices to line the coffers of the Labor government and put this hidden electricity tax on the people of Queensland. That is why they welcome the efforts of the Turnbull government to make sure we rein in the power of the network. | |
| Ah, the upcoming Queensland election should be fun. The rest of the answer is not anything we haven’t heard before, so let’s move on. | |
| Updated | |
| at 4.40am BST | |
| 4.28am BST | |
| 04:28 | |
| Cathy McGowan has the independents’ question and she uses it ask about detainees on Manus Island: | |
| On the 14 September this year, minister, you told parliament in question time that there will be about 200 asylum seekers found not to be refugees moved into a detention centre in Papua New Guinea. There are eight days now until the Manus Island centre closes. Can you provide an update on how many asylum seekers will be left behind after October 31, what will happen to them, and will the government continued to provide these asylum seekers, in line with UN convention, with appropriate medical and healthcare, torture and torture support-… trauma and torture support and security services.” | |
| Peter Dutton spends most of his answering time talking about facts and figures – the remaining population is 606 people, there were 141 who were found to be non-genuine refugees and the remaining people can move into another facility which has been set up. | |
| McGowan interrupts on a point of order to state her question was about the media, healthcare, torture and trauma services, which Dutton says he was about to get to. | |
| That sets off a firestorm of heckling from Labor, which Dutton addresses before getting to his answer: | |
| I was coming to that point. Nothing was provided by Labor, you put the people there. I will not be lectured by Labor ... The honourable member has a much more distinguished record in this area and has the ability to ask these questions sincerely. The services she speaks off, they will continue to be provided and there will be transport arrangements from the new centres to transport people regularly. | |
| Updated | |
| at 4.38am BST | |
| 4.22am BST | |
| 04:22 | |
| Back to the NBN and it’s once again Bill Shorten’s turn at the dispatch box: | |
| We are now in the [fifth straight year of a Coalition] government and the prime minister has made a choice, first as communication minister and now as prime minister, to build a second-rate copper NBN instead of the first-rate fibre NBN. When will the prime minister stop blaming everybody else and finally take some responsibility for the system he has been in charge of four years and years?” | |
| Malcolm Turnbull takes this one himself: | |
| The leader of the opposition and his communications spokesman, neither of them understand the technologies for the NBN at all. Now let’s deal with some FAQs … Had the government, had the Coalition continued with fibre to the premises, as proposed by Labor, it would have taken six or eight years longer and $30bn more... The people who had no broadband would have been waiting for many years longer to get it and the cost of providing it would have obviously been much higher because the capital cost would be greater. The only advantage of, the big advantage is that it can carry a higher line speed. That is the deal. That is the proposition. | |
| Mr Speaker, let me make this observation. The NBN now knows what Australians would be prepared to pay for. Seventy-nine per cent of people on fibre to the premises order speeds of 25 megabits per second or less. And they are on fibre to the premises. Eighty-seven per cent of fibre to the node order speeds of 25 megabits or less. Seventy-seven per cent of those on a hybrid car lacks order the same and the same pattern is true with others. | |
| So the whole premise of the fibre-to-the-premises argument by the Labor party has been comprehensively disproved by what the public are prepared to do and use. It was a folly ... The Labor party set it up and we are sorting it out. | |
| Updated | |
| at 4.37am BST | |
| 4.17am BST | 4.17am BST |
| 04:17 | 04:17 |
| The government still really wants to talk energy. It sends out Scott Morrison, via a dixer, to link the national energy guarantee to jobs growth. | |
| I’ll just pull out the highlight for you: | I’ll just pull out the highlight for you: |
| Certainty is required for business investment and that’s what the national energy guarantee is providing, the national energy guarantee provides certainty for businesses to invest in greater energy supply to ensure more affordable and reliable energy for Australian businesses so they can continue to invest in their businesses and create even more Australian jobs, Mr Speaker. The national energy guarantee means more and better-paid jobs and Labor remain opposed. | |
| Updated | |
| at 4.22am BST | |
| 4.15am BST | 4.15am BST |
| 04:15 | 04:15 |
| Back to Labor’s questions and Michelle Rowland picks up the NBN case: | |
| Today his hand-picked CEO said about the NBN that it is too early to tell whether it’s a success or a failure. In the fifth year of the prime minister’s mismanagement of his second-rate copper NBN where no one else is to blame, is this the best the government can do? Why isn’t the government doing anything to fix the problems that are plaguing the NBN on his watch? | |
| “Why don’t you clean up our mess better,” one Coalition MP yells across the chamber. | “Why don’t you clean up our mess better,” one Coalition MP yells across the chamber. |
| Paul Fletcher picks up the answer and starts talking about other lands in an attempt to be funny, to which Anthony Albanese interrupts to state: “None of us are from the land of nitwits.” | |
| I guess that depends on your position in the chamber. | I guess that depends on your position in the chamber. |
| Fletcher picks up from Turnbull’s attack | Fletcher picks up from Turnbull’s attack |
| We are rolling out the NBN as fast as it can be rolled out and just a couple of months later, just a couple of months later, they exited office with their leave 50,000 premises able to connect, barely 50,000 premises able to connect. We now have well over 6 million premises able to connect and over 2 million that actually are connected. When the shadow minister says says and presumes to contrast this government’s record of delivery of the NBN with Labor’s shambolic and hopeless record, I said to her, we didn’t want to start from where we did but we have been getting on with the job, over 6 million premises now able to connect. | |
| Updated | |
| at 4.21am BST | |
| 4.09am BST | 4.09am BST |
| 04:09 | 04:09 |
| Sarah Henderson gets the first dixer and gives the prime minister permission to talk more about “affordable and reliable energy”. (Side note: where did “responsible” go?) | Sarah Henderson gets the first dixer and gives the prime minister permission to talk more about “affordable and reliable energy”. (Side note: where did “responsible” go?) |
| Oh wait, I spoke too soon. Malcolm Turnbull has remembered responsibility is meant to be part of the non-three-word-three-word-slogan. | Oh wait, I spoke too soon. Malcolm Turnbull has remembered responsibility is meant to be part of the non-three-word-three-word-slogan. |
| What we have now is a recommendation from the energy security board that will deliver affordable and reliable energy and will enable us to meet our emissions reduction fund obligations, affordability, reliability, responsibility. This is not a political proposal, it’s come from the experts in the business, experts appointed by Coag, chaired by an independent chairman with the energy market operator, the rules make, the regulator all on that board. This is what they’ve recommended – rules maker. | What we have now is a recommendation from the energy security board that will deliver affordable and reliable energy and will enable us to meet our emissions reduction fund obligations, affordability, reliability, responsibility. This is not a political proposal, it’s come from the experts in the business, experts appointed by Coag, chaired by an independent chairman with the energy market operator, the rules make, the regulator all on that board. This is what they’ve recommended – rules maker. |
| What did the leader of the opposition say in response to that? He called it science fiction. Then he called it nonsense. No respect whatsoever for people whose intellect and experience makes them the best qualified in the industry. It’s no wonder, Mr Speaker, that one group after another is endorsing our national energy guarantee. The head of Bloomberg energy finance solves problems in an incredibly elegant way, that’s what they said. Mr Speaker, we’ve seen from ACCI, AIG, the Minerals Council, the BCA, BlueScope, BHP Billiton, Ryder – across-the-board support for the guarantee and Labor should back it and back the experts. | What did the leader of the opposition say in response to that? He called it science fiction. Then he called it nonsense. No respect whatsoever for people whose intellect and experience makes them the best qualified in the industry. It’s no wonder, Mr Speaker, that one group after another is endorsing our national energy guarantee. The head of Bloomberg energy finance solves problems in an incredibly elegant way, that’s what they said. Mr Speaker, we’ve seen from ACCI, AIG, the Minerals Council, the BCA, BlueScope, BHP Billiton, Ryder – across-the-board support for the guarantee and Labor should back it and back the experts. |
| Updated | Updated |
| at 4.19am BST | at 4.19am BST |
| 4.06am BST | 4.06am BST |
| 04:06 | 04:06 |
| Who had the NBN as the first question? | Who had the NBN as the first question? |
| Bill Shorten jumps straight into it: | Bill Shorten jumps straight into it: |
| My question is to the prime minister, the prime minister’s second-rate copper NBN is creating a digital divide across Australia. With the one side of some streets getting first-rate fibre, while the other side gets second rate copper. How is this fair? Will the prime minister admit his second-rate copper NBN is creating a digital divide across this nation? | My question is to the prime minister, the prime minister’s second-rate copper NBN is creating a digital divide across Australia. With the one side of some streets getting first-rate fibre, while the other side gets second rate copper. How is this fair? Will the prime minister admit his second-rate copper NBN is creating a digital divide across this nation? |
| Malcolm Turnbull continues his defence of the NBN rollout, which is a matter very close to his heart, given he oversaw it while communications minister. He’s settled on his attack against Labor though, having given it a test run earlier today, and shouting to be heard over Labor’s heckling, he unleashes it: | Malcolm Turnbull continues his defence of the NBN rollout, which is a matter very close to his heart, given he oversaw it while communications minister. He’s settled on his attack against Labor though, having given it a test run earlier today, and shouting to be heard over Labor’s heckling, he unleashes it: |
| The Labor party said when they announced they were going to establish a government company to build a national broadband network that it would be the most fantastic commercial opportunity. Kevin Rudd said that mums and dads would be lining up to invest, but, but he said he was stern, he said even though it was going to be the best investment ever, the government would hold 51%. He was going to hold back all of that wall of investment enthusiasm delivered at 49%. | The Labor party said when they announced they were going to establish a government company to build a national broadband network that it would be the most fantastic commercial opportunity. Kevin Rudd said that mums and dads would be lining up to invest, but, but he said he was stern, he said even though it was going to be the best investment ever, the government would hold 51%. He was going to hold back all of that wall of investment enthusiasm delivered at 49%. |
| What a train wreck it was. Tens of billions of dollars wasted by the Labor party, leaving us with the biggest corporate train wreck ever undertaken by a federal government. Now, what we’ve done is we’ve get on – on with the job and we’re playing the hand of cards we were dealt with by Labor and we are building it – got on with the job. We are building it for $30m less than under Labor and six to eight years’ less time. | What a train wreck it was. Tens of billions of dollars wasted by the Labor party, leaving us with the biggest corporate train wreck ever undertaken by a federal government. Now, what we’ve done is we’ve get on – on with the job and we’re playing the hand of cards we were dealt with by Labor and we are building it – got on with the job. We are building it for $30m less than under Labor and six to eight years’ less time. |
| Updated | Updated |
| at 4.17am BST | at 4.17am BST |
| 4.00am BST | 4.00am BST |
| 04:00 | 04:00 |
| I’ve headed into the chamber for question time. | I’ve headed into the chamber for question time. |
| Get those QT bingo cards ready! | Get those QT bingo cards ready! |
| Updated | Updated |
| at 4.00am BST | at 4.00am BST |
| 3.44am BST | 3.44am BST |
| 03:44 | 03:44 |
| Back to estimates for a moment and George Brandis is back and defending Julie Bishop’s event attendance. | Back to estimates for a moment and George Brandis is back and defending Julie Bishop’s event attendance. |
| As part of that, he has had a lot of trouble pronouncing “Thor” and jokes about how his pronunciation of names has got him in trouble lately. He’s referring to when he had trouble saying Richard Di Natale’s name, which was corrected after Brandis was referred to as Senator Brand-arse by the Greens in the Senate. | As part of that, he has had a lot of trouble pronouncing “Thor” and jokes about how his pronunciation of names has got him in trouble lately. He’s referring to when he had trouble saying Richard Di Natale’s name, which was corrected after Brandis was referred to as Senator Brand-arse by the Greens in the Senate. |
| Updated | Updated |
| at 3.58am BST | at 3.58am BST |
| 3.33am BST | 3.33am BST |
| 03:33 | 03:33 |
| And just a few minutes after Michelle Rowland finishes speaking, communications minister Mitch Fifield announces how he will be holding a press conference in the next 10 minutes. | And just a few minutes after Michelle Rowland finishes speaking, communications minister Mitch Fifield announces how he will be holding a press conference in the next 10 minutes. |
| 3.23am BST | 3.23am BST |
| 03:23 | 03:23 |
| Would Labor’s NBN have cost $30bn more? | Would Labor’s NBN have cost $30bn more? |
| Michelle Rowland: | Michelle Rowland: |
| This is absolute rubbish coming from a government that said they would deliver the NBN by 2016 $42.95bn. It’s now blown out to $50bn, and 2016 came and went. We know that this government has failed to deliver on every single measure, whether it be increased speed, rolling it out faster and greater reliability – all those factors have failed. So we don’t accept for one minute that this government’s botched copper – based NBN is actually going to deliver dividends for the economy, and is actually what we need in the 21st-century. | This is absolute rubbish coming from a government that said they would deliver the NBN by 2016 $42.95bn. It’s now blown out to $50bn, and 2016 came and went. We know that this government has failed to deliver on every single measure, whether it be increased speed, rolling it out faster and greater reliability – all those factors have failed. So we don’t accept for one minute that this government’s botched copper – based NBN is actually going to deliver dividends for the economy, and is actually what we need in the 21st-century. |
| Updated | Updated |
| at 3.43am BST | at 3.43am BST |