AU govt boosts rural telecomms services: Alston - News - Communications

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This story was printed from ZDNet Australia.
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AU govt boosts rural telecomms services: Alston

By James Pearce, ZDNet Australia
June 23, 2003
URL: http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/communications/soa/AU-govt-boosts-rural-telecomms-services-Alston/0,130061791,120275644,00.htm

The federal government has indicated a willingness to adopt all the recommendations of an inquiry into telecommunications services in rural and regional Australia, paving the way for the likely sale of the remainder of Telstra.

The Minister for Communications, Information Techology and the Arts, Senator Richard Alston, told Network Ten's Meet the Press on Sunday that did not see "any problem" in any of the recommendations of the inquiry, conducted by Moree cotton farmer, Dick Estens.

"There are some 39 recommendations. I don't see any problem in adopting each and every one of those," said the Minister.

However, Senator Alston cautioned that the government -- which is tipped to release its response to the report this week -- was still to publicly announce its position. He said "we're not far away and I very much hope it will be in the not too distant future".

The government has previously come under fire from various industry participants for holding inquiries and then apparently ignoring the results.

"There's further detail involved in terms of what's called 'future proofing', so that people have confidence in the future, that they won't be left behind," said Senator Alston. "The fact is we have spent over a billion dollars in the last five years on improving regional and rural infrastructure and I think the reports you get back from the field are that it's made a huge difference."

The Federal Opposition has claimed a further AU$2 billion is needed to remove pair gain systems from phone lines to allow DSL broadband to be used, a figure which Telstra disputes.

There is much speculation over when the coalition will attempt to sell off the remaining 50.1 percent government-owned stake in Telstra. In response, the Minister said the government will "stick to what we said prior to the last election, that once we are satisfied services are up to scratch then we will be a position to go further on the legislation [to sell the stake]". The government has also iterated it will not consider selling its stake in the telecommunications company while its share price remains low.