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Telstra Tackles Canberra In Court |
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Written by Adam Gosling
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Friday, 03 August 2007 |
In a bold and defiant move, Telstra has commenced court proceedings today against the Minister for Communications alleging it was unfairly treated in the recent Broadband Connect funding decision which saw A$1 billion promised to its competitor for regional broadband.
In a Media Release distributed this afternoon, Telstra announced it has today commenced proceedings in the Federal Court against the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, Helen Coonan, in relation to the Broadband Connect Program.
"The Broadband Connect Program Guidelines offered "up to $600 million" of taxpayers' money to provide broadband to "underserved"rural and regional areas. Telstra submitted its proposal on that basis. Instead, almost $1 billion was ultimately awarded to the SingTel Optus and Elders consortium (OPEL) to largely duplicate existing services with little net benefit to rural Australians," says the press statement.
Geoff Booth, Telstra Country Wide Group Managing Director, is quoted in the release saying the company "could not stand by and quietly watch $1 billion of taxpayers' money being wasted under a process that has lacked transparency and fell short of its stated purpose".
"Let's shed some light on this behind-closed-doors process and see how the Minister arrived at this decision." Mr Booth said.
"Somewhere along the line the term 'under served' seems to have been
redefined so that the program was no longer about providing a service
to people who don't have one to giving people in some areas access to a
second or even a third network."
Telstra has asked the Minister to explain why it was not given an
opportunity to submit a revised proposal for almost $1 billion, and has
asked the Minister to provide it with the documents underlying her
decision. The Minister has refused to provide those documents.
Telstra has been left with no alternative but to seek orders from
the Federal Court compelling the Communications Minister Helen Coonan,
to provide documents relating to how the decision was made.
Telstra has serious concerns that it was not treated in a 'fair and
equitable' manner as required by the Program Guidelines that were
issued.
Telstra's proposal was aimed at serving 1,572 smaller communities
where there are currently no fixed broadband services and making other
network upgrades that would have given broadband access to
approximately 250,000 customer lines, the press release explains.
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