NBN debate looks more like Opel discussion

The Government is losing focus on the NBN to the point where debate is starting to follow the same lines as the previous Government’s canned Opel project, according to the Australian Computer Society.

Presenting last to a noticeably thinned-out audience at the ATUG conference, ACS national chairman Kumar Parakala criticised the Government on its lack of focus on the digital economy.

"The focus on putting a pipe in the ground is the wrong focus," Parakala said.

"Yes, you need to make sure the right organisations do the work but you also very quickly need to move on from this discussion.

"ACS has been extremely pleased with the Government putting an NBN on the agenda, and funding the investment in national broadband infrastructure, but since then something seems to have stopped.

"We seem to be getting into same kind of discussion and debate as when the previous government was in place."

Parakala said that the ACS community was concerned with "when improved broadband infrastructure services will be available."

He urged the Government to execute on its Digital Economy Future Direction consultation late last year, for which the ACS contributed a paper [PDF].

"We are waiting for the Government to act," Parakala said.

"We're happy to support the Government when they do excellent things but this is an area that's been on the horizon for a long time.

"The Government has been talking about it, talking about it, talking about it but we still don't see anything. It's very important that there needs to be a blueprint [created]".