Telstra urges Senate to delay separation

By Ben Grubb on Oct 13, 2009 3:22 PM
Filed under Telco/ISP

Pleads with Senators.

Telstra today appeared before a Senate inquiry to plead with government senators to stop the structural separation of the company by urging for a delay in the debate whilst it finishes "constructive discussions" with the government.

In an opening statement to a senate inquiry into the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer Safeguards) Bill 2009, Telstra reinforced its position on the proposed separation.

"If the government decides to proceed with the Bill, we believe that it is only sensible that the Senate defer debate until after the conclusion of the constructive discussions between Telstra and the government over the NBN and the completion of the government's NBN implementation study," said Telstra group managing director of NBN engagement Geoff Booth.

"We would also urge that significant amendments are made to the Bill," Booth said.

He said Telstra believed the way in which it could reach a mutually acceptable outcome was via commercial negotiations and not via legislation.

"We cannot agree to proposals that fail to give fair value to our shareholders," said Booth.

Optus general manager of interconnect and economics Andrew Sheridan told iTnews that Telstra's arguments were "not really fit for purpose".

"Telstra is back on maneuvers. We're now starting to see them play their old games again," he said. "They've had plenty of time to negotiate with government."

Telstra urges Senate to delay separation

13 comments in this discussion

"After years of- *Poor customer service *Expensive Bullsh*t rates *Bullsh*t 12-24 month contracts *over priced connection fees (WTF for anyway?) and all the other crap we had to put up with! Its ..."

By HesH

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Comments: 13

scan06disk Oct 13, 2009 4:05 PM	Telstra are an unruly bunch of morons ! If the NBN acquires the HFC Cable network, they can deploy their promised 100Mbps speed to more than 50% of the nation in a couple of weeks !!! Telstra have had the opportunity since.........., and haven't done bull about it and now they are crying to keep their backward network ALIVE ????!!!!!! I am really tired at seeing how Telstra are playing games with people's/shareholder's money !
RDEFCON1 Oct 13, 2009 4:42 PM	@scan06disk re: unruly morons. Pot, Kettle, Black.
mick09 Oct 13, 2009 5:01 PM	Nicely put RDEFCON1. scan06disk, with your amazing skills, why don't you show Optus how to achieve this engineering miracle with their HFC network, and make your joint fortunes?
singo79 Oct 13, 2009 5:23 PM	"We cannot agree to proposals that fail to give fair value to our shareholders," said Booth. This has not been proven that they will be disadvantaged by the functional separation. As it has been so clearly pointed out on several other articles, by bloggers mind you, that BT (British Telecom) shareholders actually were better off after separation then they were before hand. There is no reason why that will not be the same case here, apart from Telstra being scared that they will actually have to compete in the Telecommunications market, which includes broadband internet. Currently Telstra sell wholesale internet access to their competitors 30% higher then what they charge their own division Bigpond, and Bigpond are still the dearest ISP in Australia... how does that work? Telstra's competitors have to buy internet access higher then Bigpond can buy it for, yet they are able to charge less for their plans and still make a tidy profit. It just goes to show the type of crowd that you are dealing with at Telstra. Telstra had their chance years ago and now the ball is back in the Government's court. Hurry up already and pass this bill so that we can get the NBN construction underway and let Telstra worry about their commercial position in their own time.
mick09 Oct 13, 2009 7:21 PM	O dear singo79. Telstra is to be excluded from 4G spectrum auctions - fair value? Telstra is to "divest" wholesale services - fair value? Telstra is to "transfer" customer base to NBN - fair value? Telstra is to "transfer" fiber backbone to NBN - fair value? NBN construction depends on passing the anti-Telstra bill - what sort of a hick operation is Quigley's NBN? Are you saying the NBN is conditional on gutting Telstra?
scan06disk Oct 13, 2009 11:56 PM	@mick09(Do u work for Telstra ? Or a Shareholder ?) Well if you look at the HFC cable network, the cable itself is more than capable of achieving 100Mbps, secondly most providers in the US have done so by introducing the DOCSIS 3.0 platform which is basically an upgrade from DOCSIS 2 and provides faster speeds. The only problem would be providing the appropriate hardware as in Modems, as most of the Motorola modems on the market can't support 100Mbps, which is a small issue. My point being with a software upgrade they are more than capable of 100Mbps. If Optus were to do the same, don't you think Telstra will trample them ?, besides Optus have their own reasons and they don't own 50% of the internet monopoly....
mick09 Oct 14, 2009 6:32 AM	Like I said, scan06disk, why don't you perform this miracle with the Optus HFC cable network, and rid the world of both Telstra and NBNCo in one fell swoop? Slay the monster and save $43,000,000,000.00 with one blow.
Richo Oct 14, 2009 8:24 AM	And the ACCC (Anti Consumer Competition Commission) would have us believe that all bad in telecommunications. Samuels is a joke and needs to have his position reviewed ASAP. Last night on the ABC he said he wants Telstra split because it has too much vertical integration power but when asked if the sole owner of the NBN was a monopoly he said that it wasn't and that they would put changes in as they move forward. Hang on, won't the NBN control the whole network and pricing? Optus are a pack of professional whingers. You would think that they are the holy saints and pass on competitive pricing to consumers. Think again they are no better than Telstra and they themselves in Singapore are not that keen on have competition.
scan06disk Oct 14, 2009 9:22 AM	@mick09 Some people just can't talk sense, despite evolution... lol pity Its not a matter of getting rid of Telstra or Optus, whose talking about Optus anyway ?, they don't have a decent infrastructure, many states don't even have Optus cable, Optus themselves lease the Telstra HFC to provide Foxtel services, but who would wanna do that and ask the end user to pay more...? If you slay the monster, you wont save 43bn, you will still have to buy the infrastructure out, but that will be a lot cheaper and less time consuming, than implementing a new infrastructure. I am all for the NBN Co. !
anonymous Oct 14, 2009 9:57 AM	It may be a bit much to expect the Telstra droids to evolve, scan06disk, since the history of all the monopoly dinosaurs shows that they failed to evolve in any meaningful way. And we know what happened to them. More seriously (though it may be a waste of time), we could point out to the above that NBN is a network, not a service provider or content marketer. Telstra is all three, and has consistently attempted to use its incumbency to harm or eliminate competition in providing services to consumers. It's not just the other companies who have been affected by this. The real losers have been 22 million people who have been denied good comms service while being screwed on charges.
Digger11 Oct 14, 2009 12:37 PM	Telstra is just getting some of its own treatment back. A bit like the Year 8 school yard bully who for years and years has terrorised other students - until he picks on the kid with a brother in Year 11 !!! It is amazing what happens when you stand up to a bully - they really don't like it. Like the previous poster said - it is the 22 million Aussies who will benefit from NBN Co. I have never voted Labor in my life - but if they follow through properly with NBN and give us an outcome that will benefit us all, they may nearly get my Vote in the next election.
mick09 Oct 14, 2009 1:54 PM	Well, Digger11, at least you are getting to the nub of the dispute. There was an election two years ago - there will be one next year. Rudd et al promised a $4 billion NBN. It hasn't happened. Now they are playing a blame game to distract from their failure. A $43 billion Rudd Reelection Fund. The question isn't who will benefit from an NBN, but who will pay for the RRF? The answer - all 22 million of us, plus a couple of million more, born while this Monopolistic Monolith is under construction.
HesH Oct 14, 2009 2:03 PM	After years of- Poor customer service Expensive Bullsht rates Bullsht 12-24 month contracts over priced connection fees (WTF for anyway?) and all the other crap we had to put up with! Its nice to see telstra getting screwed over as well. Competition is always good and can only be good for the little guy!