Gillard to reveal NBN plan "summary"

The Federal Government has announced it will release a summary of the NBN Co business plan before seeking a final Senate vote on the Telstra split bill.

Read a 36-page NBN business plan summary document here.

The breakthrough was achieved by key independent Senator Nick Xenophon in eleventh hour negotiations with Prime Minister Julia Gillard today.

"We will shortly be releasing a document that summarises the NBN Co business case," Gillard said.

"We're determined it is possible to release carefully selected material that answers some of the [independents and crossbenchers'] key questions and allow them to explain their decision [on the Telstra split bill] to their constituents.

"We've been very careful. The material being released will not cause market uncertainty."

Gillard said the document confirmed the NBN was being built on a financially-viable basis. It would include details of the products NBN Co would offer and on what timelines; however, it did not contain details such as "places retail providers will be able to plug into the NBN" - the points of interconnect, which were under ACCC consideration.

The document would be provided to Senators Xenophon and Fielding first before it was made public.

Senator Steve Fielding had reportedly welcomed the release of the plan, according to reports on ABC News 24, although it was unclear whether or not he would support the passage of the Telstra split bill.

Fielding and Xenophon's votes were crucial for the Telstra split legislation to pass.

Xenophon said that he would characterise the release of the document as a "compromise", not a "backdown" by Labor.

He said he was "grateful" for Gillard's intervention on the NBN business plan.

"I don't think we would have got to this stage if not for her intervention," he said.

He refused to criticise the Communications Minister over his stance not to release the NBN business plan until next month.

It also appeared Xenophon had won a concession on Productivity Commission involvement in the NBN project, stating the Commission would "be there to give continual input" to the Government over the eight years of the network's construction.