Today we have finally seen the plan of the Liberal/National Coalition for Australia’s future when it comes to Internet connectivity. Today we have seen what the Liberal and National Party plan to do in order to take Australia into the Internet future. That is, move back into the past.
The Coalition has announced that Australians will have access to at least wireless with a peak speed of 12mbps. They also propose that the current Hybrid fibre-coaxial (HFC) network will bring 100mbps speeds to the major centres of Australia. They will also spend money to upgrade exchanges to provide more people with access to ADSL 2+ speaks.
Money will be provided in order to build backbones right across Australia and then grants will be provided to commercial companies to implement their network.
The problem I see is that the Coalition’s plan relies on the private sector to roll out the system. Grants might bring better services to communities, but not to those that are not commercially viable.
Photo: jepoirrier
Core infrastructure must not be subject to the concept of commercial viability. We don’t build water grids, electricity grids and roads based on commercial viability. Broadband access is not an optional extra but is core infrastructure for the 21st Century.
I can’t imagine that concept of being on a 56kbps Internet connection. There are people in the bush who are on speeds that are slower than this. The technologies and systems being proposed now, such as the e-Health system, requires high speed broadband with both high download and uploads. HFC is not the solution as while download speeds are high, upload speeds are low.
That is just what is being proposed now. Imagine the possibilities for the future if we can have even faster broadband connectivity. If they get it wrong now, the implications for Australia are massive and will be long term.
Edit:ErinAree asked in a comment what the difference was between the Coalition’s plan and the Government’s plan. Since I felt that this was really important, and since I admit I should have covered it in this post, I have included my answer here as well.
The way I see it, there would be some improvement. Just not enough for the future.
Currently in the major cities you can at least get ADSL 2+ high speed broadband. Some people can get HFC which is faster for downloads, but uploads aren’t as fast. But there are many areas that can’t get either of these. HFC is only in limited areas and some new developments were built using phone technology that doesn’t allow ADSL, let alone ADSL 2+.
That leaves wireless for those people. Wireless is expensive and you have to pay for uploads and downloads, which is unlike dial-up, ADSL and HFC. As a main Internet connection it is really the option of last resort.
The Coalition plan to upgrade exchanges to allow more people to access ADSL 2+. They then propose to provide companies with money to extend wireless services to areas that can’t be serviced by other technologies.
Remote communities will be serviced mainly by satellite by both the Government and the Coalition plan.
The biggest difference is that the Government is proposing fibre to the home. This is high speed (both up and down) and will be provided to 97% of all Australians. The Coalition is proposing to provide at least wireless to 97%. So really, the only people who get ‘proper’ high speed broadband are those in the major cities. Which is much like it is now.