The below interview was for an article I co-authored with iTnews’ Brett Winterford.

The interview was conducted with Professor Reginald Coutts, one of the six panel members for the National Broadband Network.

You can read the full story here: Minchin rebuked by Expert Panel ‘whistleblowers’

Apologies for any grammatical mistakes in advance.

Ben: Has there been a cost benefit analysis on the NBN?

The government made an announcement on April 7th.

In terms of the broad directions of the FTTP, the core back bone, broadband, wireless, and satellite backhaul et cetera,it is all consistent with what we recommended.

In terms of the broad capital costs the number forty-three billion dollars is the original costings that were certainly around in the industry for FTTN, which is fibre just going to a node in the street and not all the way to the home.

The numbers that were really being talked about, total cover costs, were about fifteen billion dollars, of which the Government obviously was talking about 4.7.

If you look at a number of quite comprehensive reports that have been done in the UK, the BSG reports, that are all in the public domain…(they suggest that) FTTN, all the way to the home, you sort of multiply on the amount of capital, it varies on many factors, anywhere between 3 and 5.

What contributes to about 80 percent of that capital cost is what we call civil engineering works.

For example if you decide, as they did in Tasmania, to use overhead (power lines) rather than bury, that makes a significant impact on that capital cost.

If you’ve got access to ducts of not only Telstra, but other utilities, that can make a significant difference.

Ben: To put your quote of Telstra having to be a part of the solution, what do you say to that?

For the proposed NBN, in my view, Telstra has to be part of the solution, not the solution.

I chose those words carefully because Telstra having not only significant infrastructure right around Australia in terms of the copper plants, the ducts et cetera, but also because it actually does have fibre connecting all the exchanges right around the country, but also because it’s such a significant market participant, so it has to be part of the solution.

That can range from them being an investor in the NBN….potentially leasing some of its infrastructure… a whole number of options.

You can’t do something like this (NBN) and pretend Telstra don’t exist.

Ben: Did the Rudd government dream up a figure of fourty-three billion dollars?

I’d dispute that.

My response is that there is a broad basis for the number.

That goes back to….the various economic modelling that has been done in the public domain, but also a number of key consultants around the world including Ovum…who’ve done various examples of both capital and operational costs of NBN vs. FTTH.

Ben: Was there further analysis after your report?

I’m not aware of what further analysis they did subsequent to our work since the 21st of January…and I know they did further analysis.

Certainly the government has been doing a lot of work.

Ben: You guys didn’t come up with the figure?

No.

This is was what annoyed me particularly in Minchin’s statement…that the panel were not asked to evaluate the governments proposal…we’d been disbanded, we’d done out job.

I’m saying that figure is consistent with the sort of number that I’m…aware of coming out of  a whole number of studies.

He’s (Nick Minchin) being the minister for opposition…I mean I guess he’s doing his job, if that’s the job specification.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd today announced 16 million dollars worth of investment for Gipps TAFE in Victoria as part of the Governments 1 billion dollar TAFE modernisation. The investment is said to help fund linesman training for the National Broadband Network (NBN).

In the Prime Ministers new hip way of announcing things, today through micro-blogging service Twitter, the Prime Minister announced funding for NBN linesman training.

Julia & I just announced $16m investment for Gipps TAFE @ Chadstone. Part of nearly $1b TAFE modernisation investment across the country.

Gipps TAFE helps train linesman to help roll out the national broadband network which will take 25,000 jobs for 7 years. Massive!