Only an issue if we’re silly enough to privatise.
What would be the value of the NBN, done as well as possible, to the nation? What would be the value to society?
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I almost fell off my chair laughing with that intro. If? It has long been our governmental gospel to do so, has it not, both coalition and ALP (starting with Hawke-Keating ‘reform’)?
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Indeed it has. We have not yet committed the final betrayal. There’s hope yet.
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Shh, government might be reading. What is left? Outsourcing parliament to the highest bidder? Oh wait, no change if they did.
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Facts or confusion?
With many claiming the NBN is on track to be complete today what else is there to consider?
Apparently despite claims the NBN is on target and budget ($29.5B government equity plus $19.5B govt loan), why would the NBN need a further $6.1B in debt?
Firstly, it’s not making a profit. It lost $2.5B (cash plus tax losses) in the 6 months to Dec 2019.
Further without the loans it has no reserves for working capital, system upgrades, to connect remaining customers and premises, or to pay back debt.
All of this suggests customers of the NBN, more accurately our RSPs will be asked to pay more for broadband in the future.
Um?
As previously posted In this topic the NBN had a fair market valuation of just $8.7b at the end of a June 2019. The PBO (Parliamentary Budget Office) will provide “in the fullness of time” a revision based on June 2020, and to be released by the Minister for Communications. The crystal ball suggests it will be late on a Friday preceding the holidays or footy grand final weekend.
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The crystal ball is not required as history of these types of statements is enough to give legitimacy to your suggestions…ie no gazing needed navel, ball or any other way… 
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An article regarding the possible future ownership of the NBN.
Telstra and the NBN. What could possibly go wrong?
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The way many have previously called the outcome was that Telstra had won the preselection but the public had not been informed. This article just echoes that belief that is held by some.
Will it be a good outcome if ends up in Telstra’s hands? My personal belief/opinion is I don’t think so and it looks like you have the same feeling.
Public ownership not Corporate of the fibre backbone should be the best outcome. I think the LNP Fed Govt feel the complete opposite of this. If it ends up in Telstra then when the outcry becomes too loud it is an easy deflection to blame them rather than the flawed Govt plan that actually created the problem…MTM NBN. As I like to call it Malcolm Turnbull’s Mess of the NBN
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Our government, and often our society, follows the US model for better or worse, especially ‘policy and practice’ during coalition years. The US has long relied on privately held telecom and it has worked about as well as anything we ‘enjoy’ +/- a bit.
While it is reasonable to want a public service solution the politics of taxation have become increasingly partisan, including a probable reaction of those with FTTP versus Skymuster paying the same internet tax for the disparate services and experience, or just differing needs and wants.
I would prefer government own and operate our telecom infrastructure, but I am not so fearful if it is privatised - at least if the ‘contract’ is better done than virtually every other ‘contract’ I have witnessed Canberra sign…
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That likelihood as you alluded to by your reference to “virtually” is about none and Buckley’s. When short term gain is sniffed by any Govt we have had since about the 70’s, perhaps even further back, the good governance we should expect is replaced by rapaciousness. Not only is the greed apparent but the desire to shift any future failures and their stink away from those we have elected to stop these odious outcomes is I feel uppermost in their minds.
We got rid of a nation owned Bank, now there are calls to reintroduce another, failure to control the private sector to hold them to at least a semblance of honour and honesty is largely the reason behind that. It would be a much more difficult task to reverse that with the NBN if it was privatised.
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Your eloquence wins the day! 
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The author has some pre-conceptions that do not sit very well with me. The following part in particular (emphasis added):
The NBN is close to completion and that means the Government will need to offload it, but there is no way any rational purchaser would fork out the kind of money the thing cost to build, particularly given it will need to be upgraded to a full fibre network if it is to compete viably against new technologies like 5G.
So why does the government ‘need’ to sell the NBN? There are plenty of government business enterprises that operate in realms that are just not ever going to be attractive to competition (postal services, electricity infrastructure (oops), airports (oops) etc.). A national, properly maintained broadband network is a natural monopoly and as such does not fit a private sector ‘competitive’ market.
As for competing with 5G, there is no miraculous new over-the-air technology. Anyone who knows basic physics will tell you that it doesn’t matter what ‘G’ we have it will not compete with a fixed line. There is only so much bandwidth that you can put over the air, and at some point (the tower) you need to shove it into wires. It will not be economical to put a 5G tower at every street corner, and so the ‘competitive’ part of the telco industry is promising the world while delivering very little.
We have seen over the last few decades that the promises of private enterprise doing everything ‘better, cheaper and more efficiently’ were lies. Our assets have been sold off in a highly politicised manner, resulting in private ownership of previously public assets at ‘mate’s rates’ and private profits on those assets going through the roof.
The backlash against this sell-off of public assets has grown, and I am not sure the Australian public is prepared to see the NBN written down and then sold off with no actual benefit (and enormous current and future costs) to the average person.
Why would Telstra buy the NBN and then roll out fibre? There is no incentive for this, and I doubt anything would be specified in the sale as the government would seek a headline-grabbing ‘sale price’ rather than consumer protections. Australian governments need to face reality and admit that private ownership does not deliver a public good. Some things belong in public hands.
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They do not need to face anything until the ballot boxes force them to. Those responsible for selling off public assets are not unique to any party except in numbers, zeal and whether sale prices are fire sale or better.
Long term we are known as a conservative country with our major parties being centre-right and right, aka Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum, so similar when in government, and so similar when in opposition.
Although one choice has a better record in nation building and actual policies, that has not consistently been rewarding for them at elections.
Therein lies a problem, ‘us’.
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The author also proposed a future Telstra split.
Should it win back control of the national network, Telstra would be forced to float off InfraCo as a separate entity, possibly to existing Telstra shareholders, or by calling in super funds as major investors.
Hence ‘two dogs’! One owner of national communications infrastructure, the other a retailer provider of mobile, phone and internet services. There are several ways this might be achieved. It’s rare such breakups that follow a major acquisition deliver two first class greyhounds, sorry, ‘investments’. Not unusually one will have all the candy, the other all the debt.
The ABC is also selling the value of the project short (oops debt funding). In addition to the $51B book value the NBN Co is busy spending up to an additional $6B against a separately funded line of credit obtained recently from the market. Given that prior the PBO had fair value for the NBN at $8.7B, is it fast approaching a give away price of a few billions?
The NBN Co comes with up to $25.5B of debt at commercial interest rates. These are many times greater than the cost of current government borrowings. It’s a question and opportunity not fully addressed by the ABC.
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I suspect that the ABC is trying very hard not to appear biased, and in doing so is trying to ignore the mess behind the mess behind the mess.
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An article regarding Telstra morphing into 3 separate businesses.
Watch this space.
It could be a long wait. Best put the kettle on? 
Telstra did say,
Mr Penn said the planned restructuring could potentially set up InfraCo to bid for a privatised NBN Co, but that wouldn’t happen for years.
He said there were lots of hurdles to jump first, including the need for NBN Co to start generating positive cash flow.
“I don’t think the NBN will be privatised for years,” he said.
“Positive cashflow” - it could be a very long wait.
In the interim if borrowings by the NBN Co continue to increase the Aust Govt might need to pay someone to take it off the books. It’s not quite there yet.
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Isn’t that clause associated with most everything NBN, excepting bonuses to executives?
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If I recall it was the issue of Telstra remaining a monolithic monopoly owner of infrastructure that refused to allow other retailers access to its wires on fair conditions, and Telstra’s refusal to spend billions of dollars upgrading said infrastructure unless the tax-payer paid for it that lead to the NBN in the first place.
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Did Mr Teller have anything to add? No? I suspected as much.
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