Interview with David Iliffe, ABC Southern Queensland

DAVID ILIFFE, HOST: For a long time, it’s been pretty well accepted that the further west you go in Queensland, the slower your internet speeds are going to be and the more dropouts you’ll have to contend with. And this has just been accepted as a matter of course. This is just the way things go - the lot of people who live in some of the State’s more remote corners. There are exceptions, of course, but as a rule, that’s the way it is. But from today, thousands of Australians living in those parts of the country can order unmetered satellite broadband services. This is after a successful trial of NBN Co’s new Sky Muster Plus product. Michelle Rowland is the Federal Communications Minister. She joins me now.

 

Minister Michelle Rowland, good morning.

 

MICHELLE ROWLAND, MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS: And you.

 

ILIFFE: How many people listening to us right now from Murgon in the north to the New South Wales border in the south, to Charleville in the west and Laidley in the east, approximately how many people in that area would have access to this vastly improved internet service?

 

ROWLAND: We’ve got about 20,000 satellite customers across the area who will be able to upgrade to a new product that we’re launching called Sky Muster Plus Premium. And that will provide those customers with unmetered data, 24 hours a day and faster speeds of up to 100 megabits per second. The entire satellite footprint for the NBN is around 400,000 premises across Australia, and all customers will be able to access this new unmetered satellite product.

 

ILIFFE: And tell me how it’s actually come about? I mean, was this a case of NBN Co just putting bigger and better satellites into orbit achieve this? Or has it been more a matter of tweaking the current gear to get a better result?

 

ROWLAND: This is by design, and it’s better utilising the beams to some extent that are on the satellite service. Ultimately, this is about moving customers from the satellite service where available on to the NBN fixed wireless service. That has been made possible by some half a billion dollar investment in improving the fixed wireless service that’s freed up congestion on the satellite. It is also part of our goal to get more customers available for full fibre access. We’ve had a large investment in that as well, to move some 660,000 customers off copper to fibre.

 

This is about utilising better technologies. The ultimate outcome here is making sure that irrespective of where you live, including in rural and regional Australia, whatever access technology you’ve got for the NBN, you’ve got the same great service. It’s having this uncapped, whereas previously some of your listeners would have utilised the Sky Muster service and it would have been capped at particular peak hours or in evenings, and it would have speeds that are unreliable. This is now uncapped 24/7, and the speeds available will be up to 100 megabits per second, and that is a really game changer for these satellite customers.

 

ILIFFE: It really changes what they can do in terms of, you know, being able to, you know, communications which are crucial for school of the air and properties that are educating their kids sort of via long distance, I guess, even in their leisure time, watching movies and that sort of thing. We’re really talking the difference between being able to do that effectively and not do it at all, aren’t we?

 

ROWLAND: Absolutely. Because we conducted this trial from March to May for some 10,000 customers, it just proved that they were data hungry, that they wanted to utilise their internet services better. We rely on telehealth so much more, particularly since the pandemic, we’ve had a lot of people undertaking that very conscious change to move to regional Australia. They legitimately expect that they will have a comparable broadband service, irrespective of where they live. We know that business is conducted so much differently now. We’ve got small businesses and micro businesses in regional Australia that need the best access to e-commerce for themselves and their customers. The way that we study has changed. The way we even interact with government has changed. And that expectation needs to be met, and we are very confident that by providing this choice for those customers, this Sky Muster Plus Premium, there’ll be a demonstrable difference and improvement in the way that their broadband can be accessed.

 

ILIFFE: I would imagine to a lot of people listening when they heard this, or perhaps they’re hearing for the first time as we’re talking now, but either way, their reaction might be a mix of jubilance peppered with a healthy dose of scepticism in terms of, “Yeah, but how much am I going to be paying for it?” Can they expect to pay more potentially for this service, or will that depend on who their provider is?

 

ROWLAND: It does depend to some extent on the provider. But what we’ve got for a wholesale service here for a monthly wholesale price is $65. That’s for a 100 per cent unmetered high-speed plan, and people will make that choice. I think by providing that choice to customers – and we know that there are other options that a lot of these customers have out there – but the thing about this service is it provides a real safety net. It is one that has been worked on by design and in response to needs. It is certainly one that, when you compare it to the current plans, is not only affordable but also provides a much better quality service. We know that is what customers are looking for.

 

ILIFFE: We keep using the term “unmetered”. Can we just clarify that? Because to some people listening they’d see unmetered as I pay one price and I can get whatever, not just, you know, bandwidth that doesn’t change according to the time of day but as much download and upload as a like. So when you’re talking unlimited, yes, what exactly are we talking about – unmetered, I should say. What are we talking about?

 

ROWLAND: Yeah, that’s right. I think the easiest way to explain that is there were data usage caps which applied at certain times of the day. That was in response to – let’s face it, there was a lot of pent-up demand before this service was launched some time ago. But now people expect that they won’t have these data caps. Data caps by and large don’t apply to a lot of products that are available in metropolitan areas. I’ve been out to some of these regional areas and listened to customers who are on this service. They don’t want to have to conduct their business outside of peak hour times. They want to be able to have it on and know that they can access as much data as they like at any time of the day. That is what this service will provide.

 

ILIFFE: Michelle Rowland, just finally, what’s the next big goal in terms of improving connectivity for all Australians? Because I guess a lot of people would be assuming the NBN rollout is complete. That’s pretty much it, what we’ve got now is what we’ve got. But what is planned for the future in terms of what’s the next big goal?

 

ROWLAND: The next big goal here is to deliver not only on our election commitments – and, you know, I was sworn in a year ago today – our focus has very much been on improving connectivity for regional Australia. So that’s not only in terms of broadband, but it’s also in terms of mobile services and we’ve got a number of open applications at the moment, including for mobile black spots. We had some big-ticket items in the Budget about improving broadcasting services and TV services across regional Australia. I think the big goal is what we’ve had for the last year but pursuing that, David, is to ensure that irrespective of where you live in Australia, we’re very much focused on bridging that digital divide that’s been talked about for so long. But now we have those technologies to make it happen and we’ve got a government with the will to make that happen as well. So there’s a lot more to do, but I think ultimately, this is about delivering every aspect of the Communications portfolio, the telco services, the broadband services and the broadcasting services in rural and regional Australia. We’ll keep working hard every single day to do that.

 

ILIFFE: Alright. Michelle Rowland, I appreciate your time this morning. Thank you.

 

ROWLAND: Absolute pleasure. Thank you.