IPA Report Calls Out Liberal Broadband Plan
IPA Report Calls Out Liberal Broadband Plan
October 31, 2007: The Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) has released a report which shows the Liberal Government’s regional broadband plan can only cover half the area it claims too.
Shadow Communications Minister, Senator Stephen Conroy has been calling the Liberal party’s wireless broadband plan for regional Australia a sham for weeks, only now there are independent research findings backing up the claim.
The ongoing tussle over the wireless network stems from the transmission distance offered by the WiMax technology. Liberal’s original claim was that there towers can transmit up to a distance of 50km, this was then amended to 20km when the company who would actually be providing the technology, Opel only backed up a 20km distance.
Senator Conroy has constantly attacked this figure as well, claiming it doesn’t allow for line of sight problems that the WiMax technology would have getting through the rugged terrain in the bush, this attack has been backed up by the IPA.
“A more likely range for the WiMAX deployments would be in the region of five to ten kilometres. To be uncharitable, when considering environmental and topographical factors, a maximum range of as little as one or two kilometres is entirely possible.” Said Chris Berg, Research Fellow at the IPA in the report.
Senator Conroy has likened the Liberal’s broadband coverage to a block of Swiss cheese and has pointed to the IPA reports claim that “what appeared to be blanket coverage is revealed to be relatively Spartan”.
The report refers to the Communications Minister, Senator Helen Coonan who released Opel maps of the network coverage where “the Government has assumed a range of 20 kilometres, with a ‘possible’ further 5 kilometres, a much further distance than the broadband is likely to be available” said Berg.
Berg has produced a set of estimated realistic maps which show a greatly reduced coverage area then those supplied by the Communications Minister.
Senator Conroy has previously pointed to another problem with the WiMax technology in that it’s a shared connection, meaning users who connect to the transmission towers will be sharing the broadband speed with other users and not be receiving the “up to 12mb/second” the Government is claiming. The more people who connect to the transmission tower, the lower the speed everyone will get Conroy explained.