Broadband in rural and regional Australia has always been a concern, particularly for business owners, but the Telecommunications Reform Package introduced to Parliament last week seeks to change that.
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The legislation includes a guarantee for all premises to access broadband services, something which Yass business owner Caleb Bright believes is integral to success.
“I would say we do struggle with broadband connections [in Yass],” Mr Bright said.
“We just don’t have the options that you would get in a major city, for businesses.
"Everything is somehow connected to the internet now, so whether it’s speed or whether it’s dropping out, an unreliable connection is just as bad as a slow connection, and rurally we seem to get both.”
Recently, the National Broadband Network (nbn) announced that it will deliver better value broadband to more than 240,000 homes across Australia, and increasing average peak downloads by up to 50 pe rcent.
This means that “the majority of consumers and businesses on the service are expected to receive larger peak and off-peak plans from their retailer at a similar cost to what they are paying today”, according to a media statement released by the nbn.
However, Mr Bright believes that while this is a good first step, there is a way yet to go before all Australians can expect truly equal coverage.
“That’ll give people more downloads for the money they’re spending, but it won’t necessarily increase their experience when downloading or using that data.
“It certainly won’t fix speed and those sort of issues … it’s going to rely on the carrier passing that on to the user.”
Though the business owners can continue the call for better broadband, at the end of the day it is in the hands of the government.
Chief executive Bill Morrow says that nbn is “committed to helping to bridge the digital divide by delivering a world-class broadband service to regional and rural Australians.”
- For more information, please go to nbnco.com.au