By CASEY NEILL
Isaacs residents would wait longer and pay more for NBN under a Labor Government, the seat’s Liberal candidate has said.
But ALP incumbent Mark Dreyfus said Garry Spencer “must be kidding, confused or have the shortest memory in Isaacs”.
Mr Spencer said Labor’s policy was to slow down the rollout in the electorate “because they will dig up everyone’s front garden and driveway – despite technologies being available that avoid this”.
He said suburbs including Bangholme, Dandenong, Dandenong South, Keysborough and Noble Park may have to wait until 2022 for National Broadband Network (NBN) connection.
“Under a Coalition Government they will have the NBN over the next two years,” Mr Spencer said.
“Monthly internet bills are also set to rise under Labor because their policy costs $8 billion more than the Coalition’s.”
Mr Dreyfus said it was “laughable” that Mr Spencer would raise the issue “given the Liberals’ utter failure on the NBN in Isaacs”.
“Labor will deliver a world-class network with more fibre. The Liberals will deliver an obsolete copper network. It’s as simple as that,” he said.
Mr Dreyfus said that in 2013, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said that every Australian household would have access to a faster, cheaper NBN.
“It is now 2016 and the Liberals have failed on every single level,” he said.
“The Liberals’ second- rate network has blown out in price and been delayed again and again, and in the small pockets of the country where an NBN has been built, has used old copper technology.
“The Liberals’ NBN policy is broken.”
