nairbe,the labor run governments allowed workers to install foil over electrical wires.
Abbott did not send them to their deaths, and fires in roofs were a delberate act of the Rudd/Gillard governments rejection of the NZ experience of installing bats in NZ roofs.
The NBN with headquaters in the busy melbourne Docklands estate proves that they do not care about the regions.
If they were fair dinkum,the NBN HQ would be built in Mount Gambier or Portland with a 15 minute ride from airport to city centre.
Docklands takes one hour to get from airport to NBN HQ.

What does the HQ of broadband got to do with it.
Portland, Fairy Dell, i am sure they are great places but we are talking about a national scheme.
Expand your vision a little, and you may see something.

The point of this thread is that for all Labor sponsored projects, there have been several factors in common:

1 - The costs have always overshot the original estimates by a long way,
2 - There has been a need to stamp out competition to make it viable. (for toll tunnels alternate routes were closed)
3 - The revenue and benefits, where presented, have fallen far short of estimates, leaving either the tax payer to foot the bill or the private partner to go bankrupt.

The reason that the NBN company has to be entirely funded by the government (read taxpayer) is that no sane business or bank would touch it with a barge pole. And Julia's refusal to allow the productivity commission to review it shows that Labor knows this and are desperately trying to hide it from the Australian people.

The first signs of this come from the trial roll out in Tasmania, where having run fibre either to or close to 500 homes of which about 250 have allowed connection to the homes, and of whom only 30 have signed up to NBN broad band, mostly at the cheaper low speed packages.

Knowing that just about every Labor policy has turned to dung, Julia (Imelda Marcos) Gillard is desperate to maintain the lustre of the last policy that the voters like, and has fought against the release of every piece of information.

So for the expenditure so far of $37 000 000 we have 30 users paying an average of about $60 per month. This does not even cover the administration cost of invoicing let alone help pay off the capital.

I'm just scared that the NBN will be as deadly as the other Labour 'projects'.

I don't want to surf the internet at the risk of electrocution then be charged (no double meaning intended) excessively for the priviledge.

It's simply not feasible to perform a standard Cost Benefit Analysis on a public infrastructure project with an anticipated 50 year window.
It's not a Shopping Centre or a block of flats where shareholders need to get all costs plus profit back as quickly as possible.

How would you do one on a Public Hospital?
If it costs $1Billion to build one today, what's the total cost to the community over 50 years of NOT building it?

Using the same sentiment, it's a wonder that we have any Hospitals at all, let alone roads, schools or railways.
How could you justify any of them in the current political situation?

The Telstra Copper Network was built over decades at a cumulative cost of $10 Billion, plus all the associated switching and
transmission equipment, and is reaching the end of its serviceable life, let alone any technological restraints.

If it's due for replacement anyway, why replace copper with more copper?

"It would seem that now the public mood has been made clear that the NBN is wanted..."

As evidenced by what? A willingless to pay for it voluntarily? Or a belief in getting something for nothing by taking it from someone else?

The directors of a private corporation would be in jail for doing what the Labor ministry is doing with NBN, not to mention the carbon tax.