Doomed broadband tender to be examined by the Audit Office

Following the recent and highly controversial tender process for the National Broadband Network (NBN), the Federal opposition has said that the Audit Office will be investigating the bid rejections by the Government, including the ejection of Australia’s largest telco, Telstra.

The national broadband network tender that was eventually cancelled by the Government in favour of its own network plans will be investigated by the National Audit Office (ANAO) according to the latest reports from the Federal Opposition.

With the tender bid entered by Telstra being deemed an invalid entry and the panel of experts that had been brought in by the Government deeming the bids invalid the whole tender process was highly controversial.

The development of a $43 billion network that will run fibre-to-the-home will run in partnership with the private sector after the original process was scrapped by the Government.

The whole process will need to be examined as it was flawed at a fundamental level according to Nick Minchin, the Opposition Communications spokesman.

He said “We do believe the tender process the Government just conducted for its national broadband network was a complete waste of taxpayer’s money and a waste of time. The Government spent $20 million of taxpayer’s money, it took 18 months and it’s come up with nothing. We believe this whole process was doomed from the outset.”

The initial process for tendering was clearly never going to work right from the beginning said Senator Minchin.

He said “The Government set about this tender without clarifying in any way the regulatory environment that would apply.

One of the expert panel who sat in this is just recently described the whole process as, quote, ‘rather weird.’ So, I think this has been a monumental waste of taxpayer’s money and I’m glad the Auditor-General is going to have a look at it.”