Saturday, January 22, 2011

Andrew Robb: Maestro of Bullshit


There’s no sign of the Coalition’s NBN smear campaign slowing down, with their latest effort being a disgusting attempt to use the Queensland floods as a tool to stop the network that cost them the last election, and could well cost them the next one.

My guess is that Abbott and the Parties of No are beginning to realise that by the 2013 federal election, the NBN will be well underway and employing tens-of-thousands of Australians. Should they go to an election with a policy that will result in the dismissal of 20-30,000 people, it could cause some problems! So better to nip it in the bud before it’s too late!

In response to Finance Minister Penny Wong’s explanation as to why NBN funding couldn’t simply be diverted to flood relief, shadow Minister Andrew Robb issued a response which was so full of bullshit that he could sell it as fertiliser:

Penny Wong’s absurd denials that the billions to be borrowed for the NBN will not affect the budget bottom line and could not be redirected to flood recovery efforts demonstrate that she is disingenuous, out of her depth or both.

For the benefit of the new Finance Minister here are the facts about the NBN.


If the following ‘answers’ are Robb’s idea of facts, then Australian politics is a scarier place than I ever imagined. He’s either totally incompetent or the most accomplished bullshit artist in Australian history. And that’s a big statement!
Question: Where will Penny Wong get the at least $27.5 billion that the NBN Co requires in government equity?

Answer: She will have to borrow it.

Question: Is the money interest free?

Answer: Of course it’s not. Treasury conservatively assumed an interest rate of 4.9 per cent.
Note the weasel words in there. “Treasury conservatively assumed”. Let me translate to what he wants the reader to see: “Those moronic stooges at Treasury took a rough guess and think it will be at least 4.9%”.

Bullshit. Treasury are well aware of the Australian Long Term Bond rates, which is how the NBN will be funded. If Robb isn’t, then maybe he can speak to his broker.
Question: Do the interest repayments hit the Budget bottom line?

Answer: They certainly do and could amount up to $2.4 billion alone by 2013-14.
Now that one redefines bullshit!

$2.4bn by 2013/14???? I don’t know what planet Andrew Robb is on, but it’s not Earth. Even if every cent of the Government’s $27bn is invested in NBN Co by 2013/14 (which it won’t be), the Government Bond Rate would have to increase by 100% in two years for Robb’s figures to be accurate. It’s like saying NASA could achieve faster-than-light travel by 2013!

Robb also conveniently leaves out the fact that NBN will have a higher return than the bond rate. In other words, it will earn more than the interest charges.

Question: Could the money she will borrow for the NBN be redirected to assist the flood reconstruction effort?


Answer: Of course it could. And if it was via public/private partnerships it would remain off budget.

More bullshit. You can’t redirect the NBN debt to flood relief. Or more accurately, there’s no point doing so. The NBN will earn a positive return. That is, the income from it will be more than the interest charges on the debt that’s funding it.

As for the next paragraph…What is this moron thinking? “Keep it off-budget via public-private partnerships”? The NBN is off-budget because it makes a positive return. If Robb can explain how the rebuilding of publicly-owned infrastructure by private industry can make a positive return to Government (without imposing a toll), then I’ll eat my Akubra.

Is Robb just lying, or does he seriously not have any comprehension of finance? Either way it’s a worry that this guy could one day be a Government minister.

Question: Could the government reschedule the NBN construction timetable?


Answer: Yes. In the same way it has brought forward plans to build NBN satellites by five years in response to political pressure.

Yes, the NBN could be delayed. It just wouldn’t make any difference to the flood rebuild.

While the timetable for satellite construction is totally irrelevant to the floods, it’s worth noting that Robb is inaccurate in his claim that the satellite build was brought forward by 5 years, further demonstrating his dishonesty and incompetence on the NBN topic. The satellites are scheduled for launch in 2015, which is about 2 years earlier than first planned. What has been advanced by 5 years is that NBN Co will begin offering a temporary satellite service using existing satellites until their own can be launched. So  Robb is either incompetent, in that he apparently didn’t know the difference between building and operating satellites. Or he’s just being dishonest in simply making incorrect claims.
Question: Will the NBN generate income over time to taxpayers?


Answer: Nobody knows, because the government refuses to subject it to a cost-benefit analysis.

Bullshit meter off the scale. As a finance spokesman, Robb is aware that a CBA is most certainly not required to predict a return or not. Such a claim is beyond absurd. When international accounting firm KPMG studied the NBN, they found that not only would it generate a return, but that the fibre component could be increased beyond the proposed 90% coverage to 93%, and it would still earn a return of 7%pa.

Robb is just using this question to continue the party line that a CBA can predict as-yet unknown benefits. Thank God Robb wasn’t running the show when the telephone was proposed, or we’d still be using smoke signals!


After reading the above collection of absolute bullshit, I truly doubt that Andrew Robb can lie straight in bed. Considering the plethora of embarrassing gaffs he made during a pre-election press conference, I wonder how long the party will keep this moron on the front bench.

No comments:

Post a Comment