MRCCI would like to thank the early supporters of the Petition for NBN Fibre priority for the Margaret River Region.
Here is a copy of the Petition:
Support the need for a Margaret River rollout of NBN Fibre to the Node before June 2016
To the Honourable President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled:
Support the need for Margaret River to be included in a NBN Co rollout of Fibre to the Node in the current NBN Co construction schedule.
Margaret River is a renowned state, national and international tourism destination and super fast internet is crucial to our social development, digital economy and ongoing global competitiveness.
– Right now, there is no NBN Fibre to the Node rollout scheduled for Margaret River
– Busselton and Dunsborough combined has 14,000 Multi-Technology Mix NBN connections scheduled
– Margaret River and Augusta combined only has 1,200 Fixed Wireless connections scheduled
– Right now, Telstra supplies a 100Mb fibre connection to only one Margaret River suburb
If they chose to, NBN Co and Telstra could provide NBN Fibre to the Node with Telstra’s infrastructure in Margaret River.
Support this petition and help the Margaret River Community demonstrate to NBN Co and Telstra that they need to supply Margaret River with NBN Fibre to the Node before June 2016.
[button url=https://www.change.org/p/support-the-need-for-a-margaret-river-rollout-of-nbn-fibre-to-the-node-before-june-2016 target=blank size=28 color=red icon=pen icon_size=32]Click here to sign the petition[/button]
So you know, petitions to Senate, or anyone, need to be very specific. So in the petition we referred directly to Margaret River, but we mean our entire Shire; Cowaramup, Witchcliffe, Gracetown, Prevelly, Gnarabup, Augusta, Karridale and others. It just all begins with the “Super Town” of Margaret River.
There is no infrastructure more vital to the Australian economy than NBN Fibre to the Premises because the burgeoning digital services industry can provide millions of jobs to Australians.
I’m talking about jobs doing the simplest support tasks of website content and administration; software data entry; design and graphics; e-commerce, app and social media management; online marketing; the list goes on and on.
The entire future of Australia’s Digital Economy has been utterly compromised with NBN Co’s new multi-technology mix and Regional Australia cops the worst of that mix.
Local, state and federal politicians need to pull their fingers out and start typing on a keyboard with them so they can google freelancer.com, odesk.com, elance.com and elto.com. When they do that, they may realise that online freelance marketplace models are the key to the future of millions of jobs.
Regional Australia needs a bare minimum infrastructure of NBN Fibre to the Node. Without it we can forget about putting an end to unemployment by training and upskilling our population in digital services because we won’t have the internet bandwidth to support thousands of people working in regional towns on the degraded copper networks.
Let me remind everyone, especially the Government, that there are 3 Billion internet users and 7.18 Billion people on earth. The maths is easy. More than half of the world’s population is still to come online and as they do, it will be on mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. Who is going to be on the other side of those screens creating, managing and administrating that digital information?
The Margaret River Chamber is doing something about this issue for our town and region.
With the release this month of the disappointing NBN Co Corporate Plan 2014-2017 essentially providing no new information beyond confirmation of the Multi Technology Mix infrastructure for the NBN, the MRCCI has begun an electronic petition addressed to the Parliament of Australia Senate for the need of a NBN Fibre to the Node rollout in Margaret River before June 2016.
Further, MRCCI will also deliver a submission to the Senate Select Committee on the National Broadband Network. This submission will state the case for NBN rollout prioritisation for Margaret River and include the MRCCI Internet Speed Tests, NBN Prioritisation Polling Results, Mobile Black Spot Reporting and the Petition. The submission will also be delivered to all telcos and media.
The Chamber is also doing more. An e-commerce marketplace hybrid mobile app for Margaret River is under active development. It is an “Ebay for Margaret River” open to everyone to buy and sell online and it will be directly linked with the Main Street Free Public Wi-Fi Network. So as you can see, we walk our talk.
The Chamber implores Margaret River locals and visitors to sign the petition online at www.change.org/organisations/mrcci
