Telstra: Senator Lees says: "Take the bait!"

by Peter Mac

Former leader of the Democrats, Senator Meg Lees, gave the Howard 
Government the vote it needed to introduce the Goods and Services Tax and 
the Workplace Relations Act And now the good Senator is advocating the sale 
of the rest of Telstra in order to fund works to conserve the environment. 
At least, that's the stated intention.

This line has a familiar ring to it. Some of the funds raised from the last 
sell-off of Telstra shares were to be used for environmental projects, 
including tree planting works.

The ABC's Four Corners program later revealed that the tree planting 
was carried out at a fraction of the rate at which trees were being lost 
due to land clearing in Queensland, NSW and elsewhere.

The sale of remaining government shares in Telstra is not necessary to 
raise the money for environmental projects. At best this argument is a 
thinly disguised attempt to win environmentalists over to supporting the 
complete privatisation of Telstra.

Money is not the issue. There are many other sources of money that Senator 
Lees could have, but did not suggest. These include the billions of dollars 
on military spending and the billions of dollars in corporate handouts — 
spending which is more likely to result in further environmental damage.

The key issues are the government's support for privatisation, its pro-war, 
pro-US foreign policy and its complete failure to act on environmental 
questions. A few more dollars will not bring about fundamental change in 
any of these critical areas.

The Howard Government has, for the first time in Australia's history, 
ordered Army Reserve units for overseas duty in East Timor, thus clearing 
the way for regular troops to be sent to Iraq to fight for US corporate 
interests.

The government has demonstrated its environmental priorities by repudiating 
the Kyoto treaty on climate change and endorsing a US "alternate" program 
which commits neither country to reduce greenhouse gases, and which accepts 
a reliance on coal fired power generation "for many years to come".

Telstra last week announced increases in the cost of phone rentals. This 
will be only partly offset by reductions in other charges, to the detriment 
of poorer people who make less calls. The overall result is expected to be 
a net increase in after tax profits of $200 million in the fiscal year 
2003.

The ALP acting spokesperson on communications, Kate Lundy, last week 
declared that Telstra was obviously being "fattened up" for the sale of the 
government's remaining shares.

Prime Minister, John Howard last week claimed that the improvement in 
services to country areas (a prerequisite for the sell-off stipulated by 
the National Party) is virtually complete.

Profits versus service

Significantly, tenders for the provision of extra services in country areas 
were not submitted by Optus, which did not consider the works involved 
sufficiently lucrative. This has implications for the full privatisation of 
Telstra.

What will happen in years to come when Telstra is fully privatised, and 
rural and regional Australia are yet again left behind as technology moves 
on?

As a profit-oriented private service provider, beyond public control and 
accountability, the organisation would not favour the maintenance of the 
enhanced services to remote locations, or even the existing services — at 
least not without fat government subsidies.

Apart from gaining National Party support in the Lower House, the 
government needs to get the sale through the Senate.

The Coalition has 35 out of a total of 76 Senators.

The government's tactics have been to split the opposition forces by 
offering certain necessary works, but with very long strings attached.

The most significant of these is the offer of environmental rectification 
works, such as a program of tree planting to combat salinity, which was 
successfully used to split opposition ranks prior to the second sale of 
Telstra shares.

However, it is by no means clear that the same tactic could be used again, 
since the abject failure of the previous reforestation works is now clearly 
evident.

The Greens have two Senators. Although party leader Bob Brown recently 
toyed openly with the idea of taking the bait, the party membership very 
quickly persuaded him that environmental works should be carried out as a 
necessity, rather than as part of a "horse-trading" deal involving the sale 
of crucial public assets.

Two independent Senators have expressed their willingness to consider the 
Telstra sale. However, independent Senator Brian Harradine, who opposed the 
GST legislation despite enormous pressure, has described the request for 
his support of the Telstra sale bill as a "tall order".

This means that for the Coalition to succeed, the support of at least one 
Democrat Senator is essential. And Senator Meg Lees is not the only 
Democrat showing signs of breaking ranks with their Party on the Telstra 
issue.

Senator Aden Ridgeway has also indicated he might support the Bill, stating 
equivocally that "any party that decides to lay their policies in concrete 
would have to be fools".

As a result the polls are showing a disastrous drop in support for the 
Party. Astonishingly, some observers are predicting that the Party will 
have to either drop their opposition to the Telstra sale or suffer a split 
in the party ranks.

Democrats leader Natasha Stott-Despoja, on the other hand, has correctly 
attributed the party's drop in popularity to a public perception that 
Democrat Senators could be instrumental in passing the Telstra sale 
legislation, in a re-run of the GST disaster.

Ms Stott-Despoja has called urgently for party unity on the issue. "The 
polls are telling us ... that disunity is death", she observed.