18 April 2007
The ACCC Chairman Graeme Samuel this week admitted he'd been sidelined by the Government that appointed him to the job as Australia's chief competition watchdog.
The admission came as Communications Minister Helen Coonan entered talks with carriers on fibre broadband proposals, shutting the door to Mr Samuel.
"So much of the activity at the moment in relation to this area is occurring in the political arena," Mr Samuel told a communications conference in Sydney.
"So I have to say we're not participants, but we have been relegated to interested - and, perhaps at times, anxious - observers."
Mr Samuel has every reason to feel anxious.
Under his watch investment in fixed telecommunications infrastructure has sunk to record low levels, while all the time Mr Samuel has steadfastly refused to admit there is any problem with regulation or indeed the regulator itself.
When Telstra's fibre investment plans stalled last year Mr Samuel used his media machine to claim existing investment access arrangements could be made to work - only Telstra wasn't interested in using them.
As recently as last month the ACCC continued with this argument, holding up an access agreement between the ACCC and Foxtel as evidence the regulations really could be made to work.
That attack on Telstra conveniently overlooked the fact that the Foxtel agreement had taken over five years to get to that point. And now this week we learn of yet another appeal, meaning that case will drag on into its sixth year with still no binding agreement.
Mr Samuel says Telstra should have used the same flawed process to get approval for its new fibre to the node network. Imagine where the rest of the world will be in six years time if Australia is still waiting on the ACCC for the go-ahead to start investing in a fibre network?
No wonder the Government has relegated Graeme Samuel to being just an observer.
Despite all of this there is no sign of any contrition or remorse from the former investment banker turned competition champion.
Indeed there is every sign the Samuel-led ACCC couldn't care less, as its response to the very serious reprimand by the Federal Court recently showed.
A quick re-cap: The ACCC worked in tandem with SingTel Optus in a case that had no evidence to back it up and left Telstra shareholders exposed to a billion dollars in fines. It finally ended when Justice Annabelle Bennett ruled the regulator had acted illegally and denied Telstra the right to natural justice and procedural fairness.
A serious abuse of powers - perhaps the ACCC boss might have been held to answer for? No way. Even then Graeme Samuel (and some of his usual mates in the media) had the audacity to dismiss the decision (www.accc.gov.au) as nothing more than a slap on the wrist and claim that that most of Telstra's complaints had been dismissed.
Is it any wonder Helen Coonan decided to take control of the broadband issue and leave Mr Samuel out in the cold?
In our view, the ACCC has demonstrated that it is more interested in making decisions in the interests of largely foreign owned telcos and not in the long term interests of Australian consumers who need investment in infrastructure to get the services they will want and demand in the future.
Now he's got some time on the sideline, we believe Graeme Samuel should give some serious thought to his future as Chairman of one of the most important institutions in our free enterprise democracy.
Maybe it's time to go Graeme?
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