LABOR’S Alannah MacTiernan (right) will hold a meeting on the NBN at Bassendean community centre on April 1—no, it’s not a joke.

The federal MP is pushing for local suburbs including Bedford, East Perth, Inglewood, Maylands, Morley, Mt Lawley, Highgate and North Perth to receive fibre-to-the-home broadband, as Labor had proposed when it first started rolling out the NBN.

The Abbott government has abandoned free FTTH, citing higher cost, and is rolling out a mixed-technology NBN which it says will be sufficient.

Suburbs once slated for FTTH are now slated for fibre-to-the-node (a box in the street), with copper connecting homes to the node. “Many households are unable to connect to basic ADSL 2 speeds, and in some cases are unable to even have reliable voice service,” Ms MacTiernan says.

“A large part of the current problem is due to the appalling state of the copper wire.

“It is inconceivable that this copper infrastructure could deliver high speed broadband through the fibre-to-the-node fraudband model proposed by minister Turnbull.”

Labor shadow assistant minister Michelle Rowland will attend the meeting.

by STEPHEN POLLOCK