Labor's NBN cash injection would make faster internet connections possible but not automatically

Anthony Albanese wants to make internet access an election issue, yesterday promising $3 billion in upgrades to the National Broadband Network if Labor is re-elected. That money would allow the NBN to offer faster speeds to the last remaining homes and businesses that still use slower copper wires instead of fibre optic cables. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese promises a $3 billion injection to "finish" the National Broadband Network and speed up internet services, as Labor and the Coalition swing into election campaign mode. It abandoned Labor's plan to lay faster fibre optic cables to individual premises, instead laying them up to central "nodes" or curbs then using existing copper wires the rest of the way. Of the 3.5 million premises "ready" for fibre-to-the-premise connections, only about 300,000 have so far used them, at a rate of 6,000 new premises a week according to NBN Co's last annual report.