Labour asks for government to question Telecom on XT outages

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › Labour asks for government to question Telecom on XT outages

freitasm

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#57735 23-Feb-2010 10:15

Govt should intervene in troubled XT network - Labour

Newman: govt should question Telecom on XT - hard

Why people think government should be involved in something that is obviously not a monopoly? There are options - Vodafone New Zealand, 2degrees Mobile, MVNOs such as TelstraClear, Slingshot, Black + White.

Do you agree with these calls for action?

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#301403 23-Feb-2010 10:23

Can't see the rationale there, or that it would even be helpful.

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#301404 23-Feb-2010 10:27

The answer won't be far away, Ernie has stamped his little feet. As if that is all it would take.

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#301407 23-Feb-2010 10:31

What a dumb statement by labour. No good would or could come from the government getting involved.

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#301409 23-Feb-2010 10:35

Hopefully people will vote with their feet and leave. (Or grumble that they've been screwed by the contract they signed)

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#301411 23-Feb-2010 10:45

The government is getting involved, without Labour's prompting. According to the NZPA (don't have link), Minister Joyce rang Paul Reynolds to express the government's concern with the XT outages.

Joyce says the government can't intervene though.

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#301413 23-Feb-2010 10:52

Nothing new, though. The bane of politics is that, when something goes wrong, people expect the government to "do something" even if there's nothing they can actually do. It's one of the reason we see new laws proposed every time there's a high profile criminal case, even if the existing laws cover the case perfectly well.

Having said that, it's amazing how much can get done when a minister picks up the phone and calls a company in the sphere they represent.

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#301419 23-Feb-2010 11:01

I agree, although this is frustrating and annoying, the government has no stake in this. Stephen Joyce can make all the phone call she likes but he is just another stakeholder in this, as is the Labour government. I do not believe that the government can add any value to the discussion.

This is a high profile incident, there isn't much for people to pin their flags to at the moment that has such a high profile, Labour is only coming out saying this becuase they have nothing else to say. But it gets them in the media, showing people they are 'keeping on top' of all the relevant issues.

While Telecom has a lot of work to do in resolving this, and restoring some consumer confidence, they certainly have a long road ahead ... most of the public talk is simply grand standing for publicity.

IMHO that is :)

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#301420 23-Feb-2010 11:02

Eh, just Labour getting brownie points for a hot topic at the mo. Populist politics at its best. Just like the MTR issue the govt should leave well enough alone.

Although I think there should be a provision / fine for not providing the 111 service IF that is the case (which i doubt, media is probably overhyping that too).

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#301657 23-Feb-2010 21:10

I see it as just Labour doing what they do as opposition, using current events to tackle the government with. The Nats did the same when it were Labour it power

I don't think they should do anything of significance. Perhaps a phonecall telling them to sort it out (if even that)

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#301661 23-Feb-2010 21:24

Can you imagine the phone call...

"Hi there Telecom, please sort out your network, this is getting tiresome".
"Oh gosh - We'd never thought of doing that, we'll get straight onto it sir".

I seriously don't think it's 'news worthy' at all.
But hey, if journos have column inches to fill, and politicians feel the need to talk to them - then it's up to us to ignore them. :)

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#301666 23-Feb-2010 21:41

Tbh It's not really the governments choice on what telecom do, and shouldn't interfere with them. they lost that chance when they sold off Telecom.

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freitasm

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#301667 23-Feb-2010 21:42

Exactly. Why those "institutions" are asking for government intervention is not clear.

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#301671 23-Feb-2010 21:49

Seriously.... do they ( labour & Govt ) think that Telecom need any more prompting, encouragement or threat. A core part of their business is not working after over $700 mil spent another $400 mil to come, $1.2 bil of their money spent just to ignore the issues they have. I think that there is more than enough pressure from customers alone. They know things are not right, they will fix it - what ever it takes. I think the statement by labour only makes them look even more foolish ( labour that is ) BTW, I live south of Taupo and have been effected by the outages however worked around the outages

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#301673 23-Feb-2010 21:53

I think it should be like Taxi's, to become a Taxi driver you have to maintain certain standards and offer a 24 hour service because of the nature of their business. There were penalties and your license could be revoked if you broke these rules.

I believe Telco's should have to have a similar laws, where if you register as a Telco, you had to have certain SLA's for your services offered, as they are essential services, even if offered by a private company.

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#301732 24-Feb-2010 08:38

exportgoldman:
I think it should be like Taxi's, to become a Taxi driver you have to maintain certain standards and offer a 24 hour service because of the nature of their business. There were penalties and your license could be revoked if you broke these rules.

I believe Telco's should have to have a similar laws, where if you register as a Telco, you had to have certain SLA's for your services offered, as they are essential services, even if offered by a private company.

You should also add power companies to that list..

Regards,

Old3eyes

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