From: Vincent Cunniffe (vincent at domain cunniffe.net)
Date: Wed 29 Aug 2001 - 12:05:21 IST
Dave Neary wrote:
> Justin Mason wrote:
>
>>Unfortunately we're a bit late, I think the seminar is well underway by
>>now. Darn timezones! ;)
>>
>
> Nope - it's 4pm *today* - in about 6 hours.
Excellent : hopefully this arrives in time and you can print it off ;-)
>>Vincent Cunniffe said:
>>
>>>I can supply exact pricing, statistics and services on request
>>>to anyone willing to stand up and use it at the meeting. There
>>>are also some interesting aspects to the legal obligations
>>>which the NZ Telecom operator has towards the people of New
>>>Zealand, which it is not permitted to weasel out of under any
>>>circumstances. It might be worth also posing this sort of
>>>question to the Minister and/or ODTR, if possible.
>>>
>
> I for one would appreciate that. Cheers
Background :
-----------------------------------
New Zealand is extremely similar to Ireland, with a population of 3.8
million, a heavily agricultural background, and with a population
scattered amongst a few major cities and a scattering of towns.
Auckland and Wellington, the two largest cities, follow very closely
the populations of Dublin and Cork, and the rest of the population
is ditributed in very similar manner to Ireland.
Their National Telecoms operator was originally State-owned, and was
privatised in 1990. This took place with a number of restrictions
which the new owners/shareholders were obliged by the Government to
follow, and which are explained below.
-----------------------------------
Dialup Services :
Monthly rental of phone line, including equipment rental and all
taxes : £16
ISP Monthly access fee for completely unlimited, 24-hour a day,
peak and offpeak 56k dialup access : £11.50
(All local residential calls in NZ are completely free, so the fee is
to the ISPs, all of whom operate local POPs or 1800-equivalents)
Interestingly enough, an 8-hour Internet connection in Dublin would
cost an Irish internet user 8*20*12p = almost £20 peak, or £4.80
offpeak.
The same call, to a Dublin POP number for internet access, would cost
an Auckland user just £3.20, for 8 hours of Internet access, dialling
from Auckland across the world to a Dublin Eircom number.
-----------------------------------
ADSL Services :
JetStream/JetStart, (http://www.telecom.co.nz/content/0,2502,200345-200133,00.html)
Basic package : 128k/128k, £12 per month, no bandwidth cap
JetStream 400 : up to 2MB/512k, £20 per month, 400MB/month bandwidth cap
JetStream 600 : up to 2MB/512k, £28 per month, 600MB/month bandwidth cap
JetStream 1500 : up to 2MB/512k, £80 per month, 1500MB/month bandwidth cap
----------------------------------
Obligations of Telecom NZ towards the people of New Zealand :
In New Zealand, the Kiwi Share has embodied a form of universal service obligation. It requires
Telecom, unless the Government agrees otherwise, to:
* provide a local free-calling option for residential customers;
* ensure that the line rental for residential users in rural areas will be no higher than the
standard residential rental;
* charge no more than the standard residential rental for ordinary residential telephone
service and from 1 November 1989, not increase the pre-GST standard residential rental in real terms
provided overall profitability is not unreasonably impaired; and
* continue to make ordinary residential telephone service as widely available as at 11
September 1990.
(full details in http://www.teleinquiry.govt.nz/reports/issues/issues-02.html#P115_22457)
-----------------------------------
Hoping this is some use in questions towards both Eircom and the Government
about Ireland's telecomms issue, such as why Eircom has no obligations whatsoever
towards the people of Ireland.
The two questions I would suggest :
1 (To Eircom) :
Why, given the extraordinary similarities between New Zealand and Ireland in terms
of population, infrastructure and history of telecommunications, can the people of
New Zealand enjoy free local residential calls and low-cost ADSL access, while the
people of Ireland are left paying appallingly high rates, paying per minute for
access, and seemingly unable to get any ADSL service whatsoever, leaving us with the
distinction of being the only country in Europe apart from Portugal who have no
ADSL?
2 (To the Government)
Why was nothing ever set in stone with Eircom with regard to the services which they
would owe the people of Ireland, whose taxes built and maintained the copper network
which is now being held hostage by a company which clearly shows no intention of
using it for their general benefit?
I would be very grateful if anyone could post a summary of the meeting
on ILUG afterwards, preferably with casualty descriptions ;-)
Regards,
Vin
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