The Commonwealth Government is committed to ensuring a stable and prosperous future for Tasmania, by helping create sustainable and exciting jobs for the state.
Tasmania’s economic future is increasingly dependent on the internet and electronic commerce to secure a world market for the state’s products and services.
I am therefore delighted to announce that the Commonwealth Government will allocated $4.37 million to extend access to the internet to an additional 44 communities across Tasmania.
The funding, from the highly successful Networking the Nation program, will allow the establishment of 44 new Communities Online centres around the state. This will more than treble the existing number of Centres.
The Centres allow Tasmanian communities to advertise their products and services internationally. They provide global advertising of the state’s wonderful tourism opportunities, helping expand tourism to individual communities and to the state as a whole.
They also provide Tasmanian employers with access to global markets for their products.
And these Centres help further reduce the sense of isolation so often felt by smaller Australian communities, by allowing Tasmanians to keep in touch with friends and relatives around the state, around the nation and around the world.
The original 18 Communities Online centres, also set up with Commonwealth funds, are already providing ordinary Tasmanians with access to e-mail and other electronic services. Proud parents, for example, can electronically send photos of their latest addition to family, to friends and relatives around the world.
Through our investment in the Communities Online centres, the Commonwealth Government is helping secure the economic future of Tasmania.
The Networking the Nation program is funded from the Commonwealth’s Regional Telecommunications Infrastructure Fund (RTIF). The $250 million RTIF was established from the proceeds of the one-third sale of Telstra.
Labor opposed the establishment of the RTIF and at the last election Labor said it would "freeze" the remaining $181 million in the Fund.
7 November 1998