On 9 November, the final day of the T3 share offer, Telstra customers were notified of increases in the charges for STD calls. Customers who used the HomeLine Plus Service were advised in a letter, "From 25 November 2006, the $2.00 STD Call Cap, which was available for up to 3 hours at all times, will be available for calls up to 20 minutes during the day (7am to 7pm) and continue to to be available to for calls of up to 3 hours at night (7pm to 7am)."

So after only twenty minutes, rates of 20c per minute, on top of $2.00 would apply.

In practice, this would cause the cost of a one hour STD call to rise from $2.00 to around $10.00 and the cost of a three hour call to rise to $34.00. Applying this charging scheme to one recent monthly bill for $100.00 it was calculated that it would have added $73.00 to the STD component of $69.28, increasing the bill total to $173.00. Clearly, many Telstra customers, who remain on their existing billing schemes can soon expect massive hikes.

Mr James Sinnamon, spokesperson for the group Citizens Against Selling Telstra said, "The hardest hit will be those who have missed out on the opportunity to use cheaper Internet based alternatives to STD calls, thanks to Telstra having, in August, cancelled plans to build the broadband FTTN network (1) after many years of delays. Rural users, who need to make a higher proportion of STD calls than their city cousins, will suffer disproportionately.

"At a time, when fuel prices are historically high and expected to continue to rise, call costs should be reduced, rather than increased, so that travel can be avoided, particularly in rural Australia.

Mr James Sinnamon noted that in his letter accompanying the T3 share prospectus, Finance Minister Nick Minchin told potential investors that this would be for the benefit of all consumers. Mr Sinnamon then asked, "Perhaps Senator Minchin would care to explain to consumers how increases in their monthly bills of around $73.00 per month is to their benefit?"

Mr Sinnamon observed, "In previous months both the public and shareholders alike have stood back and watched as millions of dollars of Telstra's funds have flowed into the pockets of Telstra's senior management and their business associates. This has included:

• "A staggering $54 million dollars for Telstra's strategic report including business class air fares and five star hotel accommodation for consultants from the US, Singapore and Europe (2),
• "$1.5 million bonus, awarded for work, apparently done by others, to Sol Trujillo,
• "Additional $11.5 million in bonuses that are expected to be awarded to Trujillo and six senior Telstra executive, when 'a cornerstone investor buys a stake of more than 15 per cent in the company' (3), and
• "Millions of dollars in additional bonuses, yet to be quantified, to be paid to another 220 executives (4)".

Mr Sinnamon remarked, "This latest price hike, following on from the increase of monthly line rental to $29.95 in 2004, up from $11.65 in 2000, shows that this money didn't just fall out of the sky. Instead, it has come out of the pockets of Telstra's customers. This is money that will no longer be available for the weekly grocery bill or to meet mortgage repayments.

"It has also been paid for by declining standards of service, the removal of 5,000 pay phones this year alone, and the loss of employment and training opportunities, including the current program to eliminate 12,000 positions over the next five years."

Mr Sinnamon asked, "Where did the Australian public ever give their consent to this? All opinion polls show that they are overwhelmingly opposed to privatisation. At the time that the Telstra privatisation bill passed the Senate in September last year, 70% of Australians opposed privatisation, according to a NewsPoll, and all the evidence before us shows that they were right to do so."

Mr Sinnamon called upon the Federal Government, as a matter of urgency, to scrap its plans for privatisation. "This country simply cannot afford privatisation," said Mr Sinnamon, "Whatever costs the Australian public may have to bear in order to call off privatisation, even at this late stage, will be much less than what it will cost them, in the longer term, if privatisation is not stopped."

"If the Government refuses to act to stop privatisation, then at the very least it must, without delay, enact legislation that would prevent these price increases and and stop other similar rip-offs," said Mr Sinnamon.

Footnotes

1. Correction : This is not strictly correct. In point of fact, Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) can work over copper based ADSL connections, but the connections, whilst often satisfactory, have also been found, on occasions, to have been unreliable and of poor quality. As Australia's copper network degrades to ruin as a result of past wanton neglect, ADSL, and hence VOIP, will be available to fewer customers. Nevertheless, any Telstra customer with either form of broadband should seek to use VOIP as soon as possible in order to avoid these new charges. The additional necessary USB headset need not cost much more than AU$30.00 and the skype software is free and simple to set up for those with Micro$oft operating systems. See www.skype.com for more information.
2. Michael Sainsbury, "Trujillo spent big on report", 28 Sep 06, news.com.au
3. Kate Askew and Matt O'Sullivan, "Sol and Telstra six to get $11.6m", 31 Oct 06, SMH
4. Michael Sainsbury, op. cit.