Australia's NBN costs taxpayers 24 times South Korea at one tenth the speed: report

Australia's national broadband network will cost taxpayers 24 times as much as South Korea's but deliver services at just one-tenth the speed, new research claims.

The opposition claimed the research vindicated its position that the NBN was a waste of public funds, while the government countered that comparing Australia to South Korea was "like comparing apples to oranges". The research from the Economist Intelligence Unit shows Australia is spending an estimated 7.6 per cent of annual government budget revenues on its broadband network."In South Korea, by comparison, the government is spending less than 1 per cent of annual budget revenues to realize its broadband goals, achieving targets by encouraging the private sector to invest in the country's broadband future," the Economist Intelligence Unit said. However, the EIU report does not mention NBN Co's announcement last year that its network will also be capable of the same speeds as South Korea's network. Shortly before the federal election, chief executive Mike Quigley announced the fibre network would be built to carry speeds of 1 gigabit per second in a bid to differentiate the project from the opposition's broadband policy.