The Full Bench of the Federal Court of Appeal today allowed Telstra's appeal and overturned the earlier judgment by Justice Graham. This means the Government will now provide Telstra with the documents it has been asking for since August last year, says Telstra.

Telstra launched the action after the previous communications minister, Senator Coonan, refused to release documents that could explain why her government altered the size and purpose of funding available under the Broadband Connect program.

"The program was originally a $600 million initiative to provide broadband to new rural communities for the first time, yet the Government awarded nearly $1 billion to the Optus/Elders consortium to duplicate services that already existed," said Telstra.
The broadband services still haven't been delivered.

"OPEL is now eight months old - and still no network, no rollout plan, no personnel and no management. Hopefully, this decision will be the first step in understanding how this billion-dollar boondoggle ever came to be," said Telstra Group General Counsel, Will Irving.

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