Small businesses in the Mountains are being urged to complete a survey about their internet experiences to bolster a bid to bring the NBN to the area as soon as possible.
The Blue Mountains Connected Communities NBN is intending to meet with Communications Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, to highlight how the Mountains suffers from the unreliability of the current ADSL services.
“The point of the survey is to find out what people’s individual experiences are, particularly if you have a home-based business [and] whether it’s affecting your profitability,” said the chairman of Connected Communities, Mr Hereward Dundas-Taylor. “The internet in the Mountains is very broken. There are places where you can’t get it.”
Mr Dundas-Taylor said Connected Communities was made up of members of the business community, including from Biznet and the Blue Mountains Economic Enterprise.
“We have a written guarantee from Louise Markus that she will give us a face-to-face with Malcolm Turnbull... We will pitch how important it is to have the NBN up here sooner rather than later. You can’t run a business on ADSL — it’s too slow.”
Connected Communities would also outline the solutions the NBN would provide businesses in the Mountains, including teleworking and employment opportunities, smart hub centres and competitive benefits, particularly to home-based businesses.
“We have only one opportunity at this and it may be the difference between the NBN coming to the mountains in two years’ time or six years’ time,” Mr Dundas-Taylor said.
The survey closes on October 21. It can be found at https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/nbn-survey.
