Mr TURNBULL (5:58 PM) —The opposition supports the establishment of this Joint Committee on the National Broadband Network. This is certainly a second-best option to the joint committee that we proposed and it does not have the same clear focus on the cost-effectiveness of the proposal that the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works had, but it is certainly better than nothing. One question that the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport has not outlined—and if the minister could pay attention to what I am saying here—

Mr Albanese —We are discussing Jamie Briggs’s new child!

Mr TURNBULL —Thank you, Minister. Nothing could be more important than that. Scarlett Briggs is a matter of great interest to every member!

Ms Julie Bishop —It is in Hansard.

Mr TURNBULL —She is in Hansard. She is just a baby and she is in Hansard! I will leave the distraction of the beautiful Scarlett Briggs. Her father tells me she looks just like her mother. He is very modest too; he is a modest member!

I have a question for the minister which he may be able to respond to. I know it not question time but it is a matter that could be addressed. It is not at all clear what resources this committee has available to it. We are dealing with a highly technical area of investment. We all accept that the members of the committee will give it their full diligence, and due care and attention will be paid to it—and it will apparently have an extraordinarily and recently clean-shaven chairman—nonetheless it would benefit greatly from some expert advice. A question the minister may care to address in the course of this debate is: what resources will the committee have? Subject to that and the start date of the committee—which we believe should be immediate and not put off to the middle of the year, which we understand is the government’s plan—we will support the committee. It is a second-best option. The only consolation we can glean from this is that if we had not pressed for the joint committee of our design, or indeed for the attention of the Public Works Committee, we probably would not have even this much from this government.

Question agreed to.