A TAMWORTH man relying on distance education to rebuild his life after a near-fatal crash has spoken of the need for fast and reliable broadband.
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Shane MacAlpine was content grinding out a comfortable living at a local abattoir until 2011, when he was cleaned up by a car while riding his motorbike. The severity of his injuries meant his days as a manual labourer were limited and he needed to find another career in order to support himself and his family.
He enrolled to do certificates III and IV in laboratory techniques and operations at TAFE and next year will begin an applied sciences diploma at the University of Sydney.
“I was not expecting to re-enter education, because I had stable work – nine-and-a-half years I was in my previous employment,” he said.
“But the accident changed all of that and the idea was, while I’m down to my last five years of labouring, to try and educate myself. If I was to attend university proper, then my family would basically be put into hardship, as I would have to sell the house.”
Studying by distance, the 33-year-old is completely reliant on a fast and stable internet connection to listen to lectures, interact with fellow students and submit assignments. Shortcomings in the existing network saw him rejoice at the prospect of Tamworth receiving fibre-to-the-home under Labor’s National Broadband Network.
But a change in government and the Coalition’s determination to install fibre only to the node and rely on the copper network to do the rest has him worried.
“It’s not just speed,” he said.
“Everyone gets hung up on the speed and thinks it’s the be-all and end-all. But the biggest problem that I have had, and a lot of people have said, is the lack of consistency with the copper network.
“Last week the rain got into the network in our street and we lost our phone line for three days.
“If you’re doing distance education and you need to report in or submit assignments or whatever and the internet is down, or you have lags, then it can be disastrous.”
Mr MacAlpine felt so strongly about the NBN, he became involved in an online petition calling for the Coalition to re-think its stance. It attracted more than 270,000 signatures.
