Al Blake, Principal Analyst, Government Technology at Ovum said that Australia's new PM 'gets IT’.



Blake believes that Mr Turnbull’s trashing of the previous Labor Government’s NBN FttP was purely for political expediency.



“When the incoming liberal government inherited the ‘Labor NBN’, after months of trashing it as a ‘massive white elephant’, it was a political imperative to promote a different approach – resulting the mixed-mode delivery model pushed for the last two years against the advice of many in the ICT industry,” he said in a research note.



“Although he was following the party line there was always uncertainty as to how strongly Turnbull personally supported that approach and his elevation to the PM spot may allow for an NBN recalibration.





“Given the political realities it would be impossible to go back to the original Labour plan – but we may see the proportion technologies slide further towards FTTP which would mean world-class broadband performance for a greater percentage of Australians.”Having someone with an understanding of technology at the highest position in government cannot be underestimated Blake said in his note.“Australia now has someone who ‘gets it ‘when it comes to digital delivery of government services and is not going to be prepared to accept delays, excuses and second rate solutions,” he said.“He’s on record as regarding ‘digital literacy’ as important as reading and supporting open access to government data and in his role as Minister for Communications, he espoused the benefits of using high-value government datasets to assist government in making evidence-based policy decisions.“Earlier this year he created the Digital Transformation Office (DTO) within his then department – drawing extensively from the experience of the Government Digital Service (GDS) within the Cabinet Office in the UK Government - an organisation that has shaken-up UK government online services and whose activities Turnbull greatly admires.”