The National Broadband Network will be kept in public ownership under a new federal law to be put to federal parliament this week, in a surprise move by the federal government to assure 8.5 million customers their service will not be privatised.
The law will force a debate in parliament on the fate of the NBN and challenge the Coalition to say whether it would try to sell the mammoth network after taxpayers funded the $51 billion project over more than a decade.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will take the plan to the Labor caucus meeting on Tuesday morning to clear the way for the bill to be put to parliament on Wednesday, said sources familiar with the matter who spoke anonymously to discuss party deliberations.
The move will heighten a dispute over the future of the NBN and the impact on broadband prices after years of concern that selling the network would reshape competition, especially if Telstra emerged as the leading bidder.
Coalition communications spokesman David Coleman has blamed the government for letting the NBN increase its prices this year, setting up an election fight over broadband as part of the wider political dispute over the cost of living.
In putting the draft law to parliament, Labor will lay the ground for a political attack on Opposition Leader Peter Dutton if he leaves any room for the privatisation of the NBN at some point in the future.
NBN Co, the government-owned company that runs the network, increased its revenue by 4.4 per cent to $5.5 billion last financial year and is counting on customers to upgrade to higher speeds in order to keep revenue growing over the next five to ten years.
But it posted a net loss of $1.4 billion, compared to $1.1 billion the previous year, because of the heavy cost of investing in the network.
NBN Co had $42.5 billion in liabilities on its balance sheet at the end of June, including $26.9 billion in debt it took on to build the network. The company separately received equity investments from the federal government to cover the construction costs.
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