Australia's Broadband Blunder

[Commentary] Four years ago, Telstra was on its way to being fully privatized when Sol Trujillo was recruited with a specific brief to make it a "private sector, fast-moving company." He did so. Head count was slashed. Aging and neglected infrastructure was upgraded. Three different wireless platforms were junked and replaced with the fastest, most-advanced 3G network in the world. What most infuriated their hosts, though, was Telstra's abandonment of its traditional deference to policy makers. The company took regulators to court over mandates requiring it to lease its network to competitors at knockdown rates. Phil Burgess served as Telstra's head of regulatory affairs under Trujillo. Burgess bashed civil servants and politicians by name, in a fashion apparently deemed unbecoming a corporate citizen in Australia. And though he's back in the states now, Mr. Burgess hasn't let up, leading the charge against a new plan by Australia's Labor government to dismantle Telstra (which must be a surprise to investors who just bought shares from the government) in order to advance Labor's own dream of a government-operated national broadband network (known as NBN). "If you don't call a blackmailer for what they are, you pay the price forever," Mr. Burgess told an Australian reporter during a recent return visit. He was referring to threatened legislation that would forbid Telstra from bidding for new wireless spectrum and force it to divest its Foxtel TV business unless it "voluntarily" plays ball with NBN.