Union vindicated over warnings of shoddy work on Chorus UFB

E tū says union vindicated over warnings of shoddy work on Chorus UFB build.

E tū says customer complaints about the shoddy workmanship on Chorus’s ultrafast broadband network vindicate quality concerns raised by the union months ago.

An East Auckland property owner says he and his neighbours are worried that their fibre connections will fail given the obvious vulnerabilities of the network.

That includes exposed cables which could easily be damaged by lawn-mowers, dogs and vandals, as well as the use of duct tape to connect cables from the street to their properties.

E tū communications industry coordinator, Joe Gallagher says these problems reflect the concerns raised by the union in April, when Downer lost its installation contract with Chorus.

He says the union warned then that work standards would deteriorate and that is exactly what has happened.

He says Chorus chose to use owner-operator sub-contractors and the result is big costs to remediate the shoddy workmanship in the wake of a slew of complaints.

“It’s an ultra-shoddy network and we’ve been saying that for some time, but no one wanted to listen. Now it’s become all too apparent that there are quality issues.”

He says Chorus is still contracting out work on the network, which means the problems won’t go away.

“This is essential infrastructure and standards have been run down by Chorus in the drive to cut costs”, he says.

ENDS

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