Speaking at a Liberal party address in Launceston, Tasmania, Abbott attacked the National Broadband Network (NBN), describing it as a return to the 1960s' era of a Telecom monopoly, but stopped short of promising to remove the network on taking power.

"Now, I understand that before the election there was a bit of enthusiasm for this policy here in Tasmania and the last thing I would want to do is damage or detract from any new infrastructure that might actually have been rolled out here in Tasmania," Abbott said.

Despite making a commitment to remove the infrastructure, Abbott went on to attack the Tasmanian leg of the NBN deployment claiming that only half of the 5000 households passed by the fibre had been connected.

Abbot also claimed, despite on high-speed broadband's contribution to economic growth, that the NBN offered no benefit.