A tramp is a person who travels from place to place on foot in search of work or as a vagrant or beggar, and the way Telstra’s competitors always complain, you’d think they were beggars for the scraps that fall from Telstra’s table - although, logically speaking, you wouldn't call them super tramps. 

Well, with the ACCC having announced draft price reductions for fixed line services using Telstra’s network, as reported earlier today in iTWire, it is no surprise to see the CCC or Competitive Carriers Coalition making a statement and trumpeting the ACCC's move as 'sensible, logical, reasonable.'

This statement says the ACCC’s decision ‘was based on a sensible decision to protect consumers from attempts by Telstra to double dip in the transition to the National Broadband Network.’

CCC Chairman Matt Healy said: “Telstra’s argument that it needed to be compensated by competitors and consumers for the equipment it turns off as it is replaced by the NBN was always an extraordinary claim.

“Telstra negotiated a handsome payout from NBN for migrating customers off this equipment – billions of dollars in tax payer money. “Asking the ACCC to allow it to increase charges to people still using the old copper network to compensate Telstra again for the loss of scale caused by migration to the NBN was the height of cheek.”

The CCC says the 9.6% decrease in prices proposed by the ACCC ‘is in line with the minimum reasonable reductions calculated by the CCC’s expert analysts.’

Healy continued, stating: “It is important to remember the prices Australians pay for basic fixed line services are the highest or near highest in the OECD. “These prices act as a brake on national economic competitiveness and slow Australia’s transition to a digital economy as much or more than inadequate broadband infrastructure.

“It is crucial these reductions flow to competitors and into the market quickly, as this ACCC price decision process has already been delayed by more than a year to accommodate the volumes of material Telstra has thrown at the Commission throughout the process.”

With that, the CCC made absolutely no mention of Supertramp or its hit song ‘Logical’, but its declaration that the ACCC price cuts were logical, sensible and reasonable, I took this opportunity to re-write Supertramp’s hit song with some minor changes, for entertainment purposes only.

The Supertramp connection is all a bit of a manufactured stretch, so with apologies to Supertramp and to sensitive readers, here we go without further ado:

"Logical CCC Song"

When Telstra was young, it seemed that life was so wonderful,
A monopoly, oh it was beautiful, magical.
And all the birds in the trees, well they'd be tweeting so happily,
Joyfully, playfully watching me.
But then they sent me away to teach me how to be sensible,
Logical, responsible, practical.
And they showed me a world where I could be so dependable,
Clinical, intellectual, cynical.

There are times when all the world's asleep,
Metadata questions run too deep
For such a simple man.
Won't you please, please tell me what we've learned
I know it sounds absurd
Malcolm, please tell me who I am.

Now watch what you say or they'll be calling you a radical,
Liberal, Abbottical, criminal.
Won't you sign up your name, we'd like to feel you're
Acceptable, respectable, presentable, a vegetable!

At night, when all the world's asleep,
Snowden’s questions run so deep
For such a simple man.
Won't you please, please tell me what we've learned
I know it sounds absurd
Turnbull, please tell me who I am.

The original Supertramp Logical song lyrics can be found here.