Coalition Senator Cory Bernardi has withdrawn two motions that would disband the Senate Select Committee on the National Broadband Network and replace it with a government-dominated joint committee.
Senator Anne Ruston yesterday evening withdrew the two motions on Bernardi’s behalf.
The Coalition would have needed support from minor party or independent senators to do away with the existing committee.
Bernardi had postponed the motion to disband the committee three times, most recently in August.
The Senate’s NBN committee is chaired by Labor Senator Kate Lundy, and comprises three Labor senators, three Liberal senators and a Greens senator, giving supporters of fibre-to-the-premises for the National Broadband Network a majority.
The joint committee proposed by Bernardi would have had five Coalition members, three Labor members and an independent senator.
Bernardi is the deputy chair of the existing NBN committee.