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Soul, which The Australian reports is referred to by staff as Two.Tel, is also facing legal action from its dealers who claim that they have not been paid commissions they are owed. Soul has denied the suggestions that it cannot pay its dealers, but all is obviously not well with the company.

Since its merger with TPG earlier this year, all but two of the company’s directors have resigned. And former CEO Michael Simmons has left the company to become bid manager for Terria, the Optus-led National Broadband Network consortium of which Soul is a member.



According to staff contacted by The Australian,  the company is in “chaos” with employees left with nothing to do but wait for redundancy payouts that the company may no longer be able to afford.



Staff numbers have already shrunk dramatically in recent months, with the numbers in the company’s Perth office having shrunk from around 400 to just 50 over the last year.



The problems at Soul may not be as  serious as reports suggest. Nevertheless they are a reminder of the vulnerable position of smaller telcos in an industry which favours size and the related dangers facing their employees. The first concern of all unionists must be to see that the rights of these workers are protected and their full entitlements guaranteed. But the other lesson to be drawn from Soul’s problems is that the creation and operation of key national infrastructure is a task for a company with deep pockets, not for a collection of second and third tier companies whose own future may be uncertain.