Federal Communications Minister Stephen Conroy said on Friday that the planned web filter by the government would not slow down internet speeds but simply ensure that child pornography would not invade Australian households hooked up on the national broadband network (NBN).

Senator Conroy pointed to successful precedents in Europe where countries such as UK, Finland and Sweden established filters that up to 95 percent of online users have to go through yet no considerable complaints on web connection slow downs were ever pushed forward, effectively underpinning the accuracy of the initiative.

He rejected earlier claims of his opposition counterpart Malcolm Turnbull that the proposed internet filter would do nothing but slow down broadband connections and only give Australian parents a false sense of security, countering that "it has no impact on speed and anybody who makes a claim that it has an impact on speed is misleading people."

Senator Conroy argued that the actual threat on Australia's internet speed is the Coalition's intent to block the NBN's full implementation on claims that the project is a huge waste of money that otherwise be used for the national government's more pressing social services.

Opposition leader Tony Abbot labelled the federal project as a white elephant in the making and put Mr Turnbull in charge to lead the Coalition's campaign of sidelining the Labor government's pet project, with hopes of eventually reducing it to oblivion.

The Coalition said that a more viable alternative could have been implemented had their leaderships were given the chance to take the lead in the government as Mr Turnbull assailed the NBN plan as lacking in sound business and financial sense that would only drain taxpayers' money from federal coffers.

The communications minister, however, countered that contrary to the Coalition's claims, the NBN is poised to spark substantial improvements in the country's economic activities, which was outlined in the $25 million McKinsey report, that the Liberals may have failed to appreciate, according to Senator Conroy.

He said that Mr Turnbull's claim that Australians could enjoy the same amount of speed offered by mobile online access was based on questionable facts as the technology that supports the fixed-line broadband capacity is way ahead from the capacity that is being carried by wireless networks.

Senator Conroy maintained that the fibre-optics being utilised by NBN as the backbone of its network would soon ease out the current copper lines widely used in the country as he added that once fully operational, the NBN would spawn economic productivity and advantages in areas such as e-health and telecommuting.

Also, the communication minister said that reports of only 50 percent of residents in a number of Tasmanian towns should not be a cause for alarm now as he stressed that NBN would eventually realise its 93 percent footprint target for the state once the deal with Telstra takes its full course, which is for the telco giant to retire its copper network to make way for the superior fibre-optics network of NBN.