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General News

12 January, 2023

Member for Mallee pushes for better mobile coverage

Member for Mallee Anne Webster is calling for the Federal Government to make reforms to the Universal Service Guarantee (USG) and mandate mobile roaming to tackle mobile black spot issues. Dr Webster is calling for an extension and reform of the USG...

By Riley Upton

Member for Mallee pushes for better mobile coverage - feature photo

Member for Mallee Anne Webster is calling for the Federal Government to make reforms to the Universal Service Guarantee (USG) and mandate mobile roaming to tackle mobile black spot issues.

Dr Webster is calling for an extension and reform of the USG — designed to provide all Australians with access to broadband and voice services regardless of location — from landlines to mobile phones, and the introduction of mandated mobile roaming this year, which she believes is essential for regional growth.

She said issues of mobile service and internet connectivity are raised with her regularly and more needs to be done.

“Black spot issues are flagged right across Mallee, it’s something that’s raised regularly and I perfectly understand people’s ire when it comes to telecommunications,” she said.

“It’s so frustrating when you’re in the middle of an important phone call and it cuts out because there’s no service or if you’re in a house and you can’t reliably access the internet.

“It doesn’t matter where you live, you should have the ability to connect reliably — it’s not reasonable, it’s not fair and far more needs to be done to address this, particularly for regional people.”

The USG was introduced to provide all Australian homes and businesses with access to both broadband and voice services, regardless of their location.

Dr Webster said while beneficial at the time, the USG needs to be updated to include mobile phones rather than landline, which is used less frequently.

“When the Universal Service Guarantee first came into being it was when we only had landline phones and now, we hardly use them,” she said.

“I’m not ignorant of the fact we’re a very large country with large distances and a relatively small population.

“The cost for us in terms of any form of infrastructure is huge to connect everybody, particularly for telecommunications and internet, and it’s not a simple problem but we need to find solutions.”

It comes as the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) opens a survey as part of its Regional Mobile Infrastructure Inquiry, with the survey asking how businesses and consumers are impacted by a lack of mobile coverage, whether the provision of mobile roaming during emergencies would be supported and where coverage can be improved.

Dr Webster said the inadequacy of telecommunications across Mallee furthers the divide between metropolitan and regional communities.

“There’s absolutely no question this furthers the divide between people in the city and those in the country,” she said.

“One of the understandings that came out of COVID is the ability to work from home and if you’ve got connectivity both in terms of network and mobile coverage, you should be able to work from anywhere.

“When we want people to move out from the city and come to work in our regional areas, they need the assurance that connectivity is possible and they can do business.”

Operating on the Maryborough-Dunolly Road, Sonac’s managing director Simon Cox said changes to the USG and mandated mobile roaming would make a difference, but wouldn’t be the “ultimate” solution.

“Those changes won’t necessarily fix the black spot areas where there are no telecommunications towers, but it would certainly alleviate some of the challenges we have,” he said.

“It may not be the ultimate solution but it would certainly make a difference for a lot of people, myself included.”

He said mobile connectivity is something that crosses his mind on an almost daily basis and in a lot of cases, is unable to take calls in his office.

“It does cross my mind sort of daily, most people contact one another on mobiles these days,” he said.

“There are many times during the day that I’ll get a phone call on my mobile when I’m in my office and I’ll have to go outside or ring them back which is actually embarrassing as much as it is inefficient.

“You really want to have a clear and uninterrupted dialogue over the phone and I risk that in Maryborough which I find disturbing in a way.”

To provide feedback to the ACCC’s survey, head to consultation.accc.gov.au/accc/regional-mobile-infrastructure-inquiry/

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