Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

There was no replacement on the cards when Keating decided that would be it—sunset, finished. In December 1999 it was all over. We are back to those days. Then we were able to initiate, through the enormous efforts of the former Deputy Prime Minister, Tim Fischer, having a CDMA network installed for rural and regional Australians. He identified that this was a network that could be up and running relatively quickly. But even then, when we had that CDMA network up and running relatively quickly, we had enormous fallout because the CDMA coverage did not extend to where the analog coverage had extended previously. That was supposedly called ‘fortuitous’ coverage by Telstra and others when they were rolling out their CDMA and we were having complaints and people who had been used to having mobile phones no longer had a service. But they had ‘fortuitous’ coverage.

This is exactly the same problem that is going to occur now. This is a safeguard, a protection, for Australian television viewers, primarily in rural and regional areas, when it is determined that the switch-over should occur—unlike the analog CDMA service. In fact, when Telstra were introducing 3G, I was still trying to fill the black spots of the CDMA service. Now 3G is in there and I still have enormous black spots. Do the members of this House and the government not learn from experience? Do they not have these same issues in their electorates? I am sure they do. But are they willing to speak out on them? That is the very great difference.

These are particularly relevant amendments that focus on the transmission black spots and the transparency of the legislation. There is an enormous amount of work needed to rectify the black spots in advance of the switch-over, and you need to know where those black spots are. There need to be studies of where those black spots are. I live in the city of Wagga Wagga of 60,000 people. My house sits right in a black spot. It does not bother me, but the fact of the matter is there are people in regional centres who are in black spots as well. It is not just that you think we on this side of the House expect the coverage to extend to every gum tree, to every kangaroo and to every wombat in Australia. You treat us as though we are gum trees, kangaroos and wombats that do not deserve consideration when it comes to having access to the primary fundamentals that are available to all other people.

This is a sensible proposal to recognise where these black spots are before the shutdown of analog occurs. Without these amendments there is no incentive, there is no pressure, to make any changes. There is no incentive to ensure that people are not going to be left just watching black screens. We have been there before. We have done that—

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