Ed Husic (Chifley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Consumer Protection) Bill 2013, which is fixed largely on improving the operation of the Do Not Call Register Act. This act reflected community sentiment that they wanted to see something done about telemarketing being used by a range of organisations. At one time I worked for electricity distributors, where deregulation had occurred and companies could pursue new customers. They employed a range of techniques to reach those customers and that included face-to-face doorknocking, which the member for Oxley reflected upon in his contribution to the House a few moments ago. You can now see affixed to the doorframes of most homes a small sticker requesting that people do not knock on doors for the purpose of marketing and peddling business. As a result of that sentiment, we had the establishment of a register to prevent people being disturbed at home by telemarketers.

The statistic that stood out for me in the second reading speech was that, with a population of 22 million Australians, nine million people have signed up and are asking that they not be contacted at home via telephone for the purpose of marketing. So there are 22 million people in this country, nine million households and nearly two-thirds of all the subscribers of fixed line telephone services say, 'Please don't call.' I do not think that reflects at all a degree of them not being sociable or being unfriendly but it does reflect in large part that they have made a determined decision that they do not want to be contacted at home as a way of someone trying to make money from them and that, when they do need to make a decision about how they wish to purchase or procure a product or service, they are quite fine doing that on their own and not being disturbed. It may be the case, as has also been reflected upon through the various contributions made by both sides of the House today, that people will make a decision that will ensure that their privacy after a long day at work is maintained. They do not feel like they need to jump through a series of hoops when people ask them all sorts of very intrusive questions about their purchasing habits or otherwise and wish to be put on this list.

So there have been three sets of amendments made to the consumer protections within the sector. Specifically, as I said, these amendments are designed to improve the efficiency of the act—largely to regulate unsolicited and unwanted calls. It provides that a person must not make or cause to make—which is an important distinction—a telemarketing call to an Australian number if the number is registered on the Do Not Call Register and the call is not a designated telemarketing call.

The explanatory memorandum to the bill indicates the problem has arisen. This amendment has been framed to try to tackle the problem. The explanatory memorandum says:

In some instances, the ACMA has encountered difficulty in establishing evidentiary links between the first person and the other party providing the telemarketing and/or fax marketing services. This has commonly arisen because agreements between the parties relate to the sale and/or marketing of the first person’s goods or services without any specific reference to the means by which the goods or services are to be sold and/or marketed.

These amendments are proposed to streamline the process for developing and amending industry codes under part 6 of the act. I have to commend the industry. No doubt they were very resistant initially to the change that was brought about. The member for Chisholm, with all due credit, at the time in opposition led a very active and energetic campaign to see this arise. I imagine that at that point in time it would have been quite confronting for the industry to be faced with the prospect of this act, but over time industry has recognised the value in responding to consumer sentiment and they have put in place their own codes. With work between the government and industry, industry is prepared to amend the codes. This amendment in particular enables industry codes to be varied rather than having the requirement that they be completely removed. It extends the application of the reimbursement scheme that helps develop consumer related industry codes, and that will also apply to varying those codes. It requires code developers to conduct transparent and accountable code development processes. They would do this by publishing on their websites the draft codes, the variations and any submissions received about them.

Another aspect of what is before the House involves amendments to improve the operation of the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman scheme. It does this in two ways. I want to reflect on the TIO as well, which has done a great job in being able to provide redress for people who feel that telecommunications service providers are not responding in a timely or helpful way to the complaints that are raised across a range of services, from telephony through to internet. The TIO, I have to say, has played a very important role within the sector to help address consumer sentiment or dissatisfaction in relation to the way that services are provided to them.

I will go to the two points that will see an improvement to the operation of the scheme.

Mr Fitzgibbon interjecting—

There are two, member for Hunter. I note the member for Hunter's long-term and consistent advocacy in the telecommunications space. I think his voice needs to be heard more often on these matters, but I understand he is focused very much in the agriculture space now, being a very active regional member. But, member for Hunter, it is good to see that the TIO, the government and specifically the member for Wentworth are seeing two amendments to the TIO scheme which we support. They will provide greater clarity about the ombudsman's role and expected standards of operation required by the TIO scheme to comply with standards determined by the minister. There will be periodic public reviews conducted by a person or body independent of the TIO and the telecommunications industry, which is another good development to ensure that there is an arms-length ability to look at the way that the scheme is working. It ensures that the operation of the scheme gives people a great degree of confidence in it. I will leave my comments at that. I am grateful for the audience.

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