Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Minister for Urban Infrastructure) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Mayo for her question; she is absolutely right to make the point that it is very important that we have—to the maximum extent possible—redundancy in reliability in telecommunications networks, both fixed and mobile. And that includes robustness in the face of emergencies such as bushfires, which can, obviously, have an impact on the network and can also have an impact on individuals in their homes. So there are a number of principles that underpin the approach that the government is taking. One of those is to get the maximum degree of redundancy between fixed and mobile networks. If you are in a location which only has one network, you are more vulnerable than if you are in a location which has both a fixed network and a mobile network. That is the reason why the Turnbull government is committed to the Mobile Black Spot Program, with some 499 base stations to be delivered just under round 1 of that program—

Mr Rob Mitchell interjecting—

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