Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the Broadcasting Services Amendment (Community Radio) Bill 2022. Community broadcasting plays an incredibly vital service in my electorate of Mayo. According to the Community Broadcasting Association of Australia, approximately 5.3 million Australians listen to local news, community information, music and talkback every week on more than 500 community broadcast stations across the country, two-thirds of which are in regional and rural Australia.

I'd like to give a shout-out to some of mine. We're talking about, down the south coast, Happy FM, Fleurieu FM and Alex FM, at Goolwa. Moving further up, we have Tribe FM. They're based at Willunga and they share the license with McLaren Vale's Triple Z. Then we have Lofty radio, based in the Adelaide Hills. I'd also like to give a shout-out to one that stretches—sort of leaks—out of its licence area, and that's Coast FM. Even though it is based in Glandore, which I think is probably in the member for Boothby's electorate, the signal goes far. Coast FM was where I got my start in community radio back in 1992 or 1993, a long time ago and, that's the thing, it's a great training ground for young people—I was a young person back then—and it's a great for retired people as well. What I see across most of my community radio stations is you have older people and younger people all coming together and sharing and enjoying their time together and communicating with their community, whether it be talk back or radio. I actually had a country music program—an award-winning program, I might just say—and that's why I had to correct the member for Lyons: country and western are actually two kinds of music. It is really important and it has such a variety on community radio that you don't get on commercial stations.

I think a lot of people don't realise that community radio presenters and producers do all the work themselves. If you are in a commercial radio setting, all you are doing is pressing buttons all day and reading out essentially the script you are given. Whereas in community radio, it is far more fluid, far more dynamic because it is all about what that individual programmer is doing and how they are connecting with our community. Really, anything goes on community radio, and I love my community radio stations in Mayo.

Community radio plays such an important part in the lives of so many Australians. I think we particularly felt that in Mayo during the bushfires in December 2019. It was our community radio stations that were providing real on-the-ground knowledge. Of course, we have the ABC as well but this is particularly prevalent and important for those who don't have other forms of communication. During the bushfires we lost towers and, really, it was essentially the radio only. I've been remiss; I have missed one radio station in my electorate on Kangaroo Island—that is, KIX FM. KIX FM, during the bushfires, were extraordinary in sharing information with the community.

So aside from what's in my electorate, back in 2020 I ended up driving to Canberra because there were limited flights, at times no flights, and I wanted some staff to come with me. I have to say it was community radio that shared the journey with me on the drive over here. When I am back in my community, like the Speaker, I take time to go and spend time in my local community radio stations, share with them what is happening in this place. It's great when I'm stopped by young people in particular who say they learn a lot more about the parliament and what happens in here after those interviews, so it's great to be able to sit down and have those chats It is also really good for local small businesses because they often don't have a huge amount to spend on advertising whereas becoming a sponsor of their local community radio station is affordable and they are directly connecting with other locals.

I would like to thank the government for the additional $4 million they have announced in the budget. It's a really welcome amount of funding. What we need to do is ensure there is sustainability in community radio station networks because we have seen in my electorate the loss of Hills Radio. Even though the population has increased, we have not seen an increase in a number of community radio stations. The northern part of my electorate could certainly do with its own community radio. I have two radio stations that are on temporary licences in my electorate—ZZZ FM sharing with Tribe FM; they share 50-50 the time together, 3½ days each—so when moving over to permanent licences, we need to look at each community radio station and its needs individually because, from my understanding, for those stations it's a happy arrangement and they have been able to make it work really well.

I don't want them to be forced into a certain licensing arrangement, or even having a permanent licence and perhaps having to merge. It's really important that we nurture community radio. I don't know about other community radio stations, but, really, most of the time, these radio stations are run out of older houses, older buildings or older demountables. Just getting the resources together to be able to afford a desk and soundproofing, let alone having turntables, CD players or digital equipment—it's incredibly expensive. So having more resources and grants available to provide community radio stations with improved technology is critical. When I first started, there were two record turntables. They were still relatively new and exciting. But we had the old ABC desk that was quite geriatric in its application. I'm sure we can do a lot more in this place. It really is pocket change when we look at the budget with respect to sharing some money with community radio. They really do get good bang for their buck, because it's run entirely by volunteers.

This is an excellent bill. I give a shout out to my local community radio station, and to those hundreds of community radio stations right across Australia, you are an excellent training ground. We've had so many stars in radio on commercial channels who started their life in community radio. More power to community radio. I hope it's a medium that can grow, strengthen, prosper and flourish in the decades to come.

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