Tony Zappia (Makin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I join with other speakers who have made absolutely clear the vital service that is provided by community radio stations right around the country. It is a service that, as the member for Perth has again quite rightly pointed out, is provided by some 450 stations around the country. Five million people tune in every week to listen to it and, importantly, services are provided in about a hundred different languages. The Albanese Labor government clearly understands the importance of the service, and I commend the minister, who is with us today, for the allocation of an additional $4 million towards the provision of community radio across the country.

My association with community radio goes back decades. I was associated with the establishment of 5PBA-FM on 89.7 in Salisbury many years ago. That station is still going strong, and while I'm on my feet I commend Denise Guest who, for many, many years, until she passed away, was the station manager out there. A few years later her daughter Angela took over and provided a wonderful service for the local community. It's a service that I'm frequently asked to join in with, and I've appeared on many programs there. Indeed, I'm familiar with not only the presenters, but with the range of different programs that are provided to the wider community.

With respect to the services more broadly, I will just say this: community radio does a couple of very critical things for us as a country and for us as individuals. Firstly, as others have quite rightly pointed out, it provides a wonderful training platform for people who want to make a career out of broadcasting or similar types of skills and similar professions. Secondly, it also provides services at critical times to local communities—in particular, services for the 100 different languages that I referred to earlier. As a frequent guest on the Italian radio stations in Adelaide—Radio Italia Uno 87.6 and Radio Italiana 531 on the AM band—I know how many people of the local Italian community listen to that station to get information about government services and the like. Importantly, it also provides people with the ability to tune into information that is not generally broadcast on the mainstream radio stations. And I think that is critically important, particularly when it comes to local communities.

Again, as has also been raised with regard to this legislation, one of the issues we often talk about in this parliament is media diversity. I believe, through community radio stations, we're able to at least do something about trying to ensure there is no absolute control of media in this country, and those five million listeners each week are listeners that might otherwise have only tuned into the commercial radio stations, which are dominated by certain players in the industry sector. Again, community radio does all of that.

There are a couple of issues that I've noted during my time and my association with community radio. The first issue is that, generally, they're only able to access what I call the extreme bandwidths, the ones on the very edges, and so their reception is not terribly good outside of their immediate location. That's something I would like to see addressed because I know that some of those stations try to have a reach that goes beyond where they are broadcasting from, but, unfortunately, they quite often find it difficult. The other issue for community groups is that trying to get a license has often proved very difficult. If you put the licenses up there, just as a broad auction based scheme, then it means those with money are more likely to get the licenses than those without money. Again, I think that creates problems for smaller groups who have a wonderful service and have the best intentions at heart, but simply can't get a license.

I don't want to hold up the debate any longer than necessary, but I think this legislation goes a long way to making sure that the licences are administered and issued in a much fairer way. The whole management and process of getting the licenses is streamlined and that will make it so much easier because I know, from my discussions with the management committees of the radio stations that I'm familiar with, that sometimes that can be cumbersome. This process, as outlined in this legislation, will simplify the whole process for everybody. I commend the legislation to the House.

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