David Coleman (Banks, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Communications) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Communications Legislation Amendment (Regional Broadcasting Continuity) Bill 2024. Why is this called the 'Regional Broadcasting Continuity Bill'? The reason it's called that is because the continuation of regional broadcasting has just stopped in Mildura. In Mildura, one of our great centres in Australia, as of yesterday, Channel Ten is no longer being broadcast. Channel Ten in Mildura is a joint venture between WIN and Channel Seven, and the companies have said that for some years now the cost of running that business has exceeded the revenue, and that they had been trying and trying to come to some sensible resolution with this government which would enable them to continue to broadcast in Mildura. They said that no such resolution was provided—or, frankly, even an idea—by the government and that consequently they have shut down that service.

The issue about Mildura potentially closing has been on the agenda for a very long time. This is not a new issue and it's something that WIN has discussed over a significant period of time. WIN announced that the closure would occur on 30 June. When did the government introduce legislation related to the closure of Mildura, which was slated to occur on 30 June? When did the government actually introduce legislation to deal with this issue? On 26 June—four days before. That's when the government introduced the legislation. And what does the legislation say? It's quite extraordinary legislation, and I'll come to the detail in a moment. But I have here a letter that was sent to the Prime Minister on 18 June and signed by, it appears, all the television networks in Australia. It has Jeff Howard, the chief executive of Seven West Media; Mike Sneesby, the chief executive of Nine; Beverley McGarvey from Channel Ten; John Kelly from Southern Cross Austereo; Andrew Lancaster from WIN; Amy Wilshire from Imparja Television; and Bridget Fair from Free TV Australia. Those executives said to the Prime Minister that the closure of Mildura shows that things are getting desperate for regional television in Australia and that they needed his assistance to keep the lights on—to allow those broadcasts to continue.

They talked about the many pressures facing the industry, but what they pointed to in particular was what's known as the commercial broadcasting tax. This is a tax charged by government to broadcasters and it raises about $46 million a year. Because it's charged based on how much of the airwaves you use, regional broadcasters pay a disproportionately large amount—regional broadcasters, obviously, cover large areas and so they pay a disproportionately large amount of this $46 million. The CEOs wrote to the Prime Minister in good faith and said: 'We don't want to close Mildura and we don't want to close other regional broadcasters. What we need is a three-year moratorium on that commercial broadcasting tax.' Of course, that dovetails with policy that's already been announced by the coalition, and in fact was announced in last year's budget reply back in May, where the Leader of the Opposition said alongside the reforms that we would introduce to remove gambling advertising from live sport we would get rid of the commercial broadcasting tax. So one side of politics said, 'Yes, we are going to do this thing that is so important.'

So the CEOs write their letter in good faith, 18 June, and, to my knowledge, have not received a substantive response. On 30 June, what happens? Mildura television closes down; channel 10 closes down. If you live in Mildura today and you try to flick onto channel 10—nothing. Gone. This bill, which the government introduced four days before the closure of the Mildura service, is the government's attempt to address that issue. It is pretty remarkable what the government is suggesting here.

What this bill does is basically say, 'If you live in Mildura and you can't watch channel 10, we have a solution for you: you can get a satellite service.' Okay, but there is fine print which is, to get the satellite dish, you have to pay about $800. Imagine you are in Mildura, no more channel 10. Many people will access it through digital means but, if you can't access it through digital, you can't access it through the air waves because it is no longer there, so what does the government say to you four days before the thing is going to be shut down? 'Go and pay $800, buy a satellite dish just for the purpose of watching channel 10.' Look, channel 10 has a lot of fantastic programming—no doubt—but how many people are going to pay $800 so they can watch Ready Steady Cook? I don't know but I suspect it is not going to be a large number of people who are going to be particularly excited—Project fans though they may be—to go out and spend $800 on a satellite dish. This is the solution that this government has come up with four days before switchoff.

The network CEOs have very clearly stated there is a solution here and it is to provide tax relief on the commercial broadcasting tax, which hits the regionals really hard. If you are a regional broadcaster, obviously it is a much smaller market than if you are broadcasting into Sydney or Melbourne, so you have much lower advertising revenue, but, through this commercial broadcasting tax, you are paying quite a lot of tax. So the broadcasters are saying, 'Give us some relief from that tax.' This government said, 'No, we're not going to do that. What we're going to do is say, "Hey, people of Mildura, why don't you go and spend $800 on a satellite dish just to watch channel 10? You don't need it for nine or seven or other channels because they still work but channel 10 doesn't."'

The member for Mallee, who is in the chamber, I suspect, would have a better idea on this than me, but if you did a poll on the streets of Mildura and said, 'How do you feel about paying $800 to watch channel 10?' There would probably not be a lot of enthusiasm. But that is this minister's solution. Her solution is to say to the people of Mildura, 'You can still watch channel 10, but we want you to pay $800 for a satellite dish and you only need it for channel 10 because everything else will continue to work.' That is just very, very concerning. This is in the middle of Labor's cost-of-living crisis. As we know, many people in regional Australia are on lower incomes than people in metropolitan Australia. Who has a lazy $800 in Mildura to spend so they can watch channel 10? I don't think there would be many people in that position.

The lack of foresight, the lack of rigour, the lack of planning, the lack of strategic focus on the part of this government and this minister means we are in this situation in the parliament four days before switchoff. And, of course, we're only debating it today. It's actually two days after they switched it off, on 30 June. So two days after it's been switched off we're debating what to do.

Free TV has been quite scathing on this. Bridget Fair, always a very passionate advocate for the industry that she represents, said:

This legislation merely allows Mildura viewers the option of installing a satellite dish at their own expense to receive the remote area VAST service to replace their Network 10 services.

While this gives Mildura residents an option to replace their lost services, it is not a fair or reasonable solution, new satellite installation can cost upwards of $800.

She went on to observe, with great clarity:

In a cost-of-living crisis this is simply not realistic for many Australians just to access the television services that are available for free to everyone else.

It's extraordinary.

The member for Mallee has been articulating with such passion the situation that the residents of Mildura find themselves in, because this is actually unique to Mildura. Now, the fear is—and the CEOs talk about this in their letter—it might not be unique to Mildura in the future; this could easily happen in other country towns. And is the government's response to those towns seriously going to be, 'Hey, pay $800 to get a satellite dish to keep watching Channel 10'? The CEOs, in their letter, talk about the issues that are arising here. They say that we are now in a position where regional licensees have been forced to start turning off unprofitable licenses. The shareholders of Mildura Digital Television can no longer subsidise the losses incurred. They also say—and this is an important point. I mentioned before that, unfortunately, Mildura may not be the last. In their letter to the Prime Minister, the CEOs say, 'Decisions such as those in relation to Mildura and other challenged markets can be expected to continue into the future.' So Mildura is not going to be the last, and this proposal is a three-year relief on this bill.

But it is sometimes hard to understand the positions taken by the communications minister on so many different issues. Obviously, it's the judgement of the minister that we talk about here, given that the minister has put this legislation before parliament. As we've seen today widely reported in the media, this is the same minister who welcomed the NBN price increases of up to 14 per cent in eight months as great news for consumers. This is the same minister who, in response to the eSafety Commissioner's call for a trial of age assurance technology to protect children, wrote, in a letter to the Prime Minister in July last year, that that would be an unnecessary distraction, only to adopt that position some nine or 10 months later. It's part of a pattern of very concerning conduct by this minister.

The other part of the bill which I should mention is a sensible change to enable broadcasters to use effectively less spectrum when they broadcast, should they choose to do so. That is technically not allowed under the rules at present. So what this bill would do is enable that to occur. This is a sensible thing. It's good for the networks, it's good for the government and it's good for the efficient use of spectrum management.

This is a very concerning situation. There are some 70,000 viewers in the Mildura region who will no longer be able to see Channel 10, and the minister's response is, 'Pay $800 for a satellite dish.' It's very difficult to understand. I know the member for Mallee will have a lot more to say about this, given that this so directly affects her community. Unfortunately, this same issue may affect other regional communities in the future.

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