John Forrest (Mallee, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to use adjournment to report to the House on the outcome of digital television conversion in my constituency. When I was first elected in 1993, I realised just how significant access to television really is. At that stage I inherited the broadcast facilities at Mildura, which is the strongest community centre of my whole electorate but at that stage had only two television channels: the ABC and a commercial channel, which was left over from what was a locally owned television channel at that time. Mildura missed out completely on aggregation in the 1980s. It worked very hard with what was then the Australian Broadcasting Authority and succeeded in ultimately getting all five channels that the rest of my constituency had access to. One of those channels had a very unique ownership between the Nine Network and the Seven Network, who joined together to present the Channel 10 Southern Cross signal—a very unique occurrence in Australia. What that meant was that there was a very high concentration of digital set-top boxes in Mildura—the highest in the nation, with 80 per cent penetration.

So in late 2009, when the government announced that my constituency was going to be first, I did groan, knowing just how serious an issue television access is. But, to the government's credit and the credit of Senator Conroy, the minister—I know he worked extra hard, because the whole nation was watching what would happen at Mildura—the outcome, despite considerable teething problems, seems to have settled down. But it has left me with television access problems in the remote locations of my constituency. There were five—or really six—principal transmission sites: one at Yatpool, just near Mildura; one at Goschen, near Swan Hill; one at Mount Lawloit, halfway beneath Nhill and Kaniva; and one at Mount Arapiles, projecting a signal into Horsham. Then the eastern edge of my constituency had access to television out of Bendigo and Ballarat.

I gauge the success of this on the level of complaints I receive, and I say to the people of Mildura: the complaints have settled down, but if you do have a complaint then first get the best technical advice you can. We have learnt a lot.

I note the anxiety that many of my New South Wales colleagues are enduring now as they run through the same battle that we had way back in 2009. Get in touch with Emma Dawson, who is one of Senator Conroy's principal officers. She is a brilliant officer and I give her all the credit. She is just so keen and so committed to the task and was an enormous success and enormous support through the dramas that I had, and she continues to be so because we still have some problems on the eastern corner at Barham and Koondrook with the new transmitter there. There were seven transmitters and we now have double that number, but it just does not seem to have worked at Koondrook because of the deficiencies of the digital signal. It just does not have what the analogue signal gave us, which was good geographic coverage. It had the capacity to go around wet gum trees, which the digital signal does not, so ongoing problems exist at Koondrook. It is not sufficient to say that they can have an alternative service via satellite. They used to have good television prior to the conversion.

The other deficiency I am having is along the Henty Highway between Hopetoun and Beulah. I think I might have to concede for Beulah and have to recommend that they take the opportunity to utilise the satellite system that the government has set up under VAST—that is, Viewer Access Satellite Television. It seems to be the only solution that will come for Beulah. Hopetoun is a different kettle of fish. There are now two transmitters sending separate signals into Hopetoun, and that is an ongoing issue on which I am corresponding with the minister. Again, I say to the constituents of Beulah and Hopetoun: get the best technical advice. They have learned so much now. Before you complain to me, and I am quite prepared to take the representations onwards, I need to be satisfied that the best technical advice has been obtained in respect of the aerial and the cabling and the nature of the desktop box, or even the digital television you have purchased.

Maria Vamvakinou (Calwell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, member for Mallee. It is good to hear you give credit to advisers and staff, whom we all depend upon.