Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

Clearly what the minister and Senator Joyce have signed up to is then going to rip the heart out of the bush with the removal of these payphones. What we are going to have is the minister and Senator Joyce hanging up on the bush—not only some nebulous bush but his own neighbourhood. You can imagine that payphones provide a lifeline to many people in Australian society but they also play a role in ensuring that those who cannot afford a mobile, or do not want a mobile, have the ability to access a payphone. That is another fundamental role which a telecommunications carrier such as Telstra should be able to provide to Australians.

Senator Joyce has made sure, by signing up to Senator Coonan’s Telstra plan, that we will not have the universal service obligation as good as it should be. To be fair to Senator Joyce, he was probably either sucked in by the persuasiveness of Senator Coonan or, in fact, mugged by her—one or the other. That is his choice in this. I think that, if he had known the truth, he would not have hung up on the bush. If he had been able to say, ‘This is going to be the result where we get lists out of Maranoa and not only Maranoa but places like Rockhampton—(Time expired)