Helen Coonan (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you to Senator Carol Brown for the question. I noticed Senator Conroy trying to give her a bit of a tutorial before she asked the question. Look, I am very pleased to deal with this question. Telstra’s plan is to abolish the telecommunications-specific competition laws. Telstra, of course, is reacting to increasing competition in the sector and, if it were to succeed in that, Australia would be the only country in the OECD not to have a telecommunications-specific regime. I can only go on what Telstra itself published in its actual brochure that it sent around to all its shareholders. This is a direct quote from Telstra:

We must ALL tell them to get rid of the regulations that only apply to Telstra and stifle investment in broadband infrastructure.

That is a direct quote. What might they be? What might be the safeguards that only apply to Australia? Let me tell you, Mr President, that they include the 22c capped untimed local calls across Australia, they include the priority assistance with life-threatening health conditions and they include bill assistance for low-income earners, including pensioner discounts.

The interesting question here is not what Telstra is doing but what the Labor Party supports. For several weeks now, the Labor Party has simply refused to rule out that it is backing a campaign to abolish the entire telecommunications competition framework and the important consumer safeguards like priority assistance, 22c capped untimed local calls, bill assistance and the Network Reliability Framework. Obviously, the Labor Party does not know what it can possibly do with the telecommunications regime. It has not ruled out abolishing these important consumer safeguards such as priority assistance. I hereby challenge the Labor Party: say what you will do; say what you will rule in and what you will rule out.