Gary Humphries (ACT, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to Senator Coonan, the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts. I ask the minister: could she update the Senate on any evidence regarding the success of the government’s competitive telecommunications regime, and is she aware of any alternative policies?

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

Thank you, Senator Humphries, for your ongoing interest in telecommunications. Senator Humphries would be well aware that the evidence is mounting in support of the government’s competitive telecommunications regime. The latest ACCC reports on competitive safeguards and the prices paid for telecommunications services in Australia have now been released. I am very pleased to inform the Senate that the ACCC has reported a major reduction in the average overall price for telecommunications services, and a more competitive environment in 2004-05.

The key result for the 2004-05 financial year is that overall average prices paid by consumers for telecommunications services fell in real terms by a further 6.6 per cent. It is one of the biggest overall drops in telecommunications prices that Australia has seen. Prices had already fallen by 20 per cent since the government’s competitive reforms in 1997, and this further 6.6 per cent decrease in prices now takes the overall reduction in prices since 1997 to 26.2 per cent—that is more than a quarter. Despite the hysteria from some, the claims that the government should own phone companies to effectively regulate them is simply not borne out by these kinds of results, and the government system is working. Service standards have improved, new services are available in regional areas which, just a few years ago, were making do with party-line services and, of course, now prices have fallen by a quarter.

The ACCC report found that mobile phone prices fell the most, with a 13 per cent reduction in 2004-05 and a 36 per cent reduction in mobile phone prices since 1997. There were also significant reductions in the prices for national long-distance, international long-distance and fixed-to-mobile calls, continuing the trend of the previous six years.

A second ACCC report tabled this week, the Telecommunications competitive safeguards report for 2004-05, shows ongoing progress in the development of competition, new technologies becoming available and, of course, the industry on the verge of making significant advances in service delivery. Quite apart from being a short answer, it is a very succinct one. It shows that this government’s policies are working to deliver real benefits to consumers in Australia, while the Labor Party, I am sad to say, continues to be trapped in the past, pushing a one-dimensional policy of owning the phone company. Consumers continue to reap the benefits of a competitive market.

There is no doubt that there are no alternative policies that would amount to a coherent telecommunications policy, but this government will continue to do the things that make all the difference to how people can live, work and do business in rural and regional Australia and still have access to good communications.