Telstra calls to be freed from providing home phones
Telstra boss Andy Penn wants the telco to be released from its obligation to provide copper landlines to rural and remote parts of Australia but farmers and advocacy groups for the aged have demanded they first “guarantee” no Australian will be disadvantaged.
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Telstra wants to be freed from its obligation to provide traditional landlines to rural and remote parts of Australia.
The telco giant’s chief, Andy Penn, has called for it to be released from its universal service obligations to provide copper landlines, saying an available mobile connection should suffice.
But farmers and advocacy groups for the aged have demanded Telstra “guarantee” no Australian will be disadvantaged by the removal of landlines, before any decision or action is taken.
Aged and Disability Advocacy Australia chief Geoff Rowe said he worried elderly people living in the country could be hurt by the plan.
Victorian Farmers Federation president David Jochinke said while mobile phones were increasingly a tool of farmers and widely used, not all farmers had them.
He said significant improvements in mobile phone provision in some rural areas, “both in terms of data and voice”, would be needed.
Any move to do away with landlines would reshape how Telstra is required to meet its obligations in rural and remote communities, where in many places it must offer a fixed copper line telephone service.
As part of its universal service obligations, it must provide a house with a standard telephone service — known as a landline — if requested.
About half of all Australian households had a landline last year, according to figures from the Australian Communications and Media Authority.
Mr Rowe said rural elderly and disabled people could suffer if the telecommunications giant was allowed to be released from its universal service obligations.
“These are groups of people that don’t necessarily do technology very well,” he said.
“The intent of landlines being available is that people still have access and are able to make calls, without having to navigate the technology that’s associated with mobile phones.
“Older people and people that have a disability don’t have a lot of rights and when it comes to standing up against the big telcos and big companies, they’re often powerless.”
Mr Rowe said Telstra would need to prove nobody would be disadvantaged by the removal of copper landlines, before pushing ahead.
Most households can contract a telco to provide a landline service over the National Broadband Network’s fixed line network of cables.
About 8 per cent of households in rural and remote areas access the NBN via satellite or wireless technology.
In these areas Telstra, which is paid by both the government and its rivals to meet its universal service obligations, has been required to keep its copper phone lines.
But Mr Penn said this no longer made sense given government spending to eliminate mobile black spots had boosted remote area mobile coverage.
“Mobile ought to be able to provide a role in providing a basic telephony service but it is not allowed to at the moment,” he said. “We need to be very empathetic and sympathetic to the various different customers but not to the point where it is just completely uneconomic and inefficient.”
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