Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Triple Zero Custodian and Emergency Calling Powers) Bill 2025

Mrs McINTOSH (Lindsay) (10:25): I rise today to speak on the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Triple Zero Custodian and Emergency Calling Powers) Bill 2025. What a disgraceful display of behaviour by those opposite, refusing to have scrutiny in this parliament when it comes to the triple 0 network and allowing all those Australians who have experienced triple 0 outages and our emergency services personnel to have their say, or to have light shone onto the disasters that have been happening in the triple 0 network—the crisis of the triple 0 network.

We are here today discussing this because we have a rushed piece of legislation. It's policy on the run in its worst form. This legislation is far from perfect.

If it had been moved 18 months ago—even 12 months ago—would it have stopped the September outage, when four lives were lost? We haven't even had time, because it came to us with less than 24 hours notice, to stress test or scenario test it. Those scenario tests will now have to happen in real life, and with that come extraordinary risk as to whether the legislation will actually work.

We are only debating this today because of the catastrophic Optus outage that happened on 18 September this year. This was no ordinary outage. This outage went on for around 13 hours.

It was completely undetected. People in South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory were unable to call triple 0 in their greatest time of need. There were warning signs that this was going to happen, but those were ignored.

There were customer complaints to the Optus call centre from people who couldn't connect to triple 0, yet none of these raised an immediate red flag. It astounds me that anyone who calls their telco provider saying they can't get through to triple 0 is not taken seriously. It is completely unacceptable.

From the information we have right now, more than 600 calls failed to connect with emergency services during that 13-hour outage. But we don't know if that is all. We don't know with any certainty how many more there might be.

Tragically, as I said, four people lost their lives. Their families and their friends are mourning the loss of their loved ones. This is not politics; this is real life.

People have died. And it breaks all of our hearts here. I cannot emphasise enough how absolutely and unequivocally unacceptable this outage was, and the way it was handled by everyone involved is a disgrace.

Optus has failed Australians. They have failed in not detecting this abhorrent error in their systems, which denied Australians in emergency situations connection to help—help that we promise will be there in people's greatest time of need. This is a service which the minister yesterday agreed is the most critical service in our telecommunications system.

Optus also failed to tell Australians what was going on for more than 32 hours after this catastrophic failure of their network. They have failed to be open and transparent about what actually went wrong. On Saturday 19 September, the CEO of Optus, Stephen Rue, promised he would provide daily updates.

He fronted of the media just three more times—then radio silence. I have tried to secure a meeting with the CEO twice now—more radio silence. He did have time to meet with the minister yesterday and Senator Sarah Hanson-Young.

I hope they had a nice cup of tea. Optus have said this was human error. What does this even mean?

Did someone forget to flick a switch, plug something in or code something correctly in their systems upgrade? What was this error, and how can we ensure it doesn't happen again? It is everyone's guess right now, because no-one is talking—19 days on, we know little more than we did on the evening of 19 September.

But Optus are not the only ones who have failed here. They are not the only ones whose systems are broken. The department of communications and the regulator, ACMA, have also failed.

Exactly what did they do with the first notifications that came through on 18 September from Optus? Optus had to let them know by law. What on earth did they do with the subsequent emails that Optus sent that provided updates on the outage?

These are the questions that I have been asking for three weeks, yet the department and the regulator, ACMA, are unwilling to speak about it. That old adage that silence is the greatest admission of guilt has never been more true. Worse, the Albanese Labor government have been praying that this would just go away.

In fact, the Minister for Communications has found plenty of time to go to New York and the AFL grand final in Melbourne and attend last week's NRL grand final in Sydney, just to name a few. We have the selfies to prove it. But she didn't have time to tell you, the people of Australia, who are dependent on triple 0 in your greatest time of need, what she is doing to protect you and to fix this broken triple 0 system.

Yesterday in question time, the Minister for Communications was asked to confirm that neither she nor her office was notified of the catastrophic outage that occurred on Thursday 18 September before the afternoon of 19 September when Optus advised the media. The minister stood here, right across from where I am now, and said: Yes; I can confirm we were not notified of the catastrophic outage until late afternoon on Friday 19 September.

Let me tell you where that story falls apart. On 25 September, David Swan from the Age newspaper published a story titled 'The emails that reveal how Optus downplayed the triple zero disaster'. In this article, Mr Swan cites two emails sent by Optus to the minister's staff at 2.45 pm and 2.52 pm on Thursday 18 September—a whole day prior to what the minister stood here yesterday in question time and told the Australian public was when she knew about it.

Mr Wallace: That can't be right, surely? Mrs McINTOSH: This is the question that the minister should be answering—it can't be right. These first alerts, although lacking in detail, said that services were down in South Australia and Western Australia and that welfare checks were being conducted.

Calls to triple 0 had been impacted. The minister's office was notified directly by Optus. This was the first warning sign; it was ignored.

The minister has spoken strongly of the need to rebuild trust and confidence in the triple 0 network, so Australians can have faith that the service will work. Let me tell you, on behalf of the thousands of Australians who have contacted me about this, when every single player in this catastrophic event—Optus, ACMA as the regulator, the department of communications and the minister and her office—has failed to fess up about what they knew when, this is not rebuilding trust.

Like rubbing salt in a wound, the minister has tasked ACMA as the regulator to investigate the outage. How on earth can ACMA investigate themselves? How on earth can ACMA investigate what went wrong when they are part of the failed process?

What kind of alternate universe are you living in on that side of the House? We may have taken a walloping at the last election, but the arrogance of those on that side of the House is appalling. Wake up to yourselves.

It's time to get off your backsides, out of cloud nine, and start delivering for the Australian people. They need to have reliability. They need to have security.

They need to be able to call triple 0 in their greatest time of need. According to the minister, the triple 0 custodian has been operational since March this year in her department—the very same department that got the alert email from Optus the day of the outage and did nothing with the email. What exactly has this person or persons been doing since March?

Clearly not checking their emails from Optus about a triple 0 outage where four people have died. What astounds me most is that it's taken yet another absolute crisis with Optus to get this weak, lazy Albanese government off their backsides, and they still don't have a clue. If the role was established back in March, why wasn't it legislated then?

If the role was fully operational back in March without legislative authority, why does it need it now? And how much are Australian taxpayers paying for this custodian who can't even check an email? This is nothing but a dog-and-pony show from this arrogant government who think they can do whatever they want, whenever they want, and nothing is going to happen.

Nothing to see here. You failed to act back in 2023, but at least the former communications minister, now the Attorney-General, had the good sense to do an independent investigation. The current minister has refused to do this at every turn, and, like a broken record on repeat, the minister has continued to say that ACMA is the appropriate body—even though they're involved in the broken process and the failure to do the investigation.

They are not the appropriate body. It is clear to everyone. They failed to alert the minister when the first warning bells were rung.

Why is this not important? Why is the minister not holding them to account? ACMA and the minister's department have failed to brief.

They have failed to update the minister on the Bean review recommendations and where they are at. The minister said on Saturday that 12 recommendations were completed. The minister said yesterday that 13 recommendations had been completed.

An honourable member: Another quick one! The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Dr Freelander ): Order! We can do without the echo, thanks.

Mrs McINTOSH: Details matter here. Details do really matter. People's lives are at risk.

You've got to be across your brief; you've got to get it together. With something this important, this is absolutely critical. So here we are.

The bill is being rushed through parliament at 10 seconds to midnight because this government wants to appear like it is doing something. The government's failure to act on the recommendations of the Bean review, which it accepted and agreed to in full 18 months ago, is lazy and shows disregard for our vital triple 0 network. This bill, at face value, does little more than add bureaucratic layers to an existing process that already has multiple failure points.

I implore you to do a full review of the triple 0 ecosystem. I implore the minister to conduct that independent review. Find out the failure points, fix them and ensure that this system works.

The minister cannot continue to patchwork quilt or apply bandaids to something that isn't working. Australians deserve more. They expect more.

It is on the minister as the steward of the system to deliver that, and I won't stop. I won't back down. It might get annoying to some, but, when a system so important is broken, you need to do your job.

You need to fix it. I foreshadow that I will be moving detailed amendments to strengthen this bill, even though we have been given 24 hours notice, because, unlike those opposite, I want to properly fix and protect the triple 0 network. Colleagues on this side have been doing all they can over those few hours to contribute to fixing the system, because we care.

We care about Australians when they are in their greatest need. People are depending on us to get this right, so we will support this bill, and I implore—I deeply, deeply mean it—the Albanese Labor government to support my amendments. We come across a little bit aggressive now, but it's because we care about Australians, and we're moving these amendments because we know they will strengthen this bill.

Albert Einstein said that the only thing more dangerous than ignorance is arrogance. Don't let it blind your actions here. Do what is right and what will ensure that all Australians are safe and can call triple 0 when they really need it.