Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Universal Outdoor Mobile Obligation) Bill 2026

Senator ANANDA-RAJAH (Victoria) (13:11): I rise to speak on the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Universal Outdoor Mobile Obligation) Bill 2026. Connectivity is critical infrastructure. We take it for granted, but, when it breaks down, it can have devastating consequences.

This was best seen during the fires that affected Victoria in January, which were amongst the worst natural disasters in Victoria's history. These summer fires burned through 440,000 hectares, including more than 144,000 hectares in the Longwood region, a region that I had the privilege and opportunity to visit. This event had the largest agricultural impact from fire in Victoria's history.

There were 451 homes lost, with over 1,110 outhouses lost and 45,000 livestock losses. The shire of Murrindindi, in particular, was worst affected, but it also affected the shires of Mitchell, Mansfield and Strathbogie. It took the life of one Mansfield resident, cattle farmer Mr Max Hobson.

I want to describe the losses in Murrindindi because they speak to what this community had to go through and how they had to respond and recover when communications collapsed. That is the backdrop against the significance of having universal outdoor mobile coverage. This bill will enable communication, initially by text messaging, to happen anywhere you can see the sky.

I can't tell you how critical that is, but you need to understand the losses this community experienced. In Murrindindi, nearly 200 homes were destroyed along with over 400 sheds and outhouses. There were 1,157 properties impacted.

There were nearly 7,800 livestock losses, constituting $20 million in losses—5,600 sheep, over 1,500 cattle and nearly 500 beehives as well as poultry, goats, three horses, one pig and 40 other animals. Over 4,800 kilometres of fencing was destroyed, costing over $120 million to replace. I note that many farms were underinsured for fencing, plants and other infrastructure.

And, of course, there were impacts on the natural environment. An estimated 1,200 to 1,400 tree hollows were lost, affecting and impacting threatened species, like gang-gang cockatoos, powerful owls and yellow-tailed black cockatoos, which I see frequently when I travel to that region. During these catastrophic conditions, comms failed entirely, hampering the response and recovery of this community.

According to Telstra—and this came from the Victorian state government inquiry that happened shortly after—270 fixed and mobile sites went offline. With the fire starting on 7 January, some four days later, as many as 25 communities were identified as being at risk of losing all mobile and broadband services. Imagine that.

Courageous local emergency services were forced to relocate from their state-of-the-art relatively new facility in Alexandra to Seymour because the comms failed. They had to keep fighting without mobile connection. Can you imagine that?

Crews lost communication. Even digital radios that were relatively new on the CFA trucks failed because they did not work in black spots, leaving these crews vulnerable and unable to contact each other and unable to communicate with their incident controllers. I can't imagine the circumstances of this.

In the recovery phase, I spoke to one farmer who described what it was like. In searing heat, he had to bury carcases of his stock. In the midst of this, he had to get approval, and he had to use physical runners to send forms to the local state authorities to get permission to bury his stock, in searing heat, because the comms failed.

Under this law, as I said before, you will be able to get outdoor coverage via text messaging initially nearly anywhere if you can look up to see the sky. It could be a game changer, if we have another terrible fire season, as is being predicted. It will be enabled by LEO satellites.

From as early as 1 December 2027, this law requires Telstra, Optus and TPG to provide baseline outdoor coverage across Australia where reasonably possible, using their towers together with these low-Earth-orbit, or LEO, satellites. As of the beginning of this month, Telstra, Optus and TPG will activate temporary disaster roaming so that, when one network goes down during a severe weather event, customers can automatically be camped onto another network without losing service.

Combined with UOMO, this provides options; it provides layers of safeguards so that, when the chips are down, if comms fails, people have options. I hope we never again have to go through the kind of catastrophe and stress and anxiety that the community of Victoria, particularly in Murrindindi, experienced. I'd like to thank those firefighters, the CFA volunteers, the emergency personnel, the local leaders and the community members who welcomed me and share their stories and who have enabled this bill to come to pass.

I commend this bill to the Senate.