Mr SCHULTZ (5:47 PM) —I rise tonight to discuss the lack of mobile phone coverage for my constituents. Since the analog shutdown, there has been a large number of people who do not have any mobile coverage whatsoever and are not likely to have any coverage for at least 12 months. A lot of those people depend on mobile coverage to run their businesses. It is interesting how Telstra runs for cover on some of these issues. The Mayor of Harden Shire, Chris Manchester, is obviously very upset, as are a number of my constituents.

In July last year, the mayor was informed that Telstra would be putting up a tower in Harden. Following that, the building site, which was purchased in September last year, was approved by Harden Shire Council, and the Harden Shire Council was led to believe that it was going to be put up in December last year. Now Telstra have abandoned the idea and told council that it is not going ahead at all. I find that reprehensible because Telstra are using the excuse that those people in the Harden Shire area and indeed those between Harden and Boorowa have been getting analog signals accidentally because the signals have been coming to them from outside the designated area for the analog coverage. That may well be so, but I have yet to see any concrete proof.

The point that I am making here is that, despite Telstra making that comment, during the last four to five years many of those people have been paying Telstra for the use of that service. In fact, one of my constituents, Mr Ross Flanery, who has a property called Goonawarra at Galong, which is between Harden and Boorowa, used five handpieces to get that analog service and is dependent on mobile phones to run his business. In correspondence to me on 31 July, he made the comment:

I find it unbelievable that Telstra would go to the Harden Shire Council, tell them that they intended to put up a tower, go through the process of purchasing a site at Demondrille—which is within Harden Shire—seek development approval from the Harden Shire Council to put the tower up, have the development approval granted by Harden Shire and then tell them that unfortunately, whilst they may have said the tower was on the short list, they may get a tower but it will not occur until 12 or 18 months down the track.

If that is the way that Telstra is treating rural communities in terms of the turning off of the analog system and the switching over to the CDMA network, one can understand why there is considerable angst and anger coming from many of the rural backbenchers about this issue and why there is talk of the backbenchers making amendments to the act to make telecommunications carriers such as Telstra responsible for ensuring that communities that had some means of communication through the old mobile system get a replacement mobile system which allows them to carry on their businesses as they have done over the last four or five years of the analog system.

I can assure Telstra that this issue is not going to go away. If they want some adverse publicity, as the member for Hume I will give them plenty of publicity out there in the public arena until such time as they recognise that rural people have a right to expect the telecommunications that many of the urban dwellers in this country take for granted. I thank honourable members for the opportunity to raise this issue in the House tonight. (Time expired)