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Australia Telecommunications Regulations

The Australian Telecommunications Regulations are currently similar to that of New Zealand prior to the Telecommunications Amendment Act

Telstra holds all the cards, as did Telecom NZ, with the local loop under attack by the Australian Government ACCC to become accessible by downstream third party players.

Ministry Support

Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Hon Stephen Conroy, gets that broadband has become the fourth utility.

Conroy supports the Australian high court decision validating the regulatory environment, adding that "Fibre to the home is a challenge.....Fibre to the node should be seen as a stepping stone to FTTP".

The government is moving aggressively to implement a national broadband network. In March 2008, it announced a new Fibre to the Node Panel – a mix of technical, financial, commercial and economic expertise.

Governing Legislation and Bodies

Telecommunications Regulations 2001 - governing legislation

Australian Communications and Media Authority [ACMA] - government agency responsible for the regulation of broadcasting, the internet, radiocommunications and telecommunications.

Australian Competition and Consumer Commission [ACCC] - promotes industry competition and protects consumers from unfair practices.

ACMA

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) licenses Australia’s telecommunications carriers and regulates fixed line and mobile telecommunications. ACMA’s responsibilities include:

Supporting the development of codes of practice for the industry and monitoring compliance
Monitoring the performance of carriage service providers
Setting and enforcing industry and technical standards, and monitoring industry performance
Numbering
Advising consumers on their rights and safeguards
Managing the delivery of services to people with a communication impairment.

ACCC

Australian regulator, ACCC - Australian Competition and Consumer Commission [ACCC] stand is that competition breeds better services. Following the unanimous rejection by an Australian High Court of Telstra’s claim that its property rights were being breeched because its competitors were allowed access to its infrastructure, it was noted that the Operational Separation of Telstra is progressing somewhat differently from that of Telecom and the NZ Government. Telecom New Zealand has cooperated with the government during the process towards operation separation. Telstra appears to hold a different perspective.

ACCC and Telstra are locked in a battle with Telstra’s claims that the regulator is setting pricing too low is wearing a bit thin with the entire industry.

Forums and User Groups

Australian Communications Industry Forum [ACIF] - Documents and information for telcos to aid in self-regulation.

Australian Telecommunications Users Group [ATUG] - Business lobby group committed to improving Australia's telecommunications industry performance.

Department of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts [DCITA] - Resources and news about telephone, Internet, broadband and ICT services for consumers and for business: funding, policy, legislation, statistics, reviews, online security and contacts for industry bodies.

Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman [TIO] - Free and independent dispute resolution service to consumers with complaints about telephone or internet service.

Current Debate

Unbundling Telstras Local Loop
National Broadband Network - who will build an open access FTTH Network – Telstra or its competitors
Providing a ubiquitous international broadband and voice service to rural, regional and metro users - open access no-conflict fibre grid.

Industry Leader Comments

Maha Krishnapillai, head of group executive carrier and affairs for Macquarie Telecom, says "the telecommunications sector is marred by the market power of Telstra and their willingness to wield it in order to stall competition..... the regulatory regime is fundamentally flawed because of a decision ten years ago to make it a negotiate/arbitrate model".

This effectively means Telstra can submit any undertaking it likes and the regulator can either just reject or accept it.

Anne Hurley, CEO of the Communications Alliance said that last year there were six million calls a month to ISP contact centres. Only a small percentage of these calls were complaints, the vast majority were from customers requiring more information about the services they had just purchased.

Tony Malligeorgos - Ericsson on FTTN said "its all about business productivity. Digital TV is high profile but it’s the productivity benefits that are most economically compelling, in turn reflecting in increased jobs and welfare. The eventual solution will include a wireless element. We are seeing many planned deployments in GPON around the world, and need some standardization.... meanwhile any FTTN should be seen as a preparation for FTTH".

Paul Budde -Consultant on the Fibre Interest Group Report with 17 recommendations delivered to the Minister last week. The key message was to make sure whatever happens is open access. Paul senses active opposition from the bureaucracy “because we are intruding on their turf.”

Dr Paul Brooks - Layer 10 on FTTH Business Case - is concerned whether the user would benefit from the FTTH network. Current focus of benefits is on TV viewing rather than "the real justification should be around environment, productivity, distance education and the like...The network is plumbing – users don’t care about the technology. They care about the performance and the price.” He doesn’t think there’s any evidence the end users care about productivity benefits.

Colin Griffith from the NSW Department of Commerce said a lot of the debate around fibre is about market failure. Its important that competition is not the loser –we must not re-establish monopolies. Carriers tend to produce the “any colour as long as its black” concept, but there are a lot more possibilities than that. There are lots of options – whether it’s the incumbent, or other carriers, Open access is the key issue and we have to be clear about the definitions. There’s a golden opportunity to get the new era regime right.

Axia NetMedia Corporation Chairman and Chief Executive Art Price - on Fibre Networks. Axia claims a fibre grid that connects every community in Australia would cost just $2.1 billion. This fibre backbone would then solve backhaul issues for wireless operators in the rural areas and wired operators in the cities. He claims “It’s not an economic challenge – it’s a business operational challenge .....The traditional (incumbent’s) approach is to gain an unregulated monopoly position on the fibre grid and then leverage that position in the quickly growing big opportunity of NGN services,” .....Operational and weak structural separation do not deconstruct the old business model.” The core of the argument is “how do I compete with my supplier if he’s competing with me.” He also said government needs to back the new open-access no-conflict network as a customer, to put all education, health, security and other services onto it.

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