Telstra has put profits ahead of service reliability. Greens will move for laws to put customers first.   
2026-07-08
greens.org,au
The Australian Greens have called for laws that will put customers ahead of teleco profits and will call the company to a Senate Inquiry.

When Parliament resumes the Greens will introduce amendments that establish and enforce stronger telecommunications reliability standards, following a major outage that disrupted essential services and impacted millions of Australians. 

Greens spokesperson for Communications, Senator Sarah Hanson-Young said:

“Our telecommunications system is in crisis. Today, millions of people have been impacted by Telstra’s outage.   

“Access to a mobile phone and internet data is an essential for everyday life. Just like roads and electricity it should be treated as an essential service. Today’s outage shows how vulnerable the system is and the Government must act.

“For too long Telstra and the other telcos have put their profits ahead of their customers' safety and both the Government and regulator, ACMA have failed to hold them to account.   

“Australian’s deserve a reliable service, whether it’s to call the ambulance, call their work, or call their mum.

“There is currently no legal requirement for Telstra, or any other telecommunications supplier, to provide a reliable mobile phone system.

“The Greens will move new laws to put customers first.

“When we return to parliament, the Greens will move to legislate reliability standards to ensure that big telcos, who are raking in the big bucks, are legally required to provide reliable, dependable services

“Millions of Australians rely on Telstra's services for their everyday communications, work, banking and more. It’s not just an inconvenience when these networks go down, it’s a major disruption.

“Most concerning are reports that some calls to Triple Zero have not been connected. We know from past outages that failures of Triple Zero can be a matter of life and death.

“We will force Telstra to front the Senate Inquiry and explain why this happened and what led to the mass outage, including the impacts of cost-cutting and offshoring of services. 

“The public expect and deserve better from Australia's largest telecommunications provider. Telstra must explain what went wrong, how many people were affected, what safeguards failed, and what steps will be taken to ensure this never happens again.

“This cannot be left to ACMA to manage. ACMA has become a lapdog, not a watchdog. It has become too cosy with the big telecommunications corporations and does not stand up for the interests of the Australian people.

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As if the Liberals would ever allow that to happen.

Makes me wonder how we ever managed to survive back in the days when mobile phones did not exist and most people only had a landline.

Same as I wonder how we survived back when (in WA, at least) all shops except for a few 'corner stores' closed at 12 noon Saturday and didn't reopen until Monday morning. Tuesday if it was a long weekend.

And, if you needed petrol over the weekend in those days (again, in WA at least), you had to find (usually by looking in the paper or watching the end of the TV news before or after the weather report) and drive to one of the few roster stations that were open around the suburbs.

Bobby. wrote on Jul 11^th, 2026 at 7:07am:



Do you mean they need to be fined?

That won't achieve anything because, just like with the supermarkets, any fines imposed will just be recovered with increased costs for the customer.

Have the Greens decided that voters are too stupid to choose for themselves? People are leaving telstra for other providers because they want a cheaper service, not a more reliable one. All these laws will do is take away choice by pushing up all prices.

freediver wrote on Jul 11^th, 2026 at 7:32am:


Except in the country, because with smaller populations the telcos don't want the hassle.

whiteknight wrote on Jul 11^th, 2026 at 6:31pm:



sir Crook - are you watching the Rugby on channel 99 ?

We're winning.

https://www.ozpolitic.com/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1783719153/0#2

whiteknight wrote on Jul 11^th, 2026 at 6:35pm:



It's Rugby not football -

It's Australia versus France - an international match live and free.