Communications Minister Michelle Rowland and independent MP Bob Katter (Images: AAP) Australia has laws that say people must have reasonable and equal access to landline phone services, payphones and broadband internet — but no such rules apply to mobile phone services. That could be about to change. The Albanese government is considering developing a universal service obligation for mobile phone service providers, Crikey understands. Poor phone and internet coverage is a huge problem for many Australians, especially those living in regional and remote places, with more than 50,000 complaints made to the telecommunications industry ombudsman between 2021 and 2024, according to ABC News. Australia already has a universal service obligation that says “wherever people live or work, they must have reasonable and equal access” to landlines and payphones. The regime holds Telstra responsible for providing “standard telephone services on request to premises in Australia within reasonable timeframes, and make payphones reasonably available nationally”. Didn’t they realise there was a war going on? Inside robodebt disaster’s slow media storm Read More There are also rules guaranteeing premises can access high-speed broadband through the National Broadband Network (NBN), known as the statutory infrastructure provider regime. But a 2023 parliamentary inquiry found the existing universal service obligation was facing “growing redundancy in a world dominated by online and mobile telecommunications platforms”. One recommendation was to develop a new universal obligation to provide mobile phone services. A full year after the November 2023 report was released, the government has yet to provide a formal response to the inquiry. Crikey understands the government is currently finalising one. “The government has consulted extensively on the future of universal service delivery and funding to support delivery of non-commercial services,” a spokesperson for Communications Minister Michelle Rowland told Crikey. “Consultation has highlighted the importance and benefits of access to mobile services. The government is considering this feedback.” The rights of Australians to have equitable access to communication services became the subject of a lively debate in Parliament, after independent Kennedy MP Bob Katter tried unsuccessfully to move an amendment to the NBN Companies Act that would have added a universal service obligation. The government opposed the amendment on the basis that the statutory infrastructure provider regime already exists. “If you were sitting in a car that was dry-bogged to the eyeballs and you were praying with rosary beads for your survival when the ground temperature was about 200 degrees Fahrenheit and your father had third-degree burns and was suffering heat stroke and had nearly died, you’d probably see communications a bit differently than you city blokes see it,” Katter told Parliament last week. “You just hope someone comes along and can get to a telephone somewhere or get somewhere to use his mobile and rescue you.” Speaking to Crikey, Katter said the “tyranny of the majority” meant that sparsely populated rural areas were being left behind when it came to “essential services” such as phone and internet connectivity. “Remember also, at any point in time, there are probably about 100,000 or 200,000 people wandering around inland rural Australia as tourists or visitors or people visiting relatives,” he said. “So, I mean, there’s another thing here — you’re really cutting off people in the city from access to the bush.” Australia’s telecommunications industry ombudsman Cynthia Gebert likewise described telecommunications as essential services, which she said were “as fundamental to our way of life as the gas and electricity in our homes”. Does AUKUS have public support? Read More “I have long believed that Australians would be surprised to learn that the only telecommunications service that the Australian government guarantees is a landline, when clearly mobile phone and internet services are so important in 2024,” Gebert told Crikey. “I have made the case to the federal government that Australia needs a fit-for-purpose, updated regulatory environment that ensures both internet and mobile technology are equally guaranteed. This framework must reflect how all Australian consumers use phone and internet services, both now and into the future.” The government is currently conducting a regional telecommunications review — a project repeated every three years — and a review into the existing universal standard obligations for landline phones. Crikey understands both are likely to cover both emerging technologies and community demands for greater mobile connectivity. Telstra’s current universal service obligation contract will last until 2032 . It’s not clear exactly how Labor intends to design a new universal service obligation for mobile, or whether or not it would be incorporated into existing laws. RMIT School of Engineering Associate Professor Mark Gregory, an expert in telecommunications, told Crikey the government should consider setting minimum performance standards that companies would have to abide by when providing services. “If they’re going to sell a product, then it has to meet minimum performance standards,” Gregory said. “Otherwise, don’t sell it. And where it doesn’t meet those minimum performance standards, there needs to be compensation paid.” Have something to say about this article? Write to us at letters@crikey.com.au . Please include your full name to be considered for publication in Crikey’s Your Say . We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity.Social media users are misrepresenting a Vermont Supreme Court ruling, claiming that it gives schools permission to vaccinate children even if their parents do not consent. The ruling addressed a lawsuit filed by Dario and Shujen Politella against Windham Southeast School District and state officials over the mistaken vaccination of their child against COVID-19 in 2021, when he was 6 years old. A lower court had dismissed the original complaint, as well as an amended version. An appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court was filed on Nov. 19. But the ruling by Vermont's high court is not as far-reaching as some online have claimed. In reality, it concluded that anyone protected under the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act, or PREP, Act is immune to state lawsuits. Here's a closer look at the facts. CLAIM: The Vermont Supreme Court ruled that schools can vaccinate children against their parents' wishes. THE FACTS: The claim stems from a July 26 ruling by the Vermont Supreme Court, which found that anyone protected by the PREP Act is immune to state lawsuits, including the officials named in the Politella's suit. The ruling does not authorize schools to vaccinate children at their discretion. According to the lawsuit, the Politella's son — referred to as L.P. — was given one dose of the Pfizer BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination clinic held at Academy School in Brattleboro even though his father, Dario, told the school's assistant principal a few days before that his son was not to receive a vaccination. In what officials described as a mistake, L.P. was removed from class and had a “handwritten label” put on his shirt with the name and date of birth of another student, L.K., who had already been vaccinated that day. L.P. was then vaccinated. Ultimately, the Vermont Supreme Court ruled that officials involved in the case could not be sued. “We conclude that the PREP Act immunizes every defendant in this case and this fact alone is enough to dismiss the case,” the Vermont Supreme Court's ruling reads. “We conclude that when the federal PREP Act immunizes a defendant, the PREP Act bars all state-law claims against that defendant as a matter of law.” The PREP Act, enacted by Congress in 2005, authorizes the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services to issue a declaration in the event of a public health emergency providing immunity from liability for activities related to medical countermeasures, such as the administration of a vaccine, except in cases of “willful misconduct" that result in “death or serious physical injury.” A declaration against COVID-19 was issued on March 17, 2020. It is set to expire on Dec. 31. Federals suits claiming willful misconduct are filed in Washington. Social media users described the Vermont Supreme Court's ruling as having consequences beyond what it actually says. “The Vermont Supreme Court has ruled that schools can force-vaccinate children for Covid against the wishes of their parents,” reads one X post that had been liked and shared approximately 16,600 times as of Tuesday. “The high court ruled on a case involving a 6-year-old boy who was forced to take a Covid mRNA injection by his school. However, his family had explicitly stated that they didn't want their child to receive the ‘vaccines.’” Other users alleged that the ruling gives schools permission to give students any vaccine without parental consent, not just ones for COVID-19. Rod Smolla, president of the Vermont Law and Graduate School and an expert on constitutional law, told The Associated Press that the ruling “merely holds that the federal statute at issue, the PREP Act, preempts state lawsuits in cases in which officials mistakenly administer a vaccination without consent.” “Nothing in the Vermont Supreme Court opinion states that school officials can vaccinate a child against the instructions of the parent,” he wrote in an email. Asked whether the claims spreading online have any merit, Ronald Ferrara, an attorney representing the Politellas, told the AP that although the ruling doesn't say schools can vaccinate students regardless of parental consent, officials could interpret it to mean that they could get away with doing so under the PREP Act, at least when it comes to COVID-19 vaccines. He explained that the U.S. Supreme Court appeal seeks to clarify whether the Vermont Supreme Court interpreted the PREP Act beyond what Congress intended. “The Politella’s fundamental liberty interest to decide whether their son should receive elective medical treatment was denied by agents of the State and School,” he wrote in an email to the AP. “The Vermont Court misconstrues the scope of PREP Act immunity (which is conditioned upon informed consent for medical treatments unapproved by FDA), to cover this denial of rights and its underlying battery.” Ferrara added that he was not aware of the claims spreading online, but that he “can understand how lay people may conflate the court's mistaken grant of immunity for misconduct as tantamount to blessing such misconduct.” — Find AP Fact Checks here: https://apnews.com/APFactCheck.
All You Need To Know About US-Brokered Israel-Hezbollah Ceasefire Deal