Paul Fletcher welcomes NSW Coalition’s $25 million mobile black spots announcement

Paul Fletcher MP, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Communications, has today welcomed the NSW Coalition’s $25 million commitment to address mobile black spots in NSW.

Mr Fletcher is responsible for the Mobile Black Spot Programme at Commonwealth level, under which the Abbott Government will spend $100 million to improve mobile coverage in outer metropolitan, rural and regional Australia.

‘This announcement is great news for people in regional and remote NSW – because if the Coalition is re-elected in NSW it means that there will be even more new mobile coverage in NSW than was already on the cards under the Commonwealth Programme,’ Mr Fletcher said.

‘It is a powerful example of Coalition governments at state and Commonwealth level working together,’ Mr Fletcher said.

‘It also highlights the strong commitment of the Coalition at both state and Commonwealth level to improve communications services in regional and remote Australia – in stark contrast to the last Labor government at Commonwealth level which did not allocate one cent of public money to improved mobile coverage in regional and remote Australia.

‘I welcome the announcement that the NSW Coalition intends to draw on the database of 1,822 mobile black spots in NSW which have been reported to the Commonwealth Department of Communications by members of the community.

‘This is a smart piece of public policy from the NSW Coalition because it means that the work done to date under the Commonwealth Government’s Mobile Black Spot Programme – in identifying potential locations, engaging with the mobile network operators Telstra, Optus and Vodafone and other industry participants, and in canvassing local councils for their support – can be leveraged to allow the NSW Government funding to be deployed efficiently.

Under the Commonwealth Programme, a competitive selection process has already commenced under which Telstra, Optus and Vodafone are expected to nominate locations where they would propose to build new or upgraded mobile phone base stations around Australia, with the assistance of funding from the Programme. 

Mr Fletcher said the Commonwealth Government expects that the first base stations to be funded under the Commonwealth Programme will begin to roll out in the second half of 2015, and the full rollout will continue over a three year period.