The Australian Government quietly released its response to the Productivity Commission Inquiry Report into the Telecommunications Universal Service Obligation, shortly before Christmas.
It appears that Australians’ right to safe and reliable phone lines and payphones is soon to be relegated to history. Whilst the response assures us that a new Universal Service Guarantee, which is to replace the Universal Service Obligation (USO), will make available broadband and voice services to 100 per cent of premises on request, the detail on how this might be achieved is sketchy.
Instead, alarmingly, the Government’s response spruiks Australians’ uptake of mobile phones, claiming more than 99 per cent of Australians already have access to at least one mobile network, and states that voice and broadband services will be “delivered on a commercial basis by the market in the first instance”.
It’s bad enough that the NBN has left most city dwellers without the means of a safe phone line when the power goes off (and battery backup offers only short-term respite). But now rural dwellers are to be hit even harder; households in the NBN fixed wireless and satellite footprints will be expected to rely on wireless communications for all their voice services.
The Productivity Commission’s report states that the Universal Service Guarantee (USG) should start following the completion of the NBN rollout in 2020. In line with the Commission’s recommendations, the Government has commenced work on the new USG. However, the Minister for the Department of Communications and the Arts, Senator the Hon Mitch Fifield, assures us that no changes will be made to the current USO (which was originally meant to run until 2032) unless the “proposed new service delivery arrangements are more cost effective than the existing USO contract (including transitional costs)”.
Given that the Government’s input into the existing USO is only $100 million annually (with industry levies providing the balance), it beggars belief that substituting wireless services in rural areas for copper landlines will prove to be more cost effective if all costs are considered. But that’s the catch – many of the potential costs are being steadfastly ignored by Government.
From a health perspective alone, the long-term ramifications of pushing rural Australians onto 24/7 wireless services is likely to result in costs to the nation which will dwarf current funding.
An increase in brain tumours is but one of the many adverse outcomes which studies have highlighted as being a possible result of long-term exposure to radiofrequency radiation. Brain cancer is a rare disease; however, according to Australia’s Cure Brain Foundation it now kills more children in Australia than any other disease. According to an independent study prepared for the Cancer Council New South Wales, using data available to June 2006, the average lifetime financial costs to households for brain cancer were $149,400; this increased to $449,100 for males up to 14 years old.
Taxpayers also pay the price of increased brain tumours. An overseas 2013 study, entitled “Swedish review strengthens grounds for concluding that radiation from cellular and cordless phones is a probable human carcinogen”, states that treatment of a single case of brain cancer can cost between $100,000 for radiation therapy alone and up to $1 million (USD) depending on drug costs. And brain cancer is only one of the adverse health outcomes that may eventuate as a result of increased exposure to pulsed microwave radiation.
How ironic that progressive health authorities elsewhere in the world are advising the public to consider using landlines as an alternative to mobile phones due to substantial scientific evidence of risk, particularly in regards to children. For instance, in Israel, the Ministry of Health recommends sensible use of cellular and wireless technology, including “considering alternatives like landline telephones” (Environmental Health in Israel, Chapter 10, Non-Ionizing Radiation); similarly, the Cyprus Medical Association, Vienna Austrian Medical Chamber and Cyprus National Committee on Environment and Children’s Health recently released the Nicosia Declaration on Electromagnetic Fields/Radiofrequencies, which advises that children under 16 should use mobile phones only for emergencies, and that phone calls at home and at work should be made via a hardwired network. In Australia, however, children as well as adults are to be denied the choice to choose a safe means of voice communication.
Electromagnetic hypersensitivity sufferers marginalised
The Productivity Commission Inquiry Report on the USO highlighted the role of phones in creating social inclusion. Yet despite recognition of this, and the fact that a number of participants stated in their submission that their electromagnetic hypersensitivity rendered them unable to tolerate wireless signals without becoming ill, this direct evidence was dismissed by the Commission.
Instead, the Commission’s report lamely relayed ARPANSA’s opinion on the matter (‘no established scientific evidence that electromagnetic hypersensitivity is caused by electromagnetic fields below exposure guidelines’) and opined that there are “already Australian Government measures to address concerns in this area…”. Sadly, none of the measures which were mentioned include a means by which sufferers might access a phone line without being exposed to pulsed wireless radiation! The Commission also considered that, “even if concerns about health effects were validated”, measures such as “providing consumer information” or “setting standards” would be a more cost-effective means of addressing this issue.
Based on this, it would seem that the needs of people with electrohypersensitivity will continue to be ignored.
Fragility of wireless communications
It appears that the Government is also labouring under the assumption that wireless communications are as robust as hard-wired landlines and payphones. This is remarkedly short-sighted. Even damage from a storm can render communication towers useless for days, if not longer. Is the Government going to factor in the potential cost to the community of events such as this?
If the Australian Government’s plans for its new Universal Service Guarantee is of concern to you, please raise this issue with your local Federal MP and/or write to:
Senator the Hon Mitch Fifield
Minister for Communications
Email: Minister@communications.gov.au
To view the Productivity Commission Inquiry Report, along with its findings and recommendations, go here. (The response to concerns raised by the public about electromagnetic energy exposure is covered on pp. 237-239, plus see the comment on p. 160.)
For previous posts on this issue, see:
Telstra’s obligation to provide landlines may be given the flick
Stop Smart Meters Australia 
NBN fixed-line connections are the pits when it comes to using a corded phone. Surely, Australia should have done its homework and worked out that losing access to a phone when the power goes out is not on!! Not everyone uses a mobile. (And even if they do, what if the mobile needs
charging up, just when the power’s off?) I hope the Kiwis have more sense. See https://saveourlandlines.nz/
It’s unbelievable – Telstra emailed us to say from 23 November 2020 our landline plan now provides UNLIMITED calls to standard local, national AND Australian mobile numbers. A whole bunch of other freebies are also included (a credit to call international numbers etc.).
If only they had done this years ago!! I know so-o-o many people who were forced to get a mobile because it was too expensive to call mobiles from a landline. Then they ditched the landline because it was too expensive to have both a landline and a mobile plan.
And then the government has the nerve to say that Australians don’t want landlines any more! Is the government so blind that they can’t see that it was the corporates who forced so many people into only using mobiles in the first place?
Would it be too much to hope that the terrible fires that Australia has been experiencing, along with the resulting loss of telecommunications, might be a bit of a wake-up call for the government? Copper landlines may not be perfect. But they are streets ahead of the NBN, which drops out the
second the power goes. Even back-up batteries aren’t going to be much of a help for very long. Towers, which seem to be vulnerable to everything under the sun, are even worse. See this story from the ABC: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2020-01-13/are-australias-telecommunication-up-to-the-new-kind-of-megafire/11860238
Maxims of law are ecclesiastical in nature and often relied on by the highest courts. The maxim is “Qui tacet consentit”: the maxim of the law is “Silence gives consent”.
in other words, unless humans say no to harm they say yes.
electrohypersensitivity MUST be assumed to be the norm in all human merely beings unless rigorous testing proves otherwise….PROVIDED HOWEVER the latter is absolutely not to be construed as negating the former.
[all of witch goes to prove retired architects should never be aloud to right legaese….]
🙂
MikeR
I thought I might make an interesting point here but imagine, hypothetically, there was a way of making the human body be able to deal with the radiation that is being pulsed out daily at high levels and at higher levels in the future. I’m sure if there was a way for this to happen then alot of people would rejoice. However, the radiation would STILL be causing great harm to all of the rest of nature itself, damaging flora and fauna alike. So, even if human beings had found a way of surviving this massive flood of human stupidity in the form of radiation poisoning, there will not be a planet to live on if all other life is dead.
And that’s the point that most of these corporate and elitist boneheads don’t seem to understand. Unless, the man-made radiation stops within reason, the future is kaput! Not even the ‘elite’ will survive in the end.
Despite my account being in credit, my services were recently disconnect because I didn’t sign over to the nbn quick enough. (I had mistakenly assumed that since the ACCC had forced Telstra/NBN to compensate thousands of consumers, that they would no longer be forcing us to purchase an inferior and potentially dangerous product. Alas, I was wrong!) As the afore-mentioned article states, for those of us with serious medical issues to contend with, the battery back up offers little support and incurs an additional cost for (repeated) replacement. The technician who saw to our corded installation, stated the nbn connection boxes were the cause of the majority of faults (despite Telstra stating other issues) as they were poor quality. At the end of the day, one can only imagine how many people’s lives will be put at risk because of this ‘new’ technology. We are without question, headed back to the dark ages.