Submissions


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Details

The Productivity Commission is investigating the costs and benefits of increasing the availability and use of private and public data by individuals and organisations, including consumers’ access to data about themselves. Increasing the availability and use of data could stimulate innovation and competition, leading to increased choice and better decision-making for consumers. ACCAN broadly supports the Productivity Commission’s inquiry but outlines a number of concerns and recommendations in its submission.

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Internet Service Providers (ISPs) can use Telstra’s ADSL network to supply consumers with internet services without the need for their own equipment, called Wholesale ADSL (WADSL) services. To ensure that consumers can access a range of ISPs at affordable prices the ACCC declared these WADSL services in 2012 for a 5 year period. With the current declaration expiring next year the ACCC is investigating if this is still needed.

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The current USO only guarantees the supply of a standard telephone voice service. ACCAN believes this scope must be broadened to not only guarantee voice services, but also data services, essential content (education and government services) and include service guarantees for connection, fault repairs and reliability standards.

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The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) has undertaken a review of the captioning obligations in Part 9D of the Broadcasting Services Act (1992) as prescribed in the legislation. ACCAN participated in the consultation in a written submission. Our response to the review reiterates ACCAN’s long-held view that accurate and comprehensible captions on broadcast television are essential for full and equitable access to our foremost medium for news, information and entertainment for all those Australians who rely on captions when viewing television.

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The Australian Consumer Law (ACL) came in five years ago to help protect consumers. It is now being reviewed to make sure it is up to date.

ACCAN made 11 recommendations to the ACL Review. We want to make sure the ACL keeps pace with a number of new issues affecting communications consumers. Technology is ever changing and can lead to many benefits for consumers, sometimes laws struggle to keep up with these changes. ACCAN’s submission calls for a closer look at some of these gaps in the law, especially around digital marketplaces and new hybrid goods and services provided as part of the Internet of Things (IoT).

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In March 2016 the Department of Communications and the Arts released an options paper: ‘Communications Accessibility: 2016 and Beyond’. The paper proposed a number of options related to the ongoing sustainability of the National Relay Service. The use of the National Relay Service over the past couple of years has increased due to the significant improvements to the service through the introduction of a number of new relay services.

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Industry lobby, Communications Alliance, has proposed a number of changes to the Telecommunications Consumer Protection Code compliance regime. ACCAN believes the changes may lead to a number of positive changes which should both improve the efficiency of Communications Compliance and provide greater flexibility to smaller suppliers. However, we encouraged the industry group take further steps to address the lack of a publically available, useful performance metrics.

 

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The Federal Government is planning to amend the Privacy Act to introduce a mandatory data breach notification scheme. The scheme would mean that all government agencies, and entities with an annual turnover of more than $3m, must notify everyone whose personal information was disclosed if they suffer a serious data breach. A data breach would be 'serious' if it results in a 'real risk of serious harm' to an individual or individuals. The scheme would allow people whose personal information has been compromised by a breach to take steps to lessen or avoid potential harms, such as financial loss or identity theft.

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ACCAN made a submission to the Department of Communications and the Arts (DoCA) consultation on the Copyright Amendment (Disability Access and Other Measures) Bill 2016 (the Act). We are broadly supportive of the proposed changes, as they overcome some of the barriers faced by people with a disability – and the organisations who provide services to them – in obtaining material in accessible formats.

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New obligations on telecommunication infrastructure providers are proposed by the Department of Communications and the Arts. This is part of the policy for telecommunications services in new development. The obligations would ensure that new developments, not served by nbn or Telstra, would be served by a network which meets set standards. Furthermore information on the network would need to be made available via an online map for property buyers and developers to use.

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ACCAN has contributed to the Department of Communications and the Arts review of the Captioning Regulatory Framework. The review proposes a number of deregulation options for caption compliance reporting; emergency warning captioning reporting and related issues. ACCAN has reiterated our long-standing position that broadcaster compliance reporting is essential for consumer protection. ACCAN has opposed removing compliance reporting, called for increased requirements for captioning of emergency warning broadcasts as well as calling for increased captioning across all free-to-air channels.

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In 2014 the Vertigan panel made 53 recommendations on regulatory and market structure matters. The proposed legislation addresses recommendations made in relation to improvements in the access regime and nbn's authorised conduct. ACCAN expressed concern over three parts of the legislation.