Interview with Tony Wertz, OKR FM Mitchell Community Radio

TONY WERTZ, HOST: I’d like to introduce to our listeners in southern Mitchell Shire the Minister for Communications, the Honourable Michelle Rowland. Good morning, Michelle, and welcome to Mr Mitchell’s territory.

MICHELLE ROWLAND, MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS: Good morning. Great to be here.

WERTZ: It’s great to have you along. And you’ve got a background in legal affairs, particularly in the communications area I believe?

ROWLAND: That’s right. I had a life before I entered Parliament, the same year as my good friend Rob Mitchell, actually, in 2010. I spent 10 years as a telecommunications and media lawyer in Sydney. And this has always been my area of policy passion. I’ve done a lot of work overseas for different governments and for different regulators. In every case, it always brought home to me the transformational power of keeping people connected. And for some people watching them utilise communications networks for the first time was a real thrill. And to be now Minister for Communications is not only a really great privilege, but it enables me to bring those principles to life in what we’re doing, including in the National Broadband Network.

WERTZ: Well, it must be an exciting portfolio with all the technical changes that are going on. It would be hard to keep up with, one should imagine.

ROWLAND: It is very broad. The portfolio covers everything from the NBN to Australia Post, community broadcasting, sports, regulation of the internet, online safety and classification rules. So, it is a very broad area. There are lots of contentious aspects of it as well, including in the media space. But it, again, is one where it really does have a positive influence on the economy and on people’s everyday lives; being able to improve that through better mobile connectivity and better broadband services for example. We know that people’s habits have changed the way that we do business. For example, the rise of e-commerce,  remote working and learning from home. Especially in outer areas like we’re in today, it’s more important than ever to keep people connected.

WERTZ: Well, speaking of keeping people connected and outer areas, regional areas in particular, there’s news about mobile black spots that you might look to fill people in on.

ROWLAND: That’s right. And Rob has been keeping me abreast of developments and of people needing to have better mobile services in this area, particularly with the influx of new residents and new housing estates. The spectrum only has a finite capability, so being able to make sure that we not only do that infill but also assist people to get connected is really important. We’ve got at the moment a series of competitive rounds open for mobile black spots and communications resilience. I know this area unfortunately has also been hit by natural disasters, and that’s always a big issue. So, we’re investing to partner with the telcos to provide that connectivity. They’re open at the moment as part of our $2.2 billion investment in communications. In fact, it’s the single biggest investment by a government in regional communications since the NBN.

We are really proud of not only being able to announce this but the proof point will always be in the delivery. And that’s what it’s all about.  I know Rob has been very active in encouraging his constituents to identify areas where there can be improvements, to feed those through to the department to hopefully get some partnerships with the telcos so we can get action in this area.

WERTZ: You mentioned the NBN. It’s good news – Rob announced it a couple of weeks ago, I think, on the program. We’re starting to see a bit of fibre go to the house at long, long last.

ROWLAND: Absolutely. Unfortunately, this area has been one where the fixed line services have been delivered by a lot of copper. We know that that’s the technology of the past. We need to have fibre services for the reliability and the speed. I was very pleased to announce as part of our $2.4 billion investment in helping to fix the NBN includes some 12,000 premises here in Rob’s good electorate. That will be progressively rolled out.

I know there’s some listeners who will be on satellite services. We’ve got improvements to our satellite service now, too, with Sky Muster Premium Plus, and this means that users will be able to access speeds of up to 100 megabits per second. It’s unmetered, uncapped. And this follows a successful trial where we’re able to roll this out as the first continual product of its kind on the NBN satellite service.

That’s in addition to the third technology we use on the NBN, which is the fixed wireless network. We invested $480 million to upgrade that. It really does come together, and you can see it’s a really planned structure that we’ve got here to fix the NBN and make it better for all users.

WERTZ: Well, that sounds very encouraging from the previous attempt we had, which was anything but a plan, to see that you’re putting all the avenues together.

ROWLAND: Indeed. This is about encouraging not only consumers to have the best services but we’re very mindful of the small and micro businesses, particularly in regional Australia. And I think also that aspect of resilience, disaster planning is really fundamental to how we approach this as a government. Because, of course, our first priority is to keep Australians safe. That’s what it boils down to.

WERTZ: Yeah, particularly with mobile black spots around at the moment. The other area you mentioned briefly was community broadcasting and broadcasting in general, which comes under your umbrella. We’re particularly interested in the community broadcasting side of it. We know how well both Federal and State governments support community broadcasting. What’s your overall opinion of community broadcasting across the country?

ROWLAND: It’s absolutely an essential part of the ecosystem. We invested in our first budget some $20 million in community broadcasting. The first bill I actually presented to the Parliament as Minister was to make a number of streamlining arrangements to community broadcasting. We’re also looking at the sustainability of the sector because we know that while you serve such a great purpose, you’ve got great volunteers and sponsors, it still is challenging. So, we’ll be releasing that shortly, and that comes as a result of a really thorough look for the first time in a very long time at the sustainability of the sector.

Community broadcasting will always be important to the Albanese Government, particularly, again, in regional areas. I make the point that community broadcasting is really doing the heavy lifting when it comes to media diversity. We hear a lot of people talk about the need for media diversity. It’s not only having different voices but it’s having different people behind that content as well. And no one does it better as a single sector than community broadcasting, and I know Rob feels the same.

WERTZ: Yeah, well, Rob, of course, pops in regularly – every fortnight. We’ve even had Rob direct on the line from his office in Canberra when he had to leave the interview to answer the bell on more than one occasion.

ROWLAND: He would have been in trouble otherwise.

WERTZ: Yeah, he would have. But just made for fantastic, on-the-spot live radio, you know. And we certainly appreciate Rob’s efforts in coming in and keeping us informed. And he does a very good job of breaking politics down to a personal level. He puts a bit of personality onto politics, if you can understand what I’m getting at. The story he told of Julia Gillard with a cardboard carton of chips before her Misogyny Speech.  

ROB MITCHELL, MEMBER FOR MCEWEN: I walked out, and I said, “Geez, what did you have for lunch, boss?” And I said I said, “Some chips.” Have those every day!

WERTZ: And that’s the sort of thing I think we do. Politicians get a pretty hard mark from the public, and Rob’s effort to bring that into the context that, “Hey, we’re people doing our job, you know,” it really means something I think to the community. And to be able to broadcast that, we can give Rob time on community radio to discuss things like this which you wouldn’t get on any other media.

ROWLAND: Exactly. And I think, too, you know, radio is not only the big survivor in terms of the platforms; it’s the thriver as well. I mean, the rise of digital streaming was supposed to be the end of radio. But it’s never been more important. It’s been a real education for me being in regional Victoria for a few days and just understanding how much this is the commuter area just as much as it is a regional area. And when you’re commuting, often when you’re in your car, you’re listening. You’re listening to people with personalities. You’re able to make those connections. And people value localism. It’s localism that really differentiates them.

WERTZ: That’s where we can play our part, not only keeping the community informed of what’s going on but to promote local activities, like Rob’s favourite Wallan Market, and things like this. We can bring it together. We broadcast football live from the regional grounds. As a matter of fact, Kath was part of our broadcast at one stage. So, it’s the things that interest the community but there’s no other access to. We’re thankful for the support we get through the CPF from the federal government, and we’re pretty proud of what we’re able to achieve in being able to bring areas of news that wouldn’t otherwise make the airways.

ROWLAND: That’s what it’s all about.

WERTZ: On a more broader note, the government received some very good news with the inflation figures.

ROWLAND: It’s good to see. But, again, these are challenging times.

WERTZ: They are.

ROWLAND: We understand people are doing it tough. Again, as I was driving through the area, I said to Rob, “Looking at those new housing estates, it looks like my area of northwest Sydney.” So, these are people, real people with mortgages really modifying their budgets and making hard decisions. And this Government, we understand that. That’s why we’re offering cost of living relief. We’re doing what we can in this regard. But, Rob, you’ll hear this all the time.

MITCHELL: You’re right, it’s what we focused on and we said that with the Budget, is that we’ll need to make support for families and support for people without putting inflationary pressure on the Budget. That’s why we’ve got the cheaper medicines, that’s why we’re going to 60-day prescriptions. That’s why we’ve got childcare coming through. It’s important, what Michelle’s doing, in the NBN space because so many people are working and educating from home. We know the big issues – if fuel goes up 10 cents a litre, it’s a big problem when, for example, peak hour in Kilmore is at 5.30am in the morning and 6.30 pm at night and people are travelling. So, what we’ve done as a Government is to consistently work to go how can we do this while understanding we’ve got the issue with inflation. It’s not just us; it’s around the world. But we’re starting to see that shift turning. And I think Jim was very clear and concise when he talked about how inflation is going to be there for a lot longer than we’d like, but we’re moving in the right direction and we’re starting to see those good signs.

WERTZ: Well, that’s the other thing that I think people are appreciative of the Albanese Government, is the fact that everyone seems to be upfront and they’re telling us, you know, they’re not trying to sugar coat it.

MITCHELL: Yeah.

ROWLAND: I think that we’ve really led from the top down as well. The Prime Minister, he’s a straight shooter, and he gave one very clear instruction to us ministers, and that’s to do your job. Doing my job in helping people get better connected, making their quality of life a little bit easier with better communications services, this is where it counts. Everyone plays their part.  I think by communicating with people as grown-ups and being upfront about the challenges, people appreciate that more than one-line grabs or press releases or slogans.

WERTZ:  Question without notice, if I may: artificial intelligence, does that come under your responsibilities at all?

ROWLAND: It’s so interesting; it partly does. Artificial intelligence has been around for a long time. That’s everything from the predictive text when you go into a search engine. The reason why it’s gained prominence in recent months is because of the accessibility to some of these AI tools. On one hand, AI has really great potential– and I’ll just look at it in my space, for example. We’ve got a massive ongoing challenge with the types of content that we don’t want particularly young people to see, for example. And artificial intelligence can help to do everything from identifying scams – scam emails, scam texts, I’m sure many of your listeners would be familiar with that – but also identifying content that shouldn’t be there, that people shouldn’t see. So, there’s opportunities but there’s also threats.

So, of course, with artificial intelligence being able to create types of content that aren’t real. We used to talk about – we still do – talk about fake news, but fake images as well. It’s got threats as well. We’re approaching this as a whole of government. So, in the industry space, it’s how can we monetise artificial intelligence, how can we make sure Australia gets benefits from that. In the Attorney-General’s space, it’s about, for example, people delivering news, such as yourself, and how we can ensure that people get those benefits from the intellectual property of what you do so people aren’t just ripping off images or content. In my space, it’s about minimising those harms but also utilising AI to really be a sword as well as a shield.

It’s a whole-of-government issue. I’ll probably end by saying there is no country in the world that’s worked it out yet. I’ve had a number of face-to-face meetings with some of the heads everywhere from the EU to the US to operating platforms playing in this space. Everyone’s treading carefully because we don’t want to stifle innovation, but at the same time, there is definitely an awareness that governments need to identify where there might be harms and threats and respond accordingly. So, we’re working through that now in a very methodical way.

WERTZ: Well, you’ve certainly got a task in front of you with that one, Minister. Thank you very much for your time. It’s been a pleasure to talk to you. Thanks, Rob, for guiding the minister our way so we could have a bit of a chat. I know you’ve got a busy schedule, so I’ll thank you once again on behalf of our listeners and all of us here at OKR FM for popping in and saying g’day.

ROWLAND: Great to be here, and thanks for everything you do. And everyone, have a great day.

WERTZ: That’s the Minister for Communications, the Honourable Michelle Rowland.