Australians are rightly shocked and angry at Optus’ recent outage which saw over 600 Triple Zero calls fail to connect.

The law in Australia is clear – if an outage occurs, telcos must make sure that Triple Zero calls still connect by being redirected to alternate mobile towers. 

After the 2023 Optus outage, the Albanese Government tasked Richard Bean with investigating and recommending ways to strengthen the rules and the processes for triple zero.

Then Communications Minister Michelle Rowland did not hesitate in accepting every single recommendation, and working to enact them. 

This includes real time reporting and a Triple Zero Custodian, which are important but separate functions. 

The Triple Zero custodian, recommendation two of the Bean Review, helps provide more oversight of the Triple Zero ecosystem, and ensure it is functioning efficiently. 

In May last year the Government set up a Triple Zero Custodian Steering Committee, to bring together Government departments, industry, and emergency service representatives to develop a model for the Custodian.

The Committee was established to scope the role, functions and structure of the Custodian concept and to also consider whether it should be established as a new agency, or as a new function within an existing organisation or across organisations, leveraging best practice from around the globe. 

The Triple Zero Custodian was then established in the Department of Communications in March 2025 and the Government will soon be introducing legislation to further strengthen the Custodian’s powers. 

Separately, recommendation five of the Bean Review was for government to require carriers, through a standard or determination, to share real time network information detailing outages with relevant emergency services organisations and other appropriate entities.

The government agreed with this recommendation and in August 2024 Minister Rowland directed Australian Communications and Media Authority to amend the Emergency Call Service Determination by April 2025 to enact it, with a commenced date of 1 November 2025. 

The Determination was completed on schedule and is on track to commence in full next month as planned. 

But we have made it clear, that all telcos operating in Australia should already be transparent about outages and never delay in alerting authorities. 

Delivering access to Triple Zero to Australians at the critical moment of need is the most important and fundamental requirement for a mobile carrier in Australia. 

This government will always work to protect Australians and will hold those who fail to deliver their obligations to full account.  

Australians will also rightly look to decide on their service providers based on the confidence they can have that when they need them most, they will deliver.