MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS AND SPORT ANIKA WELLS: eSafety has today released its latest Basic Online Safety Expectations transparency report. Once again in black and white we have evidence that big tech is not doing enough to protect Australians from harm online.

eSafety has asked tech companies what they are doing to tackle serious issues like sexual extortion and child sexual abuse material. This is some of the most heinous content and conduct that we see online. And yet the report has found that big tech is simply not doing enough. They have the tools, they have the resources and yet they are choosing not to use them with full effect.

My message for big tech is this: there are no excuses here. Big tech is required under Australian law to protect Australians online from illegal material or face fines of up $54.6 million.

The Albanese Government is committed to a future where digital platforms and services are designed with the safety of their users in mind. This will become the norm rather than the exception. We are leading the way with enforceable industry codes, with our social media minimum age laws and with our digital duty of care.

This is beyond politics. This is about protecting our future, Australian children and Australian young people, yet we've already seen the Coalition put politics before kids' safety online with their decision to stall laws that would strengthen eSafety’s powers. They are leaving us all to fight with one hand tied behind our backs.

The Albanese Government won't let that happen because big tech is looking for shortcuts. We will do everything in our powers to stop that from happening. Angus Taylor and the Coalition should be doing that as well. We will back Australians over billion-dollar companies every single time.

Are there any questions?

JOURNALIST: Minister, yes or no, will you be attending the Commonwealth Games?

WELLS: It's important that Australia is represented at the Commonwealth Games. I think the athletes and everybody that works so hard to get our Australian athletes to the Commonwealth Games would like to see that support. Last week is a great example of how our ministerial schedule changes even by the hour so we're still looking at whether it would be possible for me to go.

JOURNALIST: Will you hope to go to the Commonwealth Games? Will you aim to do that to show your support?

WELLS: I love that part of my job and I love the relationship that I get to have with our athletes from grassroots through to high performance athletes that we know will be over there competing but, as always, I have to carefully calibrate my duties in the Communications portfolio alongside the Sport portfolio.

JOURNALIST: So you would hope to go, but essentially, you’re weighing up your options first?

WELLS: Correct.

JOURNALIST: Minister, why do so many Triple Zero calls fail during the Telstra outage if the camp-on function was working?

WELLS: Well, I think probably the sheer numbers that you’re looking at, that's an example of where someone has tried to place the call and then on a second time has been successful. So, that camp-on has worked, or perhaps the second attempt has worked. We track every single call that is dropped and every single call gets a welfare check. And I think one of the differences in the Telstra outage last week compared to the Optus outage in September is that in September, many of those welfare checks took 13 hours to commence from the time that the Triple Zero call was dropped, whereas last week calls to do welfare checks were taking place often within minutes of the call being dropped.

JOURNALIST: And have you had any meetings with Telstra since then and, if so, what have you learned?

WELLS: I'm in regular contact with Telstra. As you know, we're now in the investigation phase, so we're gathering facts, information and evidence. I met with the Triple Zero Custodian yesterday. That's someone that sits within my department to look after this from the perspective of Australian taxpayers and public servants. I will continue to do those meetings as we all go through an investigation phase to provide findings to the Australian public.

JOURNALIST: Did you have conversations with them about the compensation they're now offering?

WELLS: Yes, I did.

JOURNALIST: Are you happy with the arrangements that they’ve put, that customers have to go to Telstra to get reimbursed?

WELLS: I reiterated my expectation that Telstra provides an expedited triage process. Like I said on Friday, Telstra has an awful lot of work to do here to make it up to its customers and to Australians, and that will take a lot of time and it will take a lot of effort for Telstra to do that.

JOURNALIST: Minister, the business case for the National Aquatic Centre. Is the Commonwealth supportive of the development and how much would something like that cost?

WELLS: Well, exactly like you say, we are waiting for that information to come through. The Minister for Infrastructure who looks after that particular element of Brisbane 2032 will wait for evidence to come in to make sure that she can have confidence that it offers value to Commonwealth taxpayers.

JOURNALIST: So is the Commonwealth supportive of that?

WELLS: The Commonwealth is very supportive of the state government providing evidence that the decisions it has made around its venue plan offer value to Commonwealth taxpayers. We have to make sure that someone in Broome or someone in Devonport agrees this is a good spend of national money in order for Brisbane 2032 to go ahead. So we will always be diligent about that.

JOURNALIST: Minister, an independent digital publishing expert, Tim Duggan, addressed the Press Club recently calling for a 30 per cent tax offset to help Australian media, warning it’s being crippled by big tech and AI. When you look at the recent job losses at Channel 7 and challenges for media, would you consider that?

WELLS: I have a lot of respect for Tim. I have met Tim before and I think he has a lot to offer us all in terms of where the future of Australia media is going. I will continue to work with him on how we provide support to make sure that independent publishers and regional and rural news media survive. We've obviously done that federally from the News MAP [News Media Assistance Program] funding program. We’ll continue to work with Tim and other people like Tim who work with him in the alliance on making sure that our Australian media ecosystem is as strong as it possibly can be against the threats he was talking about.

JOURNALIST: Is the government open to that 30 per cent tax offset or is it something that’s already been ruled out?

WELLS: I'm open to working through all ideas that would help preserve our media ecosystem in a way that Australians would expect, that is to me making sure that the regions and the rural have their own media, that independence is still preserved and able to flourish, that new media is supported, and that particular communities like our CALD communities have their own media publishers that they can look to, to make sure that everybody in Australia is across all of Australian stories.

JOURNALIST: Moreton Bay County has a proposal for a permanent international flatwater centre that is likely to be cheaper than Rocky. Will the Commonwealth request the state to consider all options when it comes to Olympic rowing?

WELLS: I'm Vice President of Brisbane 2032, these are the kind of discussions that we have at the leadership group regularly. Ultimately, as the state government has made very clear, it did a 100-day review, it made a new plan for venues. It is well aware that it has a capped funding contribution from the Commonwealth government, and it is up to them to distribute and to deliver what they've committed to within that funding package.

JOURNALIST: So would the Commonwealth then consider all options put to them?

WELLS: We get put options to us from the state government.

JOURNALIST: Because there's concern about that Rocky venue being not desirable by competitors because it's unfair. The state government saying it had an obligation to have the games go wider than just Brisbane. Is that a good enough reason to have a track or a course that might not be fair to other competitors?

WELLS: Look, I engage with this with international federations and from the perspective of athletes as the Commonwealth Sport Minister. And I've had a lot of meetings to the effect of the things that you're talking about. I make those points appropriately within the Brisbane 2032 Organising Committee meetings, as well as working with the state's sports minister, my counterpart. Ultimately the Crisafulli LNP Government has made very clear that they felt that they needed to step in, they did a review, they set a new course for venues and it's up to them to convince Queenslanders that is the right approach.

From the perspective of the Commonwealth, I need to make sure that our international federations are happy with what we are offering by way of Brisbane 2032, their obligations under things like anti-doping are met, and I’m doing work with the Minister for Industry about what that looks like right now. And also, as a Vice President of Brisbane 2032, that the program that we are offering to everybody, to all the international athletes who are coming here is that it’s as best as we can make it, and I will always advocate for those principles within the appropriate forums.

JOURNALIST: So, if World Rowing Federation comes back and says this course isn’t good enough, is that nail in the coffin for Rockhampton rowing?

WELLS: Yeah, we have obligations to our international federations. International federations sign off the venues, so that is deliberations and agreement that the Queensland State Government must seek and receive from World Rowing, you’re correct. And I know they’re doing a lot of work to try and secure that.

JOURNALIST: And you don’t know what the result of that investigation is yet?

WELLS: The last update I had from that, which admittedly was some months ago now, was that they had not yet received the final call.

JOURNALIST: So then in that case, the Commonwealth would consider its options when it comes to rowing, if something like that was to come back?

WELLS: I think I’ve made very clear the process through which we go to determine this.

JOURNALIST: Some creative industries are worried that your government is open to watering down our copyright laws to benefit the media and AI companies as well. What reassurances can you offer?

WELLS: The Albanese Government is committed to the robust copyright framework that Australia enjoys, and I work with my stakeholders alongside my colleagues and ministers, who work with their stakeholders to make sure that we can both embrace the opportunities that AI provides, spread the benefits around to all Australians and, particularly as the Minister for Communications, protect Australians from and keep them safe online.

JOURNALIST: When your conversations with Telstra on compensation- was it floated that there could be compensation for every Telstra customer, similar to what Optus did with the $100 data offer, what were some of the conversations you had about the options when it comes to compensation?

WELLS: I'm not going to disclose private conversations, but I will say that I reiterated what I've said to you publicly. My expectations is that Telstra does the right thing by its customers. Telstra also has to do the right thing by its shareholders, and Telstra has a lot of work to do now to restore the trust of everybody after last week's outage.

JOURNALIST: Minister, initial reports suggest that the Telstra outage could have actually been prevented by replacing relatively inexpensive hardware. Would you consider this scenario as unacceptable asset management by Telstra?

WELLS: Well, like you said, there's been sort of a daily theory so far as to the cause of the outage and that's exactly why as the Minister, I should wait for the recommendations and findings to come to me. We now have three on foot- Telstra is obligated to provide a report within 45 days to the regulator about how this has gone wrong. ACMA, the independent regulator, will do its own review. You've heard from Adam Suckling, the deputy chair on Friday, who stood with me in Canberra to say that investigation was now on foot. We had some preliminary meetings about that on Friday. And now the Triple Zero Custodian will do a post outage review. I met with her yesterday about that and what we've learned so far, and we'll continue all to work regularly to try and improve this system for all Australians.

JOURNALIST: And Minister, in the case that it is a rather inexpensive fix in that scenario, does that kind of change the government’s view of the outage to more of a question of underinvestment rather than bad luck? And does it warrant a penalty beyond the existing $30 million cap?

WELLS: I would make the point that the $30 million penalty is per breach rather than in total, but at the moment we are in an investigation phase and I would await the findings from the independent regulator and from the Triple Zero Custodian about what they would recommend the minister do. In particular, Triple Zero Custodian is about trying to lift the standard and get a best-practice approach to a system that clearly needs it. ACMA is about the penalties involved.

JOURNALIST: And so, just to be clear, you're happy and you think it's fair that Telstra customers or small businesses impacted have to provide evidence and documentation as to how much money they lost during the outage?

WELLS: I believe that Telstra should offer an expedited triage process for its customers and for its shareholders. I think Telstra has a lot of work to do to restore its reputation in the eyes of Australians and Telstra should put its shoulder to the wheel to do that.

JOURNALIST: They're going to take time out of their day to ask for their money back. Is that fair?

WELLS: Like I said, that's my position which I've made clear to Telstra.