Helen Coonan (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you to Senator Webber for that question. I might rhetorically ask: why wasn’t Senator Webber fast enough on her feet to be able to change her question? What we see here is that the Labor Party has now confirmed what we have suspected since October last year; the Labor Party will back a campaign to roll back telecommunications regulation and to put consumers of this country at risk of losing these protections that for so long they have relied on, such as untimed local calls. We know that the Labor Party and of course Telstra now want to abolish important consumer safeguards. I know it sounds a bit hard to believe; many Australians will be saying: ‘Surely this is not really what Labor is proposing. Labor would surely not be foolish enough to destroy competition.’