Thursday, 10 September 2026

 Brad BATTIN (Berwick) (17:17): (1839) My adjournment is for the Minister for Planning, and the action I seek from the minister is a formal briefing for Casey and Cardinia councils in relation to the mobile phone towers throughout particularly Clyde North, Officer and Berwick. We have seen for too long people in those areas failing to get applications through for towers in that area, and the community are wearing the consequences, with phone reception in some of those areas non-existent. And when we say non-existent, there is literally no reception at all in many parts of the growth area. For those that have the statistics, statistical area level 1 areas generally have around about 100 to 150 ‍homes in them. We have got some of the SA1 areas that, according the Australian Bureau of Statistics, have four residents, but they are actually at about 3500. They are some of the areas that do not have the towers within those communities, and they have tried to get them put through.

I know for a fact that Casey has worked pretty hard on getting these towers put in place, whether on sports fields or other areas, but many of the challenges that they face are specifically in relation to planning. I note there may be a candidate in my area whose motto is going to be ‘No excuses, just action’, and the first post he put out was an excuse as to why they do not have phone towers throughout Casey and Cardinia, blaming Telstra, Vodafone and all the other phone networks. But the problem is that they have put in application after application to put phone towers up. It takes between 12 and 18 ‍months to go through the system, and at the end of it they get knocked back. Who do they get knocked back by? They get knocked back by council, based on legislation from the state government.

It is really important that we do go out there and start listening to these communities, because they cannot continue without phone reception. It is now an essential service. It is something that everyone should have and is entitled to, and I will be working hard, not just here but post the election, to ensure that we can get them delivered and that those people have the access that everybody is entitled to.