Bill
Telecommunications Amendment (Enhancing Consumer Safeguards) Bill 2025
before parliament, as at 2026-06-22. Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications, Sport and the Arts portfolio.
- Sponsor
- Not recorded
- Portfolio
- Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications, Sport and the Arts
Recorded stages
- introduced — 2025-08-28
- second reading — 2025-08-28
- second reading — 2025-09-04
- second reading — 2026-02-09
- second reading — 2026-04-01
- second reading — 2026-05-13
- second reading — 2026-05-14
- second reading — 2026-05-14
- third reading — 2026-05-14
- introduced — 2026-06-22
- second reading — 2026-06-22
Divisions
Plain-language summary
Written by a model from the Bills Digest; not the record, as at 2025-08-28.
The bill would make compliance with telecommunications industry codes compulsory rather than voluntary.
It would let the Australian Communications and Media Authority enforce codes directly through civil penalties, without first issuing a direction to comply.
The new enforcement rules would apply to conduct that happened before the bill starts, which the explanatory memorandum says the ACMA would handle with a common-sense approach.
- Removes references to industry codes being voluntary from the simplified outlines of the Telecommunications Act.
- Requires all participants in a section of the industry to comply with a registered industry code, with non-compliance attracting a civil penalty.
- Repeals the requirement for ACMA to maintain a register of directions to comply with industry codes.
- Repeals the category of reviewable decisions related to ACMA directions under section 121.
- Removes the obligation for ACMA to consult the Information Commissioner before enforcement action involving privacy principles.
Telecommunications industry participants, including providers and individuals subject to industry codes, and the Australian Communications and Media Authority.
Sources
em
digest
billhome