A new bill proposes to expand ACMA’s powers significantly, aligning the regulator’s enforcement tools across the telecoms sector
The Government has proposed strengthening ACMA’s powers to regulate the telecoms sector
On 12 February 2025, the Australian Government introduced the Telecommunications Amendment (Enhancing Consumer Safeguards) Bill 2025 in Parliament. The proposed legislation, which amends the Telecommunications Act 1997, would extend new and enhanced enforcement tools to the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA). In announcing the bill, Michelle Rowland (Minister for Communications) described the measure as a powerful deterrent for the sector. Rowland further stated that “the introduction of this bill is another way the Government is putting consumers at the centre of the telco industry,” referencing the importance of these changes to ACMA’s ability to enforce retail-level consumer protection regulations. In both her statement and the memo on the legislation circulated to Parliament, Rowland repeatedly compared the proposed amendments to the powers already available to regulators in the energy and banking sectors, and those reflected in Australian consumer protection law.
The proposed changes would align ACMA’s oversight of retail providers with that of network operators and put code enforcement on the same level other regulations
If adopted, the bill would empower ACMA to create a register of retail service providers, referred to as carriage service providers (CSPs), and require registration in order to conduct business. Network operators are already required to obtain a licence from ACMA in order to provide retail and wholesale services, but Rowland noted that the regulator cannot currently be as efficient in cooperating with CSPs to support compliance without having full awareness of all of the CSPs operating throughout the country. Both ACMA and the Minister of Communications would be responsible for setting any relevant conditions for registration for CSPs, and ACMA would also be able to create bespoke requirements for any individual CSP to further promote compliance in advance of approving their registration. The Government argues that a registry would give ACMA the power to revoke the right for CSPs to continue operating if they pose an unacceptable risk to consumers or cause significant harm. The legislation also proposes reforming the process by which ACMA enforces industry codes, which are rules developed by the sector, often at the direction of ACMA, and incorporated as binding regulation. ACMA is currently required to issue a direction to comply to operators in breach of a code before it can take further enforcement action. Moving forward, the regulator would be able to directly issue an infringement notice in the event of non-compliance. This change would make provisions in the Telecommunications Consumer Protections Code as well as the code on reducing scams both directly and more immediately enforceable in the case of harms to consumers, particularly relevant to the regulation of the retail portion of the sector and well-aligned with ACMA’s current compliance priorities.
ACMA would be able to issue fines 40 times greater than at present, up to A$10m (£5m)
Perhaps most impactful, the bill would also raise the maximum penalty ACMA can assess from its current level of A$250,000 (£126,228) to approximately A$10m (£5m). The Minister of Communications would also be empowered to increase infringement notice penalties via a determination for any type of non-compliance, which the Government argues would allow for more proportionate penalties in instances of serious harm by larger providers. The increase in fines would apply across all forms of rules, including industry codes but also regulator-issued standards and directed determinations. Rowland noted that this change would address the risk that penalties for non-compliance were increasingly seen as the “cost of doing business” as opposed to a meaningful incentive for the sector. While these changes each represent a significant expansion of ACMA’s power to oversee the industry, the bill broadly appears to offer the regulator a suite of tools that is both uniform across the different parts of the telecoms sector and aligned with those available to other sectoral regulators.
