LOCALS have vented their frustration at Lake Macquarie's poor telecommunication reception in a report compiled by Member for Charlton Pat Conroy.
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The report is the result of a survey of residents who were asked about the adequacy of mobile phone, internet and digital television services across the Charlton electorate.
Shadow communications minister Jason Clare has slammed the government's handling of the National Broadband Network (NBN) rollout, and said Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull had broken promises made about the NBN.
Mr Turnbull's office hit back, stating "on every metric, Labor failed at rolling out the NBN".
More than 300 people responded to the survey.
Some of the key findings include:
■ Cooranbong had the highest number of complaints, while Morisset, Wangi Wangi, Bonnells Bay, Martinsville and Toronto also had a high number of respondents.
■ Almost a quarter of all respondents with poor mobile phone reception lived in Cooranbong.
■ Respondents commonly had trouble accessing the internet during peak hours and in wet weather.
Mr Conroy said the survey results showed that in certain areas the quality of these services fell way short of community expectations.
"I've heard the message loud and clear that the government and stakeholders need to work together to ensure these services are adequate," Mr Conroy said.
"I don't want our area to be the forgotten region, but by all accounts it looks like we're heading this way.
"I've sent a copy of the report to Malcolm Turnbull and said you need to come up with a plan to rectify this."
Mr Clare said telecommunications should be treated the same way as electricity and water.
"Whether it's being able to turn on the telly, use a phone, or access the internet, they're necessities, they're not luxuries," Mr Clare said.
Mr Conroy said he was concerned Wangi Wangi and Toronto had been identified by the government as having very poor internet availability, yet had not been included in NBN.
A spokesperson for Mr Turnbull said Toronto and Wangi Wangi were not currently part of the 18-month NBN rollout plan, which would be extended in August to give a forecast for the following three years.
"Residents in those areas should know much more about the rollout then," the spokesperson said.
Mandalong resident Pip Mason responded to the survey and said he was devastated to learn his suburb, along with Martinsville and Eraring, had been removed from the NBN rollout map (see letter on page 12).
Mr Turnbull's office said Eraring, Martinsville and Mandalong had never been part of the fixed line rollout, even under Labor, and as such were never on the rollout map.
However the NBN website features a media release dated October, 2014, listing the three suburbs as being included in the rollout.
"The areas are low density - for example, Eraring consists of only 147 premises - and will be served by fixed wireless, and in the case of Martinsville, partly by the long term satellite service," the spokesperson said.
Turnbull hits back
COMMUNICATIONS Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s office said the slow start to the NBN rollout was due to the mess the Labor government had left behind.
‘‘By the time of the election [Labor] had only got to 17 per cent of the premises they said they would serve by then – so we have had a massive job in turning the project around,’’ Mr Turnbull’s spokesperson said.
‘‘We are now starting to meet our rollout targets and have increased the pace of the rollout fourfold.’’