As a rural general practitioner who practices from home, home being on part of the Bridport Highway between the Pipers River shop and Curries dam which does not have reliable CDMA phone service I have been at telstra for some years to improve this service for a variety of reasons;

(1) the local residents need the service for communications when away from their land line services as well as a back up when the former fails,as you will see later this has occurred with some frequency in recent times;

(2) the Bridport highway carries in excess of 1200 vehicles per day ( 800 of which are heavy transport ) the mobile phone service when available plays a role in both routine and emergency communications especially with the trucks.

(3) in an emergency be a road accident or farm acident the lack of reliable mobile coverage has impeded the delivery of needed help, often the first people at the scene of road accidents have to drive some distance to be able to call the emergency services.

On saturday 20th of September for the third time in 18 months the land line service to parts of the Pipers River area was again disrupted, I believe this and the previous break in service was due to moisture getting into the lead joins in the line. Because of my wife's medical condition ( she has been treated for a brian tumor and required constant access to her Launceston based Dr ) the fault was promptly repaired, I believe a temporary repair was done with the definitive work said to be later this week. As a husband, a general practitioner and a representative of the community of Pipers river I am concerned that this increase in frequency of disruptions of our land line services is indicative of failing infra structure, the significance of these disruptions made worse by the fact that many residence do not have a reliable mobile phone service as a back up. In my own case I have to walk some distance from the house to get a very weak signal.