Transcript - Press conference: Optus inquiry - 3 November 2025

Melissa McIntosh MP 
Shadow Minister for Communications 
Shadow Minister for Women 
Federal Member for Lindsay 

Dr Anne Webster MP
Shadow Minister for Regional Communications
Shadow Minister for Regional Development, Local Government and Territories
Federal Member for Mallee

Senator Dean Smith
Shadow Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade
Shadow Assistant Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction
Senator for Western Australia

Senator the Hon Sarah Henderson
Senator for Victoria

3 November 2025 

Transcript 

Press conference

Topics: Optus inquiry; Triple Zero; ACMA; Optus; net zero; net zero survey; Coalition.

E&EO … 

Melissa McIntosh

We've just wrapped up day one of the Senate inquiry into the Triple Zero outage and I'm here with my colleagues who will speak shortly. But we've got to remember why we're here. Four people, sadly, died during the Optus Triple Zero outage over six weeks ago and the Australian public still doesn't have answers. Answers - why did this happen? How did human error allow for this to happen? Six hundred people couldn't call Triple Zero in their greatest time of need. And the government's role, ACMA's role as a regulator in this whole failed process? We learned today through the Optus CEO that it took 12 hours for him to become aware of the outage that happened on the Thursday and then another six hours after that before he began alerting the appropriate authorities: ACMA as a regulator. And then the Minister is still saying that she didn't know about the outage until the Friday.

Last week, I suspended standing orders in the House to call upon the Minister to attend the inquiry and tell the Australian public what she knows about the Triple Zero outage, what she is doing as the responsible Minister to ensure this does not happen again.

Sadly, today, I think we're walking out of this inquiry with more questions than answers. But my colleagues, Sarah and Dean were prosecuting on behalf of the Coalition. I'll ask Sarah to say a few words.

Sarah Henderson

Thanks, Melissa, and to my colleagues. Thank you all very much for being here this morning. We've just had the first of a number of hearings to uncover the truth, to get straight answers, and we have been shocked by what we have heard today. Optus never detected the outage, which is shocking.

There were 10 different points of failure. There were five calls to the overseas call centre which were never escalated. The CEO sat on his hands and for many hours didn't inform ACMA, the regulator and the Minister's office about the true scale of the catastrophe, with three people confirmed dead as a result of what happened on that terrible and fateful day.

We also heard from the regulator and it's clear the regulator and the Minister have also drastically failed because new rules which were put in place in April, including to test the Triple Zero service whenever there was a system upgrade. They were not implemented until the first of November. Why did the Minister sit on her hands for six months? Why did the regulator allow this to happen? They are just simply not tough enough.

And again today we call on the Minister to front our inquiry. We say to the Minister, this is not good enough. We deserve answers. Three people died. This was a catastrophic outage. And it is time Minister, you fronted the inquiry and gave Australians the answers they deserve.

We are shocked by what we heard this morning, including that Optus could not provide basic answers about their communications with the families of those who died. And I have cited that they could even be in contempt of our committee for failing to answer certain questions. So, there are many more things to uncover about what went wrong. Because at the end of the day, this is a critical service and all Australians need to know that when they pick up the phone to dial Triple Zero, they will get the help they deserve. Thank you.

Dean Smtih

Well, day one of what will be a very, very important piece of parliamentary work over the summer holidays. The Senate Committee report will issue its final report earlier in the year. We've got a clear commitment from Singtel Optus today that they would make the full inquiry that they are conducting, the Schott review, available to the committee.

And we fully expect that the full and complete ACMA inquiry will be made available to the committee before we meet and deliberate on our own findings. But a number of future pathways that we will pursue; clearly, what did the Prime Minister know in the Optus submission? In the Optus submission, it makes no reference to what the Prime Minister's Office sought from Optus or what it might have known.

Buried deep in the timeline of events which was attached to the submission, was a single entry that said that the Prime Minister's Office had made an inquiry by email to Optus. Why didn't the Prime Minister's Office make an inquiry to the Minister's Office? What was the full extent of the Minister keeping the Prime Minister abreast of developments?

As a West Australian senator, it was tragic that there were two West Australian lives lost. It's my expectation that the committee will make itself available to go to Western Australia to understand exactly what was the West Australian context of what's been a very, very tragic set of circumstances.

It was interesting Optus admits it has been a systemic failure on the part of Optus organisation. Very revealing. Very revealing, though, that we're told these were failures of personnel. Often, we're told that these are technical failures, and these are network outages that not even the very best of technology can correct for. But the Optus CEO made it very, very clear that these were failings on the part of Optus personnel.

Tragic set of circumstances. The committee's work has only just begun, and we are grateful for the participation of regulators today, but also into the future. But just to reiterate what Melissa and Sarah and others have said, our full expectation is that Minister Wells makes herself available to the committee to take our questions and provide some answers where there are many, many questions still remaining.

Anne Webster

Melissa and I have asked for an independent inquiry. This Senate inquiry is the very first step in finding out what has gone wrong here. We find that there have been ten failures in the process of this Optus outage. We don't want this to occur anymore. Australians deserve better. They need to be able to trust the systems, the emergency systems that are in place. And right now we're not sure that that trust is justified.

We need to know that Optus, Telstra and especially this government are held to account for their failures. The Minister needs to front up to this inquiry, there is no question about that. But there also needs to be faced here that it needs to be an independent inquiry that holds ACMA to account for its part as well, as well as the government itself.

So, this is the first step. We're really pleased to see that this step has been taken, and our Senate colleagues have done an excellent job today. It will continue. Optus, Telstra, ACMA, the Minister herself and the Prime Minister all need to be held to account: their feet to the fire. Lives have been lost. This should never have taken place.

McIntosh

Thank you. Questions?

Journalist

Ms McIntosh, Stephen Rue has said that he will continue as CEO in his position. He said that it's not him – him leaving the company would not be helpful at this moment. Do you believe that his - him continuing CEO is tenable, given everything that he has …

McIntosh

I said very early on that customers and Australians generally were losing confidence in the Triple Zero network and they were losing confidence in the CEO. It's not up to me to force the resignation of a telco executive, but, you know, he's let Australians down. And the revelations today out of the Senate inquiry showing that it is people error.

So, what's going on in the culture of Optus to allow this to happen? And how does it occur that he, as the CEO, the top of the pile, doesn't get alerted of this catastrophic outage for 12 hours and then another six hours later he decides to tell the authorities and the regulator and then there's confusion reigns after that and it has done for six weeks, and we still don't have answers.

Journalist

Surely you have a view though?

McIntosh

Beg your pardon?

Journalist

Surely you have a view though?

McIntosh

I have a view. My view was expressed very early on that if he doesn't have the confidence …

Journalist

So, you don’t?

McIntosh

He should go. I said this very early on that Australians are losing confidence. This is, as all of us have said, people have died. This is just not playing politics. This is life and death stuff. People should be able to pick up the phone and call Triple Zero in their greatest time of need. And we're not getting, even today under Senate inquiry, we're still not getting the full answers to our questions.

Journalist

So sorry, to clarify, you don’t?

McIntosh

I said very early on that he should step down as the leader. Who takes responsibility in a crisis? The leader does. And right now, I'm not seeing anything that gives us confidence that things will turn around and this will not happen again.

Journalist

So, what are these unanswered? When, I think Senator Henderson, you spoke about potential contempts proceedings that you used that word earlier on. What are the questions still outstanding and how seriously are you taking that potential?

Henderson

Well, there are many questions outstanding and we've asked for a lot of information on notice and as Dean has said, including other communications with the Prime Minister's Office. We don't believe we have been told the full story in relation to the communication between Optus and the Prime Minister's office.

But I ask very specific questions about Optus’ communications with the families of those who have died. Now this is tragic and we are acutely sensitive about the tragedy and about the privacy of these families. But we did ask about compensation. We did ask about whether there's been any meeting, whether there's been any communications. And we were point blank told that we will take these questions on notice, which I believe is in breach of Senate rules. And that's why I raised the issue that the Chief Executive Officer could be in contempt of our committee. But what I will say is that there is an opportunity for more information to be forthcoming.

But to anyone who has been affected by not being able to dial 000, this is a really important opportunity to send your submission or your email to our committee so we can hear your story and potentially also tell that story through the Senate inquiry.

And I do want to say to the families and loved ones and friends of those who died, if you do want to reach out to us - we are so horrified about what has happened - if you want to reach out to us, either confidentially or otherwise, we are here to hear your story because this is part of our inquiry. Australians need to know this is never going to happen again. And the voices of Australians who have been so tragically impacted is important.

Journalist

What about the question of compensation there? Is that something that on the compensation potentially for families (inaudible).

Henderson

I am concerned that Optus said we will do the right thing and please be assured we will do the right thing. And I don't have the confidence at this point in time that Optus will do the right thing. And so therefore I believe we need full facts in relation to what Optus is going to do in relation to those failed Triple Zero calls which resulted in such tragic, tragic circumstances.

Journalist

To you, and maybe to you Mrs McIntosh, just to clarify, do you think Optus should pay compensation to the families of the victims here?

Henderson

Oh absolutely. Absolutely. I mean if they provide a service that service failed. We even heard today that reforms had they been implemented earlier that these deaths were potentially preventable. I mean we heard today that Optus didn't even test Triple Zero calls during the system upgrade during the firewall upgrade. Now I also blame the Minister and I blame the regulator because these were new rules that were put in place that did not come into effect until the first of November.

That is not good enough. But can you imagine doing a system upgrade after what Optus put Australians through two years ago after the recommendations of the Bean Review and they could not even test to make sure the Triple Zero service was working. So I think Optus has got huge liability and we demand answers as to what they are going to do for these families.

McIntosh

And that's why we've been calling. Sorry, I just - that's why we've been calling for an independent investigation from the very beginning. Not by ACMA. ACMA as we saw today was caught up in the failed process. They're essentially investigating themselves and that's not good enough. An independent investigation will get to the bottom of both what's been going on in the government, the failed processes of ACMA, the failed communications from the Minister herself and of course the failures by Optus.

Journalist

Senator Smith, if I can, in WA the Libs and Nationals run a scheme separate parties when they're in Opposition. We've seen a couple of elections where the two parties are taking competing policies on the same issue to an election. How do you think that that works with the electorate?

Smith

Well, the first thing I'd say is that how the Liberal and National parties operate across Australia is different depending on which jurisdiction we're talking about. It is true that in Western Australia we have a very healthy separation from the National Party. I would argue that it has worked very, very well for us in the past.

There's no doubt that in Opposition, particularly when we're navigating some important but contentious policy issues, sometimes those differences between the National Party and the Liberal Party can flare up. But people in this building will know that I'm a very, very strong coalitionist. I do believe we should be working and thinking about ourselves, about how do we act and perform when we're elected to government.

And I would just say to my colleagues one thing there is a dearth of opportunity at the moment to hold Labor accountable. We are about to enter the summer. Electricity prices are at the core of refrigeration and cooling. I think Australians are going to feel firsthand the high cost of Labor's energy policies. And I think we should use this as an opportunity as we wind down the parliamentary year, get ourselves worked up for the summer holidays, just to remind ourselves that the key point of focus here is Labor's failings on energy policy that are driving up costs for families, that are driving up costs for businesses, and, as we've seen, unfortunately, driving significant industrial enterprises out of business.

That must be our first and primary focus during the course of this year. But I'm a strong coalitionist. These are early days of Opposition. We're working hard to get ourselves elected. Credibility is at the core of everything we do. I actually welcome the clarity that the National Party now has around its position. I'm a member of the Coalition working group. Their position will help inform our position. But I'm sure the National Party is very, very, very aware that the Liberal Party will come at its own position, informed by its own priorities and considerations and in its own time.

Journalist

Is a party room meeting needed this week to provide some clarity? I mean, it's very difficult for the Opposition to put the focus on Labor when the two Opposition parties can't get on the same page.

Smith

No, I disagree. I think last week in the House of Representatives, certainly in the Senate, we did put the focus on Labor very, very convincingly. Chris Bowen did not want the intergovernmental brief to be presented to the Parliament.

Journalist

You must agree that the focus is on you this week, though, because of …

Smith

No, no, no, no. Your point was, and I'm going to reiterate this, last week was a powerful demonstration that there is (a) opportunity to hold Labor accountable. (B) That was one very powerful example of Minister Bowen wanting to hide critical information, not just from the Parliament, but from the community.

I'm someone who believes that when the government came out and announced its emissions reduction target, it was characterised by a lack of enthusiasm. A lack of enthusiasm on the part of Prime Minister Albanese and Chris Bowen. And my assessment is that they understand, just as well as The Nationals and just as well as the Liberal Party, that rising energy costs are creeping into the consciousness of Australian families and Australian businesses. So, I think last week we demonstrated that there is full opportunity to hold Labor accountable.

I would like that to be the focus of our energy discussions. But at such an early stage of Opposition on what is an important issue that goes to the core of our economic security, that it's to be expected that we will use this time to deliberate over our particular policy positions. And in the Liberal Party, and I think it's fair to say in the National Party, we do have a very proud tradition of people speaking their minds and I think that's a very, very necessary and positive feature that we use to get to what I think will be a very compelling outcome when we get there.

Henderson

And can I just add, as a member of the backbench, the only backbencher here, I very much hope that my Liberal colleagues support the position where we turn our back entirely on Labor's terrible net zero laws, which are just ...

Journalist

Do you support a party room meeting to settle it this week? Sussan Ley's leadership's under threat.

Henderson

Which, if I could - which are causing enormous environmental and economic harm. Australians can see it. Electricity prices are skyrocketing, emissions are flatlining. And that's why I believe that we will get to a position where we will work together to reject Labor's net zero laws.

Journalist

How does it play out this week, in your view?

Henderson

We'll work through our own internal processes.

Journalist

Should there be a Liberal meeting this week?

Henderson

Well, I just hope that we reach a position as soon as possible. I don't think this can go on for a long time, but I do hope that we reach our position as soon as possible.

Journalist

For a mainstream opposition party to go - is it credible for a mainstream opposition party to go to an election without promising something on the line of net zero. In your point of view, is it credible for the Liberal Party to have the next election without …

Henderson

Absolutely. Because Australians. Yeah, sure. Because Australians can see that these policies are not working. We know that Labor won't reach its 2030 target. We know that Labor won't reach its 2035 target. And the crippling costs, particularly in regional communities, mean that so many Australians are suffering. So these policies are not working. Australians can see it.

The National Party have called this out. Yes, we are very concerned to ensure that we continue to reduce emissions, but we are not going to allow Australians to pay the highest price with policies by Labor that are simply failing Australians.

Journalist

Are you concerned about the instability this week? I mean, it's difficult to get a message out when the focus is on where the party's going to go if there's a split between the Nats and the Libs.

McIntosh

Well, we managed to get you all here and we're standing here as a strong Coalition.

Journalist

So now concerns?

McIntosh

Let me just answer. Anne, myself, have been prosecuting this along with their Senate colleagues for weeks and weeks now. And this is what we do when we are a strong Opposition. We hold the government to account. They're letting Australians down on Optus and this is life and death. They're letting Australians down, they're not going to be reaching their 2050 targets. Letting Australians down on housing, their promises to build more houses, and now it's come to the revelation that they're not going to do that. And people I know in my community in outer metro Sydney struggling to even get into a home and they're letting Australians down with those broken promises, including $275 less on your energy bill. So, when we are a strong Opposition, we get our stories out.

Journalist

On net zero, what do you see as the next step for the Liberals?

McIntosh

I've surveyed my community. I've been out very strongly on the perceptions of my community. Over 1500 people came back to me and said that they do not support net zero. 65%, 87% are paying more on their energy bills now and they are suffering - their cost of living. Everything about their lives, they are suffering. We have homeless people on the streets of Penrith in my community like never before. They want to do the right thing. They're putting solar panels on their roofs but they can't afford the batteries. This is not anti-environment, it is pro-reality and that's what's happening in the suburbs and right across Australia.

Journalist

Do you agree with your colleague, just to be absolutely clear, do you agree with your colleague, Senator Henderson, that the Liberals should walk away from net zero?

McIntosh

I don't support net zero on behalf of my community because they are paying the price. I've said this all along. These are everyday Australians whose energy bills are through the roof. It is not politics, it's not ideology. It is around once again, it's around people's survival in the suburbs of Australia. And so of course, but we will come to a solution and we've got our nuts colleagues here and I'm sure we'll work out a pragmatic energy policy that suits our electorates.

Journalist

Would you like a debate about it this week in the party room?

McIntosh

We have a party room every week. If it's open to debate, then we would all, I think all of us would welcome that.

Henderson

We all agree that we need to resolve this matter as soon as we can and we're working very hard to do so.

McIntosh

And we've been having those conversations, we've been having meetings, very ongoing. There may be one more question.

Henderson

And, we might just make this the last question because I finished leave in just a few minutes.

Journalist

Dr Webster, Senator Smith just said that, you know, The Nationals position will inform the Coalition position. That doesn't necessarily mean it will be the Coalition position. Was your sense from the National Party room yesterday that there is room for compromise if the Liberals land in a slightly different spot?

Webster

Look, David Littleproud has been extremely clear that we will have constructive conversation. That's what we do in a Coalition. This isn't news. We have our different views and we bring those into the party room and we discuss those views. That's what good politics is about. And as a Coalition, that has fundamentally the same values, we want to see Australians prosper. We want to see independent enterprise. We want to see people being able to make their own choices. People are hurting in Australia right now. Energy is the economy and energy is hurting people. This is a very, very important topic and we all feel powerful passionately about it.

And however, in terms of The Nationals’ position, we are giving our Liberal colleagues, my colleagues, their space to make their own decisions. That is what we do. We respect each other's party room. Then we come together and we will formulate whatever the final position is. The Nationals have made their - we have made our position very clear. We have a pathway forward for cheaper, better and fairer energy policy. And that's what we want to prosecute. Now, the Liberals, we do respect them to have their space, to be able to make up their mind.

McIntosh

Thanks, everyone.