SUBJECT: AusAlert, Polling

MINISTER FOR EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT KRISTY MCBAIN: The national test of AusAlert, our new emergency warning system, has been successfully completed. Advice from our telco partners is that 94% of targeted cell towers successfully broadcast the AusAlert test messages to mobile devices around the country. This is above the National Emergency Management Agency's target. Compatible devices across the nation have received the test alert and it was effective across all states and and territories. I want to thank Australians for their support to test this critical capability that will provide near instant alerts during local and national emergencies. We have already debriefed with a range of emergency service organisations in each jurisdiction and they are also reporting successful tests and widespread coverage of devices who have received AusAlerts in communities around the country. We have also been tracking public responses from the National Situation Room and reports are that test messages reached high numbers of mobile devices around the country. Obviously we're only an hour after this test, so NEMA will continue to analyse the technical and performance data and engage with emergency service organisations around the country. Don't worry if you did not receive an alert. This could be because you were not in a coverage area, your software was not up to date or your device was incompatible.

I do want to thank the National Emergency Management Agency for delivering this game changing capability. Just to reiterate, AusAlert is potentially life-saving technology. The test has shown AusAlert's capability to deliver emergency warnings at pace and scale with 94% of targeted towers broadcasting across Australia. This is another example of the Albanese Government delivering real change for the Australian people, building on the improvements we have already made to emergency management, including the establishment of the National Emergency Management Agency to create a single nationally coordinated end to end Commonwealth agency to better prepare for, respond to and recover from increasingly frequent and severe disasters. Our $1 billion disaster ready fund delivering disaster resilience and risk reduction across the country. More than $100 million that we've invested in our national aerial firefighting capability to support states and territories to respond to crises. And the continued investment in the National Emergency Management Stockpile to support the rollout of critical goods and services to communities quickly. I'll now hand to NEMA's Interim Coordinator-General Patrick Hetherington to talk about next steps.

NEMA INTERIM COORDINATOR-GENERAL PATRICK HETHERINGTON: Thank you, Minister. Today's test was all about understanding how AusAlert performed at scale across millions of devices and at hundreds of different environments. NEMA will now assess all of the data including reports from our technical and operational partners, jurisdictions and community feedback. We'll do a deep dive into all aspects of today's test and make any necessary modifications to the system so that AusAlert is ready for the Australian Government and emergency service organisations to use from October 2026. AusAlert has been developed in partnership with states and territories over several years and has been the subject of extensive governance, policy, operational and technical consultation. We've always said that states and territories will determine when they use AusAlert and we've planned for a phased adoption across jurisdictions. State and territory emergency management agencies will have access to both AusAlert and the existing text based system until at least July 2027. With both emergency alert systems in place for the upcoming high risk weather season, jurisdictions have the option to use one or both from October 2026. NEMA has already started to train key personnel in most emergency services agencies to use the AusAlert system and this training will continue to be provided across all states and territories in the coming months.

MCBAIN: Questions?

REPORTER: That 6% of towers that didn’t go off, were they largely in regional or remote communities?

MCBAIN: No. The 6% of towers relate to towers that are offline for maintenance, that are being upgraded or have other things happening at that point in time. So, those 6% have a range of things that are already happening. As I said, we're already above NEMA's national target.

REPORTER: When will you know how many phones people received the message and will that be publicly available?

MCBAIN. We'll continue to work with our telco partners as well as device manufacturers on a range of the feedback that will come in from this test. I do want to give a shout out to NEMA and the amazing work they've done to date. NEMA is also taking feedback from constituents so you can jump on the AusAlert website and provide feedback directly to us from there.

REPORTER: Is that a commitment to tell the public how many devices have been receiving this?

MCBAIN. We'll continue to work with our telco partners around a whole range of data and make sure that that is communicated to the public. Obviously this has been a very successful test. We have reached more towers than we anticipated in this test. We already know the nine successful trials we held in jurisdictions in each state and territory, as well as running a remote test critical test that all of those tests were already successful. So, the fact that we have reached and exceeded the target that we set shows that the technology works. It shows that the partnership that NEMA has with its international partner agencies has been effective in making sure that this build was as successful as it could be for the Australian context.

REPORTER: Minister, are you able to just quickly reiterate how long you expect this alert to perhaps keep going on people's phones for people who switch their phones off, domestic violence survivors, people who have come out ranked, that sort of thing, when should. For those people who turn their devices off, when is a safe period to return those back?

MCBAIN. The broadcast signal went from 2:00 clock to 2:15pm Australian Eastern Standard Time today. We worked really closely with family and domestic violence organisations who have created a safe phone guide. Those organisations have said that people in these situations either need to leave their phone in aeroplane mode or off for 24 hour period out of an abundance of caution.

REPORTER: You said just before that people don't need to worry if they didn't get the message. There's a range of reasons why they might not have. When should people start worrying? As we come into bushfire period, as this system starts to actually be used, if they've got an old phone or they can't upgrade it, probably [INAUDIBLE].

MCBAIN: The AusAlert system is a much more capable system than the current emergency alert system that we run. But it is not the only thing that we do in an emergency. This is just another tool that we have for emergency service agencies to use in times of natural disaster or police incidents where we might want to get messages out to people quickly. The important thing that people need to do is continue to be aware of their surroundings, understand through their local emergency agencies what is happening around them, keep an ear out for emergency broadcasts on radio and tv and obviously there is nothing better than communities looking after each other, family, friends and neighbours getting in contact and keeping people up to date as they need to. This tool, AusAlert, is another tool that emergency service agencies can use in times of natural disaster. It is a much more effective tool than the current emergency alert system. But human to human contact is the thing that we need in this country and it's what Australians do really well. They look after each other in times of emergency and they will continue to do that.

REPORTER: It will never be 100% successful?

MCBAIN: There is no one avenue of communication that we currently have that is 100% successful. It is so important that communities continue to look out and look after each other. We've always done that as Australians and we always will do that as Australians. This technology is more reliable than the current text-based technology. But as I said, this is just another tool in the toolkit for emergency service agencies who are doing a really good job in communicating to communities that are at risk during a natural disaster. They will continue to do that. They've just got an extra tool now to help get that message out.

REPORTER: So, what is the internal benchmark for success there when it comes to the towers and for how many devices should receive?

MCBAIN. The benchmark that the National Emergency Management Agency set was for 90% of towers. We've reached nearly 94% of towers across the country. We've already touched base with telco partners around those and we're getting feedback that's coming in already, as I said, above the average that we thought we might get and we'll continue to work with them in the coming weeks as we refine this system before it goes live in October this year with the localised testing.

REPORTER: Do you have results from that on not the amount of towers that broadcast the message, but on the proportion of phones in that region that were reached?

MCBAIN: Look, I'll have to go to the telco partners for that one but what we do know is that it was successful in reaching the location that it was set for in those community-based trials and that phones acted the way we thought they would during those community based trials.

REPORTER: [INAUDIBLE]

MCBAIN: It's incredibly important that we continue to test this system. We know, for example, in New Zealand, their first national test, they only hit 30% of phones and towers. They're now testing at a rate of 90% in New Zealand, which has improved year on year. We know, for example, in the US that the system has been in place since 9/11 and they use it very effectively for natural disasters, but also for Amber Alerts. We know at the moment with busfires in France, that they've deployed their FR Alert only the end of last week to alert people around bushfires. So, countries around the world are already using this system very successfully. We've now had a successful trial and we'll continue to refine the technology in Australia and work with states and territories to make sure it is available for use for them from October onwards.

REPORTER: Another topic, if I can. We had a polling capital brief today, one of these MRP polls that does a seat by seat breakdown. It showed that One Nation would win somewhere in the higher 50s, low 60s seats. One of the Labor seats that was most at risk was yours and you were at the Labor conference last week, a lot of talk about One Nation. Do you feel threatened from One Nation in your seat. And what can you do about it?

MCBAIN: Look, polling is polling. At the end of the day, communities like mine want people delivering real change. They want people delivering the things that they thin matter most. And what I hear consistently from communities that are disaster prone is that in the Black Summer bushfires, when text message alerts went out, a huge chunk of our community never received them. A huge chunk of our tourists never got them until days later when they got home. So, here's new technology being delivered across the country that will make sure we are keeping more people safe during an emergency. That is delivering real change. People are asking us to deliver for them in their local communities. I live in a rural and regional community and I've got thousands of kilometres of road, which is why we've delivered a significant road funding increase to every local council across the country. Because to communities like mine, they want to make sure that they can get to and from work, to and from sport, to and from medical appointments safely and we drive more than our metropolitan counterparts. So, delivering real things to people in communities is what they want to see. That's what we've been able to do as a Labor government. In 30 years in politics, One Nation hasn't delivered anything federally and I think that's the key point here.

REPORTER: Minister, this is a rather interesting piece of technology. It allows you to override the settings on people's phones. Can you tell us a little more about the technical details of the product? Did you partner with a vendor? Did the Australian government partner with an IT vendor to deliver it? And is it a technology that other government departments are going to consider looking into? Will we receive messages from the ATO or others from similar base technology?

MCBAIN: Cell broadcast technology, as I said, is utilised in 35 countries around the world. We didn't create the technology, but we absolutely want to take advantage of it in the Australian context. AusAlert has been delivered because we know from the 2020 Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements that there was a call out for a nationally consistent messaging system so that the Australian people, wherever they are, would be receiving the same advice. For example, in a national emergency. We would never want to dilute the effectiveness of a system like AusAlert by sending out messages that aren't alert or aren't critical. It is incredibly important for us that this technology remains for the context it's required in, and that is for emergencies. We've worked really closely with our state and territory partners and will continue to do so. At the end of the day, 99% of the time, states and territories will be the ones using this system and it will be the lead emergency agency of whatever the event is that will be sending out these notifications to advise people of what the incident is, how serious it is and where it's located and where you can go for more advice. This technology is there to alert communities when they need to make decisions quickly in a rapidly changing event. So, in my mind, this technology is for the intended purpose of emergency management and that's exactly why we've partnered with the states and territories to deliver it.

REPORTER: ahead of this emergency, high risk weather season, will you publish the results of this test in terms of the proportion of phones that have been reached so Australians know what sort of penetration this system is getting ahead of that season?

MCBAIN: As I've already said, we will provide a range more details when we go through some of the technical advice that we are still getting in. We're an hour after this test now, but early on I can already tell you 94% of towers across the country have received the cell broadcast message. We know that some devices did not receive the alert and there are a range of reasons for that. And as I said, the AusAlert website allows people to provide direct feedback about their experience during the AusAlert trial. It is incredibly important that we get that feedback. We work with the states and territories on the transition and communications protocols because this technology is much more effective than the current technology we have. This is another tool in the toolbox of emergency service organisations and we are really excited that we now have this in Australia so that people will be able to receive this alert along with their emergency broadcasts from radio, from television, along with the advice from local emergency service agencies, along with the community interaction that people have during a disaster. We will continue to provide more opportunities for more information to get to people so that they can make decisions on how to keep themselves safe in a disaster event.