THE Commonwealth Government expects Victoria to help upgrade some of the State's 3892 mobile phone blackspots, according to Federal Parliamentary Secretary for Communications, Paul Fletcher.
The State Government has so far declined to say how much of the $40 million promised for mobile phone upgrades will be spent on phone black spots in the bush.
The State Opposition has made no commitment to fund black spots, saying it was a Commonwealth matter.
But Mr Fletcher said the Commonweath's expectation was clear: State Governments must chip in.
"Victoria made an announcement there would be $40m to fix mobile black spots, there is a clear commitment from the Napthine Government and certainly there has been extensive discussion between the Commonwealth and Victoria as to the mechanism as to how the competitive selection process will work," Mr Fletcher said.
"Clearly the expectation based on the plain words of the Premier, on April 8, is that there will be $40m across WiFi and black spots. Their announcement was very clear, the $40m is across two components," Mr Fletcher said.
"There is clearly an intent to fund the two components, beyond that it is a matter for the Victorians."
The Commonwealth was committing $100m to upgrading mobile phone black spots, but expected to leverage off that with funding from the three major telecommunications providers, local and State governments.
"What we expect is that they (the telcos) will put in a significant amount of their own money," he said.
There would be a competitive tender process, between Telstra, Optus and Vodafone, to build mobile phone towers.
"It will add bang for the buck, adding capacity," he said.
Public funding was being provided to partially offset the cost of providing base stations, to speed up the process.
"It allows for sites that would otherwise be uneconomic for mobile operators, sites they would otherwise not consider," Mr Fletcher said.
The Federal Government would also have a points scheme, to ensure those areas which most needed phone upgrades received them.
"The government will then look at sites nominated by the carriers, we will weight them up, which are the ones we chose to get funding," Mr Fletcher said.
"This means the telecommunications companies won't be able to pick and chose the most commercially attractive,"
The weighting would be based on factors such as the number of premises covered and landmass.
Co-contributions would also be taken into account.
Meanwhile, the NBN Co has announced it is rolling out services to more communities across the Otways and north of Melbourne.
The community consultation phase is underway, as part of the planning for 11 new fixed wireless facilities.
"The announcement demonstrates the continuing momentum of the NBN rollout across the Colac Otway and Golden Plains Shires," spokeswoman Corrie Withers said.
"Fast broadband can give residents access to e-health services, distance education and entertainment on demand and we have seen examples of business (growth)," she said.
Member for Corangamite, Sarah Henderson, said superfast fixed wireless broadband was coming to much of the Colac Otway region.
NBN Co was about to start community consultation for the roll-out in Cororooke, as well as Alvie, Beeac, Beech Forest, Cressy East, Forrest, Gellibrand, Swan Marsh, Warncoort and Barongarook.
"This is wonderful news for these communities which have struggled with poor or no broadband," Ms Henderson said.
Further north, NBN fixed wireless was now up and running in Dereel, Linton, Rokewood, Smythesdale, Cape Clear and Ross Creek.
