We released our Draft Report for consultation on 15 July 2024 and held a public hearing on 30 July 2024. We received feedback from stakeholders on a range of issues, though most stakeholders focussed on the approach to co-user fees. We also received additional evidence of private market leases from communications companies.
We have incorporated this additional evidence into our data set and undertook further regression analysis. We have found our revised recommended fees are slightly higher across all density categories, though they remain lower than the current fees.
Table 1 Revised draft recommended vs current and draft rental fees ($2023-24 per annum, excluding GST)
|
Sydney |
High |
Medium |
Low |
|
| Revised draft Recommended fees | $36,915 | $31,012 | $17,251 | $8,793 |
| Draft report (July 2024) fees | $36,340 | $30,156 | $17,012 | $8,545 |
| Current fees | $42,132 | $35,109 | $19,505 | $9,362 |
We are also proposing the following revised and new recommendations:
- Co-users are only to pay a co-user fee where they licence additional land outside of the primary user’s compound. This should continue to be set at 50% of the primary user’s fee.
- Primary users deploying small cell technology on existing non-communication infrastructure are to pay an annual rental fee of $2,000 per site.
- Communication sites located on rooftops in only the Sydney density category are to pay a premium of $3,380 per annum.
- If IPART is to be provided a future referral to recommend rents for communication towers on crown land the referral should:
- Explicitly state the reason for referring the review to IPART.
- Be under s12A of the IPART Act so that our information gathering powers are available.
- Broaden the scope to include investigating the range of fees and charges imposed by the land management agencies
- That the 3 land management agencies improve their records, so they have information on whether co-users rent additional land and the additional costs associated with telecommunications towers in national parks.
We are interested in hearing from stakeholders on these revised draft recommendations and findings. Submissions will be open until 12 February 2025.
We commissioned research on small cell fees
Our proposed fee for primary users deploying small cell technology reflects market research we commissioned from K&T Property Consultants. We commissioned the research in October 2024 to address the lack of publicly available market evidence on hosting fees for small cell technology. We have published the report from K&T Property Consultants along with our revised Draft Report.