This body is running two different answers to the same problem at the same time, and the contrast is the most useful thing in this domain.

Answer one: pay carriers to build. The Mobile Black Spot Program has run seven rounds, invested more than $1 billion, and delivered up to 1,400 new base stations. Round 8 was awarded $21.1 million and closed for applications on 28 August 2026, alongside a $100 million Regional Connectivity round.

Answer two: oblige carriers to cover. Announced on 25 February 2025 and now in draft legislation, the Universal Outdoor Mobile Obligation would require Telstra, Optus and TPG to provide reasonable and equitable access to baseline outdoor mobile voice and SMS coverage across Australia from 1 December 2027 — made feasible by low earth orbit satellite direct-to-handset technology.

A grant round buys coverage where a carrier bids for it. An obligation requires coverage everywhere and lets the carrier work out how. The first is precise and incremental; the second is universal and blunt, and it moves the cost from the Commonwealth to the carriers and ultimately to their customers.

This database has now recorded three instruments applied to the same shape of market failure — a service the market will not supply in thin markets:

1. Childcare — the Commonwealth builds, owns and leases the asset.
2. Mobile black spots — the Commonwealth pays a private carrier to build.
3. UOMO — the Commonwealth obliges private carriers to cover.

Same problem, three answers, and no evidence anywhere that the instrument was chosen by comparing them. See Three instruments for one market failure, and no sign anyone compared them.