Hon Ken Baston asks about a TAB services outage at the Broome Turf Club during the Broome Cup. The Minister responds, explaining the cause and future considerations.

AnsweredQoN 898Legislative Council
Asked
21 August 2019
Portfolio
Racing and Gaming

QuestionView source ↗

BROOME TURF CLUB —
TAB SERVICES
898. Hon KEN BASTON to the minister representing the
Minister for Racing and Gaming:
I refer to the TAB services
available at Broome Turf Club on Saturday, 17 August, for the Broome Cup.
(1) How long were TAB services
unavailable at this event?
(2) What was the cause of the
outage?
(3) Can the minister advise what
steps can be taken to ensure this does not occur in the future?

AnswerView source ↗

I thank the member for the question.
I can assure him it is not a Rocket Racer episode! The following information
has been provided to me by the Minister for Racing and Gaming.
(1) Services were disrupted for
approximately 60 minutes.
(2) Racing and Wagering Western Australia utilises a mobile
data system that aggregates multiple 4G internet services. Due to the
number of people on the course, the 4G network suffered high congestion,
causing intermittent disruption to tote services. The decision was made with
Broome Turf Club to switch to a physical data line copper BDSL service, which
took approximately 15 minutes to implement. This is the first instance that the
4G network has failed.
(3) On advice
that the physical data line copper BDSL service would no longer be supported by
Telstra, RWWA and Broome Turf Club had previously received information from
Telstra regarding the cost of connecting to a fibre service to the racecourse.
The cost was viewed as prohibitive by Broome Turf Club and the mobile data
system was the only other option. Given the failure of the mobile data system
on Broome Cup day, the fibre service will be reviewed by Broome Turf Club and
Telstra.

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