Australian communications minister Anika Wells cut short her annual leave and held an emergency press conference after being criticised for staying silent during a major Telstra network outage. The failure disrupted phone and internet services across the country, knocked out EFTPOS systems and forced some businesses to close, while the telco investigates whether anyone died after being unable to reach the Triple Zero emergency line.

As the minister responsible for telecommunications, Wells remained on leave while Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Emergency Management Minister Kristy McBain publicly criticised the outage. A scheduled post promoting the government's digital connectivity programme appeared on her Facebook page before being deleted, and the Prime Minister's Office initially defended her right to take leave. Wells responded more than six hours after the outage began, returning to face the media following criticism from Opposition Leader Angus Taylor.