The national communications regulator's annual telephone performance report broadly shows Telstra is meeting its regulatory service requirements.

The report -- the first by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA), the successor to the Australian Communications Authority and Australian Broadcasting Authority -- documents the performance of telephone services providers in complying with government regulations like the Customer Service Guarantee (CSG), which regulates basic services to residents and small business.

The latest version -- covering the 2004/05 financial year -- found although total numbers of faults on CSG-type Telstra lines had increased by two percent, the telco's performance in repairing those faults improved slightly over the previous year to 92 percent repaired within required timeframes.

In addition, the telco was successful in connecting 90 percent or more of phone lines during the year on time, and in general the performance of its network was "the same or marginally worse than that achieved in the previous year".

"Overall, the industry's compliance with key regulatory requirements appears to have continued at satisfactory levels," ACMA's acting chair Chris Cheah said in a statement. The executive noted a result above 90 percent in any category was of a "satisfactorily high level".

Optus reported generally better service performance than Telstra, although the ACMA noted care should be taken when comparing the telecommunications heavyweight with its rivals as it was required to supply services "in areas where other service providers may choose not to operate".

Telstra immediately seized on the results as an indication it had been left "carrying the can" of Australian telecommunications.

"Australia's regulatory regime forces Telstra to provide basic telephony services to all customers in all geographic locations but encourages our competitors to cherry pick the most profitable and easily serviced markets, without putting a fair share back into the network from which they draw their profits," said the telco's head of network services, Michael Lawrey.

The sentiments echoed a statement made by Telstra several weeks ago when Optus announced it would be rolling out DSL infrastructure throughout the nation.

At the time, Telstra said Optus was misleading the market by claiming it was implementing an alternative broadband network, as Optus would only put infrastructure where it was profitable.

Communications Minister Senator Helen Coonan issued a statement claiming the report demonstrated the success and importance of the government's regulatory controls.

"Before the introduction of the Customer Service Guarantee regulation, some consumers could wait more than two years for Telstra to connect a phone service. Now consumers are guaranteed a service within 20 working days," she said.

Coonan also took a potshot at Telstra's fault performance, pointing out the telco's overall fault number had increased in urban areas while decreasing those in rural and remote areas.

"I expect that this is something that Telstra itself will be keen to address," she said.