There is concern that TV stations will no longer have to caption their programs, in a move that could cut off large parts of the deaf and hearing-impaired community.

The Government is reportedly looking to remove the requirement that all free-to-air broadcasters must provide 100 per cent captioning from 6:00am until midnight.

The changes would come as part of deregulation efforts, removing the annual compliance report for broadcasters.

The federal Department of Communications says it is looking for a change to provide greater flexibility by moving to a complaints-based approach.

Former disability discrimination commissioner Graeme Innes said the new proposal has raised concerns.

“What they do is make it easier for the industry not to comply with these captions requirements, and people who are deaf are already concerned that sometimes quality of captions is not maintained,” he said.

“This will put their captions at further risk.”

Deafness Forum Australia chief executive Steve Williamson told the ABC that the changes would likely lead to a reduction in services.

“We recognise that, of course, it's important to minimise bureaucracy and unnecessary legislation,” he said.

“But that must be balanced against the needs of the people it serves, and in this case the consumers simply weren't consulted.

“It's taken decades for Australian governments to lift the standard of captioning here, so any dilution of these standards will put us even further behind the US and the United Kingdom, and this is at a time when we need to be trying to catch up.”

“As a business person myself, I'm all for reducing red tape, but within reason,” Deaf Services Queensland chief executive Brett Casey told reporters.

“What I see here is that the Government wants to move to reduce that compliance reporting and also to change it to a complaints-based system, which relies on the viewer to ensure that the level of captioning is appropriate or not.

“In one way, I believe it shows that we're going backwards.”