EXPLANATORY STATEMENT
Issued by authority of the Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury
Competition and Consumer Act 2010
Competition and Consumer (Price Notifications—Australia Post Letter Services) Amendment (Measures No. 1) Declaration 2025
Part VIIA of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (the Act) establishes a framework for the selective surveillance of the prices of certain goods or services in markets where, in the view of a Treasury Portfolio Minister, competitive pressures are not sufficient to achieve efficient prices and protect consumers. The Competition and Consumer (Price Notifications—Australia Post Letter Services) Amendment (Measures No. 1) Declaration 2025 (the Amending Declaration) is made under section 95X in Part VIIA of the Act.
Subsections 95X(1) and (2) of the Act provide that a Treasury Portfolio Minister may declare goods or services of a specified description to be notified goods or services, and declare a person, in relation to those goods or services, to be a declared person, for the purposes of Part VIIA of the Act. The Minister may vary such a declaration under subsection 95X(5) of the Act.
The Price Notification Declaration (Australia Post Letter Services) (No. 2) 2015 (the Principal Declaration) declares certain letter services supplied by Australia Post to be notified services and Australia Post to be a declared person for the purposes of Part VIIA of the Act. This requires Australia Post to give notice to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) before increasing the price of these letter services. Australia Post may only implement the price increase if, among other things, either the applicable period has ended or the ACCC does not object to the increase. The Principal Declaration is due to cease to have effect on 30 June 2025.
The purpose of the Amending Declaration is to extend the operation of the Principal Declaration so that it instead ceases to have effect on the day before it is repealed under the sunsetting framework in Part 4 of the Legislation Act 2003, which is due to occur on 1 October 2025. This extension will provide the Government additional time to undertake consultation and consider further reforms before remaking the Principal Declaration. The Amending Declaration also makes consequential amendments in relation to priority letter services following amendments to the Australian Postal Corporation (Performance Standards) Regulations 2019 (the 2019 Performance Standards Regulations), as well as improvements to ensure the Principal Declaration aligns with modern drafting practices and is in a form that is fit for purpose.
The amendments form part of the Government’s reforms to modernise Australia Post. This includes deregulating pricing oversight under the Act and delivery speed performance standards for priority letter services, by removing those services from performance standard requirements and the scope of notified services for the purposes of Part VIIA of the Act. The reforms are intended to ensure Australia Post has appropriate commercial flexibility in the pricing, delivery timetable and terms for these letter services, so to improve Australia Post’s long-term financial sustainability.
The Act does not specify any conditions that need to be satisfied before the power to make the Amending Declaration may be exercised.
The Treasury undertook targeted consultation on an exposure draft of the Amending Declaration with the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts (DITRDCA) and the Department of Finance, being the Departments responsible for implementing the broader reforms to modernise Australian postal services, and the ACCC, being the regulator responsible for administering Part VIIA of the Act. No concerns were raised from consultation.
Public consultation on an exposure draft of the Amending Declaration was not undertaken as it extends the existing price notification arrangements and any amendments are minor and machinery in nature. However, public consultation was undertaken on the Government’s proposed reforms and on the amendments to the 2019 Performance Standards Regulations. Further, extending the operation of the Principal Declaration is intended to provide the Government with additional time to undertake consultation before remaking it.
The Amending Declaration is a legislative instrument for the purposes of the Legislation Act 2003. Section 48A of the Legislation Act 2003 provides that where a legislative instrument only repeals or amends another instrument, without making any application, saving or transitional provisions relating to the amendment or repeal, that instrument is automatically repealed. By virtue of section 48A, if the Amending Declaration is not disallowed, the Amending Declaration will automatically repeal when the disallowance period ends. Once repealed, the sunsetting regime set out in Part 4 of Chapter 3 of the Legislation Act 2003 is no longer relevant to the Amending Declaration.
The Principal Declaration is a legislative instrument for the purposes of the Legislation Act 2003. Subsequently, amendments to the Principal Declaration are subject to the disallowance and sunsetting under the Legislation Act 2003.
The Amending Declaration commenced on the day after it was registered on the Federal Register of Legislation.
Details of the Amending Declaration are set out in Attachment A.
A statement of Compatibility with Human Rights is at Attachment B.
The Office of Impact Analysis has been (OIA) has been consulted (OIA ref: OIA25-09311) and agreed that an Impact Analysis is not required. The measure has no impact on compliance costs.
ATTACHMENT A
Details of the Competition and Consumer (Price Notifications—Australia Post Letter Services) Amendment (Measures No. 1) Declaration 2025
Section 1 – Name
This section provides that the name of the instrument is the Competition and Consumer (Price Notifications—Australia Post Letter Services) Amendment (Measures No. 1) Declaration 2025 (the Amending Declaration).
Section 2 – Commencement
The Amending Declaration commenced on the day after it was registered on the Federal Register of Legislation.
Section 3 – Authority
The Amending Declaration is made under the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (the Act).
Section 4 – Schedules
This section provides that each instrument that is specified in a Schedule to this instrument is amended or repealed as set out in the applicable items in the Schedule concerned, and any other item in a Schedule to this instrument has effect according to its terms.
Schedule 1 – Amendments
Schedule 1 to the Amending Declaration sets out amendments to the Price Notification Declaration (Australia Post Letter Services) (No. 2) 2015 (the Principal Declaration).
Item 1
Item 1 updates the machinery provisions of the Principal Declaration, being the name, authority and definition provisions, to align with modern drafting practices and support readability.
New clause 1 provides that the name of the Principal Declaration is the Competition and Consumer (Price Notifications—Australia Post Letter Services) Declaration 2015. This updates the name of the Principal Declaration from the Price Notification Declaration (Australia Post Letter Services) (No. 2) 2015 to reflect modern naming conventions for legislative instruments. To assist readers, a note has been inserted to new clause 1 that alerts readers that the name of the Principal Declaration has been amended.
New clause 3 provides that the Amending Declaration is made under the Act.
New clause 4 sets out the definitions of all expressions defined in the Principal Declaration. New clause 4 makes the following to changes to the existing definitions:
• The definition of ‘Amendment Regulation’, which means the Australian Postal Corporation (Performance Standards) Amendment (Speed of Mail Delivery) Regulation 2015, has been removed as all the references to this term have been repealed, as discussed in Item 5 below.
• The definition of ‘Post Act’, which means the Australian Postal Corporation Act 1989, has been removed as that Act is now expressed in its entirety in the operative provisions of the Principal Declaration, as discussed in Item 3 below.
The remaining definitions are substantively unchanged. To assist readers, an explanatory note has also been inserted to new clause 4 to provide that, in accordance with paragraph 13(b) of the Legislation Act 2003, expressions in the Principal Declaration have the same meaning as in the Act as in force from time to time.
Item 1 also repeals existing clause 3 which repealed the Price Notification Declaration (Australia Post Letter Services) 2015, being an earlier declaration which the Principal Declaration replaced. The purpose of that provision has been fulfilled and is therefore no longer necessary.
Items 2, 3, 5 and 7
Items 2, 3, 5 and 7 make further minor amendments to the Principal Declaration to support its readability and align it with modern drafting practices.
Under subclause 5(1) of the Principal Declaration, letter services supplied by Australia Post for the carriage of letters within Australia are declared to be notified services for the purposes of Part VIIA of the Act, subject to exceptions in subclause 5(2). To assist readers, item 2 inserts an explanatory note to this subclause that refers to subsection 95X(1) of the Act, which provides the Minister the power to make this declaration.
Item 3 replaces the reference to the ‘Post Act’ with the ‘Australian Postal Corporation Act 1989’ in paragraph 5(2)(a) of the Principal Declaration. This reflects that the definition for the ‘Post Act’ has been removed by Item 1 from the expressions defined in clause 4. Expressing that Act’s name in its entirety in the operative provisions supports the readability of the Principal Declaration.
Item 5 replaces the reference to ‘this Declaration’ with ‘this Instrument’ in subclause 5(3) of the Principal Declaration to align with modern drafting practices in referring to legislative instruments.
Under subclause 5(6) of the Principal Declaration, Australia Post is declared to be a declared person in relation to its notified services for the purposes of Part VIIA of the Act. To assist readers, item 7 inserts an explanatory note to this subclause that refers to subsection 95X(2) of the Act, which provides the Minister the power to make this declaration.
Items 4 and 6
Clause 5 of the Principal Declaration operates to identify which of Australia Post’s letter services are notified services for the purposes of Part VIIA of the Act. Items 4 and 6 amend this provision to make consequential amendments following amendments to the Australian Postal Corporation (Performance Standards) Regulations 2019 (the 2019 Performance Standards Regulations).
Subclause 5(4) of the Principal Declaration makes certain priority letter services notified services. It operates to make a priority letter service, as described in Schedule 1 to the Australian Postal Corporation (Performance Standards) Amendment (Speed of Mail Delivery) Regulation 2015 (2015 Amending Regulation), a notified service only if the postage rate of a priority letter is supplied at a rate exceeding 150 per cent of the ordinary rate of postage for a regular letter.
Schedule 1 to the 2015 Amending Regulation inserted a new table in section 6 of the Australian Postal Corporation (Performance Standards) Regulations 1998 (the 1998 Performance Standards Regulations) of delivery speed performance standards for ‘regular letters’ and ‘priority letters’ respectively. The 1998 Performance Standards Regulations were later replaced by the 2019 Performance Standards Regulations. In accordance with section 10 of the Acts Interpretation Act 1901 (together with paragraph 13(1)(a) of the Legislation Act 2003), subclause 5(4) of the Principal Declaration operates by reference to the equivalent table in section 8 of the 2019 Performance Standards Regulations.
In 2024 the Australian Postal Corporation (Performance Standards) Amendment (2024 Measures No. 1) Regulations 2024 amended the 2019 Performance Standards Regulations, to remove the definition of priority letters and associated performance standards. As a result of those amendments, the table in section 6 of the 2019 Performance Standards Regulations no longer references priority letters. Consequently, all priority letter services are outside the scope of notified services because it is no longer possible to meet the criteria in subclause 5(4) of the Principal Declaration for a priority letter service to be a notified service. Subclause 5(4) is therefore redundant, and item 6 repeals the subclause to reflect this and clarify that priority letters are no longer subject to pricing oversight. As a result, Australia Post is not required to notify the ACCC of any price increases for any priority letter services.
Item 4 removes the reference to ‘subject to subclause 5(4)’ in paragraph 5(2)(b) of the Principal Declaration to reflect the repeal of subclause 5(4) made by item 6.
Item 6 also repeals subclause 5(5) which relates to the application of the Principal Declaration following its commencement on 15 September 2015 but before the commencement of Schedule 1 to the 2015 Amending Regulation. As Schedule 1 to the 2015 Amending Regulation commenced on 4 January 2016, the purpose of that provision has been fulfilled and is therefore no longer necessary.
Item 8
Prior to these amendments, clause 6 of the Principal Declaration provided that the Principal Declaration ceased to have effect on 30 June 2025. Item 8 updates clause 6 to provide that the Principal Declaration ceases to have effect on the day before it is repealed under Part 4 of the Legislation Act 2003. Part 4 outlines the process for the automatic repeal of legislative instruments after a fixed period of time. Under section 50 of the Legislation Act 2003, a legislative instrument is repealed on the first 1 April or 1 October falling on or after the tenth anniversary of registration of the instrument. Accordingly, the Principal Declaration is now due to be repealed on 1 October 2025. To assist readers, explanatory note 2 is inserted to clause 6 to explain the effect of section 50 of the Legislation Act 2003.
Clause 6 is required under subsection 95X(4) of the Act, which provides that the Minister must specify the time the Principal Declaration ceases to have effect. In accordance with that subsection, the Principal Declaration will cease to have effect at that time unless revoked earlier. To assist readers, explanatory note 1 is inserted to clause 6 to explain the effect of subsection 95X(4).
The effect of the amendments made by Item 8 is that the Principal Declaration’s operation has been extended to provide the Government additional time to undertake consultation and consider further reforms before remaking the Principal Declaration.
ATTACHMENT B
Statement of Compatibility with Human Rights
Prepared in accordance with Part 3 of the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act 2011
Competition and Consumer (Price Notifications—Australia Post Letter Services) Amendment (Measures No. 1) Declaration 2025
The Competition and Consumer (Price Notifications—Australia Post Letter Services) Amendment (Measures No. 1) Declaration 2025 (Amending Declaration) is compatible with the human rights and freedoms recognised or declared in the international instruments listed in section 3 of the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act 2011.
Overview of the Legislative Instrument
The Amending Declaration makes amendments to the Price Notification Declaration (Australia Post Letter Services) (No. 2) 2015 (the Principal Declaration). The Principal Declaration declares certain letter services supplied by Australia Post to be notified services and Australia Post to be a declared person for the purposes of Part VIIA of the Act. This requires Australia Post to give notice to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) before increasing the price of these letter services. Australia Post may only implement the price increase if, among other things, either the applicable period has ended or the ACCC does not object to the increase. The Principal Declaration is due to cease in effect on 30 June 2025.
The purpose of the Amending Declaration is to extend the operation of the Principal Declaration from its current cessation date of 30 June 2025 until the day before it is repealed under the sunsetting framework in Part 4 of the Legislation Act 2003, which is due to occur on 1 October 2025. This will provide the Government additional time to undertake consultation and consider further reforms before remaking the Principal Declaration. Further, as a result of amendments to the Australian Postal Corporation (Performance Standards) Regulations 2019, all priority letter services supplied by Australia Post are no longer within the scope of notified services set out in the Principal Declaration. The Amending Declaration makes consequential amendments to reflect this in the Principal Declaration, as well as to make improvements to ensure the Principal Declaration aligns with modern drafting practices and is in a form that is fit for purpose.
The amendments form part of the Government’s reforms to modernise Australia Post. This includes deregulating pricing oversight and delivery time performance standards for priority letter services, by removing priority letter from performance standard requirements and the scope of notified services for the purposes of Part VIIA of the Act. The reforms are intended to ensure Australia Post has appropriate commercial flexibility in the pricing, delivery timetable and terms for these letter services, so to improve Australia Post’s long-term financial sustainability.
Human rights implications
The Amending Declaration does not engage any of the applicable rights or freedoms as Australian Postal Corporation is not a natural person.
Conclusion
The Amending Declaration is compatible with human rights as it does not raise any human rights issues.