EXPLANATORY STATEMENT
STATUTORY RULES NO 105 OF 1983
Issued by the Authority of the Minister for Finance.
The attached Statutory Rules amend the Finance (Overseas) Regulations made under sections 63 and 71(1) of the Audit Act 1901. Details of the amendments are as follows.
FINANCE (OVERSEAS) REGULATION 10
Previously, sub-regulation 10(3) required that a cashier for an overseas office must pay all moneys received by him into a bank account. However, in some countries the banking of local cash collections by foreign representatives is prohibited under those countries banking regulations Sub-regulation 10(3) has been amended, therefore, to permit the Secretary to the Department of Finance to give directions to a cashier at an overseas office as to how he should deal with moneys received in a country where local banking is not permitted.
FINANCE (OVERSEAS) REGULATION 29
Regulation 29 has been amended to provide that where the Secretary to the Department of Finance directs, pursuant to new sub-regulation 10(3), that a cashier for an overseas office should retain moneys received by him, those moneys shall be held by the cashier as an advance and be used by him for purposes of the kind specified in paragraph (3)(a) of regulation 29 ie for the payment of accounts in cash, to purchase stamps or postal orders or to cash cheques for payees.
FINANCE (OVERSEAS) REGULATION 32
To ensure that proper control is maintained over moneys which are held as an advance by a cashier pursuant to new sub-regulation 29(1A), regulation 32 has been amended to provide that a cashier for an overseas office shall furnish such information or take such steps as may be required by directions given by the Permanent Head of the Department responsible for the establishment of the overseas office.
As the consequence of the introduction of this new sub-regulation 32(1), the previously numbered sub-regulation 32(1) is now sub-regulation 32(1A).
FINANCE (OVERSEAS) REGULATION 33
Because advances referred to in sub-regulation 29(1A) are to be dealt with in accordance with directions to be given by the Permanent Head pursuant to sub-regulation 32(1), the provisions of regulation 33, concerning the review of advances, should not apply. Accordingly, sub-regulation 33(1) has been amended to exempt such advances from the operation of regulation 33.
FINANCE (OVERSEAS) REGULATION 13
Paragraph (3)(a) of regulation 13 has been repealed. That paragraph prescribed payments of salary (and payments in the nature of salary) as a type of payment to which regulation 13 applied, and which were, therefore, subject to only a limited check before payment.
The repeal means that for manually prepared payments of salary the more rigorous checks required under regulation 12 will have to be performed before such a claim may be paid.