EXPLANATORY STATEMENT
STATUTORY RULES NO. 301 OF 1986
ISSUED BY AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTER OF STATE FOR TRANSPORT
PROTECTION OF THE SEA (PREVENTION OF POLLUTION FROM SHIPS) ACT 1983
PROTECTION OF THE SEA (PREVENTION OF POLLUTION FROM SHIPS) REGULATIONS
Sub-section 33(1) of the Protection of the Sea (Prevention of Pollution from Ships) Act 1983 (‘the Act’) provides, in part, that the Governor-General may make regulations, not inconsistent with the Act, prescribing all matters required or permitted by the Act to be prescribed or necessary or convenient to be prescribed for carrying out or giving effect to the Act. The Protection of the Sea (Prevention of Pollution from Ships) Regulations were made pursuant to this sub-section.
The object of the Regulations is to specify matters of detail relating to the Act as amended by the Statute Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act (No. 1) 1984, Statute Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act (No. 1) 1985 and the Protection of the Sea (Prevention of Pollution from Ships) Amendment Act 1986.
The Act will incorporate into Australian domestic law the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, 1973, as amended by the 1978 Protocol and the 1984 Amendments, known collectively as MARPOL 73/78.
Because the Regulations will commence in conjunction with the entry into force for Australia of this Convention, they were made under section 4 of the Acts Interpretation Act
1901. This section provides that regulations may be made as if the Act had come into operation. The proposed Regulations can not come into effect until the parent Act enters into operation.
Details of the Regulations are set out in the Attachment.
ATTACHMENT
EXPLANATORY STATEMENT
PROTECTION OF THE SEA (PREVENTION OF POLLUTION FROM SHIPS) REGULATIONS
DETAILS OF REGULATIONS
Regulation 1 is a formal provision relating to the citation of the Regulations.
Sub-regulation 2(1) is a formal interpretation provision linking the term “the Act” to the parent legislation of the Regulations, namely the Protection of the Sea (Prevention of Pollution from Ships) Act 1983.
Sub-regulation 2(2) facilitates interpretation of the Regulations by providing that a term used in the Regulations, and in the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, 1973 and Annex I to the Convention, has the same meaning as in the Convention.
Regulation 3 prescribes the holders of specified offices in the Federal Department of Transport for the purposes of section 9 of the Act relating to the combating of discharges of oil or oily mixtures into the sea.
Regulation 4 prescribes the holder of a specified office in the Federal Department of Transport for the purposes of section 11 of the Act relating to the duty to report incidents involving the discharge or the probability of a discharge of oil or an oily mixture into the sea.
Regulation 5 prescribes the means by which the master or, in his absence, the manager, owner, charterer or operator of the ship is to urgently notify a prescribed officer (regulation 4 refers) of a prescribed incident (sub-section 11(10) of the Act refers). In practice, this would be effected through the Federal Sea Safety and Surveillance Centre of the Department of Transport.
Sub-regulation 6(1) prescribes the form of pollution report which is derived from the format recommended by the International Maritime Organization in Protocol I to the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, 1973. The text of the report form is set out in the Schedule to the Regulations.
Sub-regulation 6(2) requires times shown in a pollution report to be expressed as Universal Co-ordinated Time (UTC). This time is fixed by the International Telecommunications Union and, for practical purposes, is the same as Greenwich Mean Time.
Regulation 7 stipulates that the period within which a report of a prescribed incident is to be furnished to a prescribed officer is 24 hours following receipt of such a request.
Sub-regulation 8(1) imposes an obligation on Australian oil tankers to carry an oil record book of the kind specified in sub-regulation 8(3).
Sub-regulation 8(2) imposes an obligation on Australian vessels other than oil tankers to carry an oil record book of the kind specified in sub-regulation 8(3).
Sub-regulation 8(3) specifies, for the purposes of subsection 12(3) of the Act and sub-regulations 8(1) and 8(2), the forms of Oil Record Books and Supplements. These forms accord with those specified by the International Maritime Organization, the texts of which are set out in the 1978 Protocol to the Convention.
Sub-regulation 8(4) contains a provision relating to the expression of time corresponding to sub-regulation 6(2).
Sub-regulation 9(1) specifies, for the purposes of sub-section 12(5) of the Act, the machinery space operations applicable to a ship other than an oil tanker and to cargo and ballast operations in the case of an oil tanker.
Sub-regulation 9(2) similarly specifies the occurrences involving a discharge into the sea which must be entered in a ship’s oil record book.
Regulation 10 prescribes the various holders of specified offices in the Federal Department of Transport for the purposes of section 14 of the Act. Sub-section 14(5) of the Act relates to the notification to a prescribed officer of the address in Australia of the agent of the owner of an Australian ship. Sub-section 14(6) of the Act provides that an oil record book of an Australian ship whose owner does not reside or is not represented in Australia can be deposited with a prescribed officer.
Regulation 11 relates to sub-section 32(1) of the Act which enables the Regulations to modify the application of specified provisions of the Act relating to oil record books required to be carried in Australian ships to a foreign ship, other than a foreign ship to which the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, 1973 applies.
The purpose of regulation 11 is to apply sections 12 and 13 of the Act to foreign ships to which this Convention does not apply when the ships are in a port in Australia in the territorial sea or in the sea on the landward side of the territorial sea of Australia while proceeding to or from a port in Australia.
Section 12 of the Act imposes an obligation to carry, enter up and sign an oil record book. Section 13 of the Act makes it an offence to make a false or misleading entry in an oil record book.
Regulation 12 delineates the power of the Minister for Transport to make marine orders which cover matters of administrative and technical detail. The power to make orders relating to paragraphs 12(a) and 12(b) is conferred by paragraphs 33(1)(d) and 33(1)(e) of the Act.
Paragraph 12(a) authorizes orders relating to Regulation 3(1) of Annex I to the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, 1973. Regulation 3(1) empowers the Administration (the Federal Department of Transport) to permit the installation of alternate fitting, material, applicance or apparatus in a ship, but excludes the approval of any substitution of operational methods for controlling oil discharge.
Paragraph 12(b) empowers the Minister to fix fees to be paid under the marine orders.
Regulation 13 imposes a fee of $40 when an oil record book is lodged with a prescribed officer in accordance with section 14 of the Act as outlined above in relation to regulation 10.
Regulation 14 is made under paragraph 33(1)(g) of the Act which permits the regulations to exempt ships included in a prescribed class of ships from the operation of the Act. The classes specified in sub-regulation 14(1) are as set out in paragraph (3) of Article 3 of the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, 1973.
Sub-regulation 14(2) clarifies the language of sub-regulation 14(1) by providing that the term “State” refers to a country which is a party to the Convention as distinct from a State of the Commonwealth of Australia.
Sub-regulation 14(3) exempts a warship, naval auxiliary or ship owned or operated by a State which is used only on government non-commercial service from the requirements of the Act and Regulations.
The purpose of the Schedule is outlined above in relation to regulation 6.