EXPLANATORY STATEMENT
STATUTORY RULES 1985 No. 313
Issued by the Authority of the Minister for Primary Industry
QUARANTINE ACT 1908
QUARANTINE (ANIMALS) REGULATIONS (AMENDMENT)
Section 87 of the Quarantine Act 1908 (‘the Act’) provides, among other things, that the Governor-General may make regulations, not inconsistent with the Act, prescribing all matters which by the Act are required or permitted to be prescribed or which are necessary or convenient to be prescribed for carrying out or giving effect to the Act.
Statutory Rules 1983 No. 70 amended the Quarantine (Animals) Regulations (‘the Regulations’) by inserting Part VIIIA into the Regulations to provide for the examination of animals for export. The Senate Standing Committee on Regulations and Ordinances (‘the Committee’) wrote to the Minister for Health, who was then responsible for these Regulations, expressing concern with respect to sub-regulations 86B(1), 86B(3), 86B(6), 86F(8), and regulation 86G.
The Committee was concerned that the words ‘where the Director is satisfied’ in sub-regulations 86B(1), 86B(3), 86B(6), 86C(1) and 86F(8) made the Director’s judgement a subjective rather than an objective one as there are no qualifications or criteria in those provisions upon which the decision could be based. The Committee also felt that the review provisions under regulation 86G would be more effective if there was an objective basis upon which the Director should be ‘satisfied’. Concern was also expressed with respect to the use of the word ‘regularly’ in sub-regulation 86B(1) as its meaning was not readily apparent.
The Committee accepted the explanation of the Minister for Health that the provision that the Director be satisfied in sub-regulation 86B(6) was necessary to prevent recognised exporters abusing the fee collection system by withholding payment of the fees and where approval was revoked as a result, paying the fees at a later time and thereby becoming approved as a recognised exporter again.
The Minister for Health advised the Chairman of the Committee that regulations 86B, 86C and 86F would be amended to provide for the Director to be satisfied on reasonable grounds and sub-regulation 86B(1) would be amended to convey the intended meaning of ‘regularly’. The Committee has accepted the proposed changes to these provisions.
The Regulations amend sub-regulations 86B(1), 86B(3), 86C(1) and 86F(8) to satisfy the Committee’s recommendation that in making a decision under these provisions the Director must be satisfied on reasonable grounds. Sub-regulation 86B(1) is also amended to more clearly convey the intended meaning of the word ‘regularly’ by omitting the words ‘a person exports animals regularly’ and substituting ‘a person has a continuing interest in the livestock export industry’.
The opportunity has been taken in the Regulations to bring the review and notification provisions of Part VIIIA of the Regulations into line with similar provisions in other recent legislation. The changes to the Regulations are primarily concerned with the form of the review and notification provisions.
The Regulations introduce two changes to sub-regulation 86G(1) to require that decisions be notified within a period of 30 days and to further require that the Director notify the grounds for that decision. The latter amendment attracts the operation of section 25D of the Acts Interpretation Act 1901. Section 25D would require a notice given under proposed sub-regulation 86G(1) to set out the findings on material questions of fact that gave rise to the decision so notified and refer to the evidence or other material on which the findings were based.
Regulation 5 of the Statutory Rules is a savings provision which will ensure that any applications before the Administrative Appeals Tribunal prior to the commencement of the regulations, will not be affected by the proposed amendments.