Bills Digest No. 158 2002-03
Export Control Amendment Bill
2003
WARNING:
This Digest was prepared for debate. It reflects the legislation as
introduced and does not canvass subsequent amendments. This Digest
does not have any official legal status. Other sources should be
consulted to determine the subsequent official status of the
Bill.
CONTENTS
Passage History
Purpose
Background
Main Provisions
Concluding Comments
Endnotes
Contact Officer & Copyright Details
Passage History
Export Control Amendment Bill
2003
Date Introduced: 27 March 2003
House: House of Representatives
Portfolio: Agriculture, Fisheries and
Forestry
Commencement: The clause referring to the
offences of providing false or misleading information or documents
will commence immediately after the commencement of Schedule 2 to
the Criminal Code Amendment
(Theft, Fraud, Bribery and Related Offences) Act 2000, and the
changes to the description of goods that originate from Christmas
Island or the Cocos (Keeling) Islands on certificates issued in
relation to goods for export will commence on Proclamation, or if
not proclaimed within 6 months of Royal Assent, on the first day
after the end of that period.
To amend the
Export Control Act
1982 for two purposes:
- to redraft the section referring to the offences of providing
false or misleading information or documents, and
- to allow certificates issued in relation to goods for export to
specify when goods originate from Christmas Island or the Cocos
(Keeling) Islands.
The Export Control Act 1982 (the Act)
sets up a regime for the export inspection of prescribed goods.
These goods include meat, fish, fresh fruit and vegetables, dairy
produce and grains. Inspection is conducted by authorised officers
of the Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service (AQIS). The
purpose of the inspection is to ensure that the goods which are to
be exported meet the strict requirements set out in the orders made
pursuant to the regulations under the Act. These requirements are
aimed at ensuring fitness for human consumption, quality and
accurate trade description of the goods.
Successive Governments have taken a serious
view of malpractice in the export food industry.(1) They
have argued that any malpractice that may endanger the reputation
of Australia s export industries and jeopardise overseas markets
for Australian goods must be strongly deterred.(2) The
Act includes penalties for false declarations and trade
descriptions, and grants extensive regulation making power to the
Governor-General including penalties for offences against the
regulations. This Bill redrafts the references in the section on
offences, replacing it with references in the Criminal Code Amendment (Theft,
Fraud, Bribery and Related Offences) Act 2000.
The World Trade Organisation s (WTO)
quarantine agreement (the Sanitary and Phytosanitary Agreement or
SPS Agreement) allows all current 141 WTO members, including
Australia, to set their own level of quarantine protection. Under
this agreement, quarantine measures must be based on scientific
principles and must not include unfair restrictions designed to
prevent or restrict trade. Australia has been able to negotiate
favourable quarantine access conditions to international markets
for agricultural exports because of our relative freedom from pests
and diseases that exist elsewhere in the world. According to the
Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Australia has
been successful in gaining access to many new markets for animal,
plant and food products during the past five years.(3)
The National Food Industry Strategy (NFIS) Ltd. reported in March
2003 that the food industry accounted for 22 per cent of sales of
Australian products overseas and that food exports, both processed
and unprocessed, were valued at more than $26 billion in the
2001-2002 financial year.(4)
Christmas Island
and Cocos (Keeling)
Islands
This Bill concerns the description of
prescribed goods, including meat, fish, fresh fruit and vegetables,
that originate on Christmas Island or the Cocos (Keeling) Islands
and are being exported. Little food is produced in either
territory. On Christmas Island food supplies are imported both from
Asia and from mainland Australia.(5) In 1999 it was
reported that, on the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, a small farm
produced some fruit and vegetables commercially, and that there was
some private production for home consumption.(6)
However, practically all food consumed on the Cocos (Keeling)
Islands came from mainland Australia.(7)
The Christmas Island economy currently centres
on phosphate mining, government services and tourism.(8)
Since the closure of the Christmas Island Resort and Casino in 1998
after four and a half years of operation, tourism has been almost
entirely driven by the unique flora and fauna within the National
Park and surrounding seas.(9) The Asia Pacific Space
Corporation (APSC) still has plans to build a satellite launching
facility on Christmas Island. It has contracts with Russian
suppliers for rocket launchers.(10) Nothing has been
built so far.(11) In March 2002 the Government announced
that it planned to build a permanent immigration reception and
processing centre to accommodate up to 1200 detained asylum
seekers.(12) The size of this facility was scaled down
to 800 places in February 2003.(13) A project manager
has recently been selected for the construction(14) but
no date has been given for completion of the centre.
Copra provided the initial base for the Cocos
(Keeling) Islands economy but commercial production ceased in the
1980s as a result of low international prices and high production
costs.(15) In a report published in 1999, the
Commonwealth Grants Commission said that economic activity on the
Cocos (Keeling) Islands was extremely limited.(16) The
major areas of economic activity were the provision of government
and commercial services, the main outlet for the latter being
through the Cocos Co-Operative Society Ltd. According to the Grants
Commission report, a small horticultural enterprise had operated on
Cocos since the late 1980s. It had received substantial levels of
Commonwealth assistance at least in the developmental stages
.(17) Several aquaculture and fisheries projects have
also been trialled on the Cocos (Keeling) Islands. These include a
pilot project to grow giant clams for export, a research project on
black lipped pearl farming, and the creation of a joint venture
between the Cocos Islands Co-Operative Society Ltd. and a tuna
fishing company from the mainland.(18) The current
status of all these projects is not known.
The Minister said in his second reading speech
on this Bill that the external territories of Christmas Island and
Cocos (Keeling) Islands do not enjoy the same relative freedom from
agricultural pests and diseases as do other parts of
Australia.(19) The purpose of this Bill is to ensure
that any prescribed goods for export, including fish, fruit and
vegetables that originate on Christmas Island or the Cocos
(Keeling) Islands, are not described as coming from Australia .
Instead, they will be described on the export certificates as
coming from the Australian Territory of Christmas Island or from
the Australian Territory of Cocos (Keeling) Islands .
Item 1 of Schedule 1 amends subsection
11Q(5) of the Export Control
Act 1982. This subsection deals with the offences of making
false or misleading statements in information or documents
concerning goods prescribed under the Act that have been, or are to
be, exported. The purpose of the amendment proposed by
item 1 is to
remove the reference to section 16 in subsection 11Q(5) of the Act
and to replace it with references to the relevant offences provided
by subsection 137.1 False or misleading information and subsection
137.2 False or misleading documents in the Criminal Code. These
offences were added to the Criminal Code by the Criminal Code Amendment (Theft, Fraud,
Bribery and Related Offences) Act 2000 and came into effect
during 2001.
Item 2 excises Christmas
Island and Cocos (Keeling) Islands from the definition of Australia
in the Act. Item
3 provides for separate certification arrangements to be
made for goods to be exported from Christmas Island or Cocos
(Keeling) Islands. It also specifies who may issue the certificates
in respect of goods originating in Christmas Island or Cocos
(Keeling) Islands. Item
3 provides that a certificate may state that the goods are
from the Australian Territory of Christmas Island or the Australian
Territory of Cocos (Keeling) Islands . According to the Explanatory
Memorandum, the purpose of this provision is to clearly establish a
link to Australia without compromising Australia s pest or disease
status in overseas markets.(20)
There may be some connection between
this Bill and an earlier piece of proposed
legislation, the Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry Legislation
Amendment Bill (No. 1) 2002 (the AFFA Bill), that is still before
the Parliament.(21) One purpose of the AFFA Bill is to
amend the Quarantine Act
1908 (Quarantine Act) in order extend the Australian
quarantine regime to Christmas
Island. When he introduced the AFFA Bill
on 29 May
2002, the Minister said in his second
reading speech that:
This bill will extend the Quarantine
Act 1908 to Christmas Island
in accordance with the government s
policy to align conditions and standards in
the Indian Ocean
territories with those of comparable
communities in the rest of Australia.
The Quarantine Act already extends to the Cocos
(Keeling) Islands.
These amendments will extend the Quarantine Act
to Christmas Island
in the same way as the act has been
extended to the Cocos (Keeling) Islands.
..
In recognition of the differences in
the pest and disease status between the mainland
of Australia
and Christmas
Island, the bill will ensure that
appropriate quarantine barriers continue to exist
between Christmas Island
and mainland
Australia.
At the same time, this approach will give Christmas Islanders the
flexibility to determine a level of protection that best suits
them, having regard to their own trading needs and the island s
unique pest and disease status.
(22)
Both the present
Bill and the AFFA Bill may be seen in the
context of the commitment of successive Governments
to:
- align conditions and standards in
the Indian Ocean
Territories
with those of comparable communities
in the rest of Australia,
and
- provide the residents of
the Indian Ocean
Territories,
over time, with rights, opportunities and responsibilities equal to
those of their fellow Australians.
The range of measures to achieve these
goals were first set out in agreements signed on behalf of the
Commonwealth by the then Prime Minister, Hon Bob Hawke, with the
leaders of the Christmas Islands and Cocos (Keeling) Islands
communities in 1991.
- The current Act arose out of events in
the early 1980s. In August 1981 discoveries were made in the
United States
of horse meat having been
substituted for beef by an Australian meat export establishment.
The reputation of the Australian meat industry was severely
tarnished. (See Royal Commission into the Australian Meat Industry,
Report, 1982). In
response to the meat substitution scandal the Customs (Unlawful Exportation of Food)
Act 1982 and the Meat
Export (Penalties) Act 1982 were enacted. These Acts were
replaced by the Export
Control Act 1982 which commenced operation on
1 January
1983.
- See for example debates on previous
amendments to the Export
Control Act 1982 including the Second Reading Speeches on the
Export Control Amendment Bill 1991, Senate, Hansard, 30 May 1991, p. 3896 and 5339.
- www.affa.gov.au
- Food exports up and down , National
Food Industry Strategy Ltd., Media Release,
11 March 2003
at www.nfis.com.au >>News &
Events >> Media releases. See also Composition of Trade, Australia
2002, Market Information and Analysis Section, Department of
Foreign Affairs and Trade, May 2003, Table 3: Australia s
merchandise trade by broad category , p. 23.
- Commonwealth Grants Commission,
Report on
Indian Ocean Territories, Canberra 1999, p. 17.
- ibid., p. 13.
- ibid., p. 17.
- The following sources provide
information on economic activity on Christmas Island:
Bureau of Transport Economics
(Australia), Christmas Island regional analysis: Report prepared for
the Indian Ocean Territories Review, December 1998
Commonwealth Grants Commission,
Report on
Indian Ocean Territories, Canberra 1999
Indian Ocean Territories
Review,
[conducted jointly by the Department of Transport and Regional
Services and the Department of Finance and Administration], January
1999.
- Commonwealth Grants Commission,
Report on Indian Ocean
Territories, op. cit., p. 14.
- Laura Tingle, Cash flood puts island at
risk , Australian Financial
Review, 1 July 2002, and Hon Ian Macfarlane, Minister for
Industry, Tourism and Resources, Moscow space talks bring lift-off
a step closer , Media
Release, 14 July 2002.
- Senator Trish Crossin, Senator for the Northern Territory, Island not so rosy , Letter to the Editor,
Northern Territory
News, 5 April
2003, p.
11.
- Hon Philip Ruddock, Minister for
Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs, Permanent
immigration facility for Christmas Island , Media Release,
12 March
2002.
- Hon Philip Ruddock, Minister for
Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs, Re-Tender for
Christmas Island Immigration Centre , Joint Media Release with Minister
for Finance and Administration, Senator Nick Minchin, MPS 9/2003,
19 February 2003.
- Senator Nick Minchin, Minister for Finance and
Administration, Project Manager appointed for construction of
Christmas Island Immigration Reception and Processing Centre ,
Media Release,
9 May
2003.
- Bureau of Transport Economics
(Australia), Cocos (Keeling) Islands regional analysis: Report prepared for
the Indian Ocean Territories Review, December 1998, p. 17.
- Commonwealth Grants Commission,
Report on Indian Ocean
Territories, op. cit., p. 12.
- ibid., p. 13.
- ibid., p. 14 and Bureau of Transport
Economics (Australia), Cocos (Keeling) Islands regional analysis: Report prepared for
the Indian Ocean Territories Review, op. cit., p. 21.
- Hon Warren Truss, Minister for
Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Second Reading Speech , Export
Control Amendment Bill 2003, House of Representatives, Debates, 27 March 2003, p.
13426.
- Explanatory
Memorandum,
Export Control Amendment Bill 2003, p. 3.
- The Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry
Legislation Amendment Bill (No. 1) 2002 was introduced into the
House of Representatives on 29 May 2002 and the second reading adjourned on the
same day. On 18
September 2002 the
Senate Scrutiny of Bills Committee recommendation was adopted and
the provisions of the Bill were referred to the Senate Rural and
Regional Affairs and Transport Legislation Committee. The Committee
reported on 12
November 2002.
On 11 February
2003 the House of
Representatives referred the Bill to the Main Committee.
- Hon Warren Truss, Minister for
Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Second Reading Speech ,
Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry Legislation Amendment Bill (No.
1) 2002, House of Representatives, Debates, 29 May 2002, p.
2559.
Rosemary Bell
28 May 2003
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