Bills Digest No. 93 2004–05
AusLink (National Land Transport—Consequential
and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2004
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
AusLink (National Land Transport—Consequential
and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2004
Date Introduced: 9 December 2004
House: House of Representatives
Portfolio: Transport and Regional Services
Commencement: Sections 1 to 3, and any anything
not elsewhere covered by the table in clause 2, commence when the Bill
receives the Royal Assent. Schedules 1 and 2 commence when Parts 3 to
8 of the AusLink (National Land Transport) Act 2004 commence.
The Bill’s main purpose is to amend the Australian Land
Transport Development Act 1988 (ALTD Act)—the main Act governing Commonwealth
land transport funding—to provide transitional arrangements until the
Government’s AusLink land transport infrastructure funding proposals commence
under the AusLink (National Land Transport) Bill 2004. When AusLink comes
into effect, no new projects can be funded under the ALTD Act. Projects
already approved under the ALTD Act will carry over into AusLink.
Background to this Bill can be found in the Bills Digest for the AusLink
(National Land Transport) Bill 2004.
The Bill has two Schedules. Schedule 1 contains consequential amendments
while Schedule 2 contains transitional provisions.
Schedule 1 has two main purposes. First, it abolishes the special account—the
ALTD Account—and any references to it. A special account is essentially
a bookkeeping device where all revenue and spending relevant to a particular
purpose are recorded. In this particular case, certain revenues are credited
to the special account and then used to fund roads. Second, Schedule 1
amends the ALTD Act to take account of the abolition.
At different times, the special account has been called the Trust Fund,
the ALTD Reserve and, now, the ALTD Account. But the ALTD Act still contains
references to the ‘Reserve’. The bulk of items in Schedule 1 eliminate
references to the Reserve. Items 9, 17, 22, 24,
26, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35 replace
references to ‘out of the Reserve’ with ‘under this Act’. Items 13,
27, 28 and 37 also delete references to the Reserve.
Item 2 inserts a definition of the ‘Auslink transition time’.
This is when Parts 3 to 8 of the AusLink (National Land Transport) Bill
commence.
Subsection 3(1) of the ALTD Act contains definitions. Items 3,
4, 6, 7 and 8 repeal definitions in this subsection.
Item 3 repeals the definition of the ‘charge rate’, item 4 the ‘indexation
factor’, item 6 the ‘Reserve’, item 7 the ‘road user charge’, and item
8 the definition of ‘urban area’.
Comment: the road user charge, the indexation factor and the charge
rate all relate to the determination of the amount to be credited to the
special account. Technically, an amount based on these three factors is
credited to the special account, which is then used to fund roads. The
road user charge, the indexation factor and the charge rate hark back
to the time when a notional part of the excise and customs duty on fuels
was allocated to road funding.(1) These arrangements were put
in place so that the government could demonstrate that it was allocating
some fuel excise revenue to road funding. But the amount credited to the
special account is only a fraction of total road funding. Consequently,
the road user charge, the indexation factor, the charge rate and the special
account are redundant.
Sections 4 to 8 of the ALTD Act deal with different categories of land
transport programs including roads, railways, urban public transport,
provincial cities and rural highways, and the black spot program. Under
AusLink, these categories become redundant and so are repealed by item
10. Item 10 also repeals sections 9 and 10 of the ALTD Act, which
deal with the indexation factor and the charge rate respectively.
Sections 11 to 14 of the ALTD Act deal with the establishment of the
special account—the Reserve—amounts to be credited to it, and the indexation
of the charge rate. These sections are redundant and so are repealed by
item 12.
Section 19 of the ALTD Act allows the Minister to reallocate funds between
state arterial roads and local roads. Item 20 repeals section 19
and substitutes a new section 19, which allows the Minister to
reallocate funds from one project in a state to another project.
Comment: this both eliminates the redundant references to state
arterial roads and gives the Minister greater flexibility to reallocate
funds.
Section 26 of the ALTD Act deals with the approval of projects and programs.
Among other things, it allows the Minister to ask various bodies to submit
particulars of proposals for roads, railways, black spots, urban public
transport, research, and road safety. Item 25 repeals section 26
and substitutes a new section 26. In essence, new section 26 provides
that when AusLink commences, no new projects can be approved under the
ALTD Act. Further, some projects approved under the ALTD Act may not be
incorporated into AusLink. New section 26 allows for continued payments
for such projects. The Explanatory Memorandum states:
This item inserts a new section 26 which specifies that
the Minister must not grant a new project approval after the AusLink
transition time. The new section continues in force an approval
made before the AusLink transition time which is not transferred to
the AusLink (National Land Transport)
Act 2004 by a determination under Schedule 2 of this Act.
This allows payments to continue to be made under the
ALTD Act for any projects not transferred to the AusLink programme.
It is expected that these will be projects not on the AusLink National
Network to be declared under the AusLink (National
Land Transport) Act 2004.
The new section 26 also continues in force any declarations
made under the Act prior to the AusLink transition time.(2)
Item 2 of Schedule 2 empowers the Minister to determine project
approvals, made under the ALTD Act, to become approved projects under
AusLink.
Item 3 provides an appropriation of $1, 371,489,000 for the financial
year ended 30 June 2005. The Explanatory Memorandum states:
The appropriation is required as the Bill removes the
provisions establishing and operating the ALTD Special Account which,
with the Financial Management and Accountability Act 1997, provide
the appropriation of funds for Australian Land Transport Development
programmes. The amount is the funding identified in the 2004-05
Budget for expenditure on the AusLink programme in that year.
Funding in future years will be provided by annual appropriations.
The appropriation also provides funding for payments
to be made for projects not transferring to the AusLink legislation
but remaining as projects approved under the ALTD Act.(3)
-
For further information, see Australian National Audit Office, Management
of the National Highways System Program, audit report no. 21,
8 February 2001.
-
Explanatory Memorandum p. 6.
-
Explanatory Memorandum p. 8.
Richard Webb
3 February 2005
Bills Digest Service
Information and Research Services
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using information available at the time of production. The views expressed
do not reflect an official position of the Information and Research Service,
nor do they constitute professional legal opinion.
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ISSN 1328-8091
© Commonwealth of Australia 2005
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Published by the Parliamentary Library, 2005.
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