Commonwealth Numbered Regulations - Explanatory Statements

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CUSTOMS (STATUTORY RULES 1992 NO. 277) (AMENDMENT) 1992 NO. 326

STATUTORY RULES 1992 No. 326

Issued by the Authority of the Minister for Small Business, Construction and Customs

Customs Act 1901

Customs (Statutory Rules 1992 No. 277) (Amendment)

Section 270 of the Customs Act 1901 (the Act) provides in part that:

"(1) The Governor-General may make regulations not inconsistent with this Act prescribing all matters which by this Act are required or permitted to be prescribed ... for giving effect to this Act or for the conduct of any business relating to the Customs,..."

The Regulations amend Statutory Rules 1992 No. 277 (SR No. 277) to correct two typographical errors in SR No. 277 which were not discovered until after that Regulation had come into force.

On 1 September 1992 the Governor-General in Council made Regulations (SR No. 277) to amend the Customs Regulations to effect a number of changes consequential on the introduction of Electronic Lodgement and to amend Schedule 2 to enable "baby walkers', to be eligible for duty free importation via a Tariff Concession Order (TCO).

SR No. 277 contained two typographical errors which cause the Regulations to have a different effect to that which was intended. The errors, their effect and the corrections are outlined below.

i)       Commencement of amendment to Schedule 2

Regulation 24 of SR No. 277 amended Schedule 2 to the Customs Regulations so that "baby walkers" would be eligible for duty free entry via the Tariff Concessions System. This amendment was intended to take effect from 22 April 1992, which was the date of the Government's decision.

A typographical error in the commencement provision of SR No. 277 provided for regulation 24 to commence on 22 April 1922. This error had the practical result of conferring a benefit on a particular applicant for a TCO who lodged an application on 9 October 1991. Under the Tariff Concessions provisions of the Act (subsection 269(n)(3) refers) an Order which results from that application has a date of effect 28 days before the date on which the application was lodged (i.e. 11 September 1991).

An amending regulation to now change the date to that originally intended would take that benefit away and therefore be in breach of subsection 48(2) of the Acts Interpretation Act 1901. Therefore to avoid a breach of that provision, the amending regulation replaces the incorrect commencement date of regulation 24 with one of 11 September 1991, which is the date closest to that of the Government's decision which does not cause detriment to the particular applicant for a TCO.

Subregulation 3.1 of the attached Regulations amends the commencement provision in SR No. 277 to provide that regulation 24 is taken to have commenced on 11 September 1991.

ii)       Amended Heading to Form 45A

Regulation 23 of SR No. 277 effected a number of technical amendments to the forms in Schedule 1 to the Customs Regulations consequential to the introduction of Electronic Lodgement. Subregulation 23.5 corrected a number of cross references to Principal Act provisions and a new subregulation in the heading to Form 45A. The amending subregulation incorrectly identified Form 45AA as the form to be amended and consequently omitted and replaced the heading of the wrong form.

Subregulation 4.1 of the attached Regulations amends subregulation 23.5 of SR No. 277 to omit the reference to Form 45AA and substitute a reference to Form 45A.

This regulation is taken to have commenced on 1 September 1992, the date of commencement of the principal Electronic Lodgement Regulations effected by SR No. 277.