Commonwealth Numbered Regulations - Explanatory Statements

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FISHERIES MANAGEMENT AMENDMENT REGULATIONS 2000 (NO. 3) 2000 NO. 310

STATUTORY RULES 2000 No. 310

Issued by the authority of the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry

Fisheries Management Act 1991

Fisheries Management Amendment Regulations 2000 (No. 3)

Subsection 168(1) of the Fisheries Management Act 1991 (the Act) empowers the Governor-General to make regulations required or permitted by the Act to be prescribed and regulations necessary or convenient to be prescribed in carrying out or giving effect to the Act Subsection 168(2)(e)(ii) provides that. regulations may be made to effect the imposition and recovery of fees in respect of the making of applications under the Act.

Section 8 of the Levy Act 1991 and section 168 of the Act empower the Governor-General to make regulations for the recovery of levy.

Regulation 21 of the Fisheries Management Regulations 1992 (the Principal Regulations)

provides that prescribed fees are payable in respect of the matters set out in Schedule 2. These matters include the making of an application for a fishing permit.

Subregulation 21(2) of the Principal Regulations provides, in part, that the fees for an application to vary a condition on a fishing permit prescribed in item 9 of Schedule 2 are not payable if that variation is to take account of the transfer of quota in the South East Trawl Fishery. This provision exists because quota transfers occur frequently throughout the fishing season and the costs of these transactions are recovered through the levy set for that fishery under the Fishing Levy Regulations.

The Fisheries Management Amendment Regulations (the Regulations) have two purposes. The first is to apply the exemption set out in Subregulation 21(2) of the Principal Regulations to a]', the fisheries managed by a system of Individual Transferable Quota (ITQ), under which units of quota are transferred frequently between permit holders throughout the fishing season. The South East Non-trawl Fishery is currently managed using ITQs, and an ITQ system will shortly be implemented in the Southern Shark Fishery. The costs of these transactions are, or will be, recovered through the levy set for the relevant fishery.

The second purpose of the Regulations is to remove the fee that is imposed under the Principal Regulations in respect of applications for fishing permits in formally managed fisheries, except the Heard Island and McDonald Islands Fishery (HIMIF) or Macquarie Island Fishery (MIF). (The HIMIF and MIF have separate application fees as set out in Schedule 2 of the Principal Regulations.) These fees are to be recovered through the levy structure for each managed fishery, and the prescribed fee in item 1 of Schedule 2 of the Principal Regulations is therefore redundant.

Details of the Regulations, which commenced on gazettal, are set out below:

Regulation 1 provides for the Regulations to be cited as the Fisheries Management Amendment Regulations 2000.

Regulation 2 provides that the Regulations commence on gazettal.

Regulation 3 provides that Schedule 1 amends the principal Regulations.

Schedule 1 Item 1 substitutes new subregulations that provide that permit condition variation fees in relation to quota transfers are not payable in respect of permits for all fisheries managed by a quota system.

Schedule 1 Item 2 omits item 1 of Schedule 2 of the Principal Regulations.