Commonwealth Numbered Regulations - Explanatory Statements

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STEVEDORING LEVY (IMPOSITION) AMENDMENT REGULATIONS 1998 (NO. 1) 1998 NO. 351

STATUTORY RULES 1998 NO. 351

Issued by the Authority of the Minister for Transport and Regional Services

Stevedoring Levy (Imposition) Act 1998

Stevedoring Levy (Imposition) Amendment Regulations 1998 (No. 1)

The Stevedoring Levy (Imposition) Act 1998 (the Imposition Act) imposes a stevedoring levy on the loading and unloading of containers and vehicles. The Stevedoring Levy (Collection) Act 1998 assigns liability for levy and provides for the administrative process for collection of the levy.

Section 6 of the Imposition Act provides that the Governor-General may make regulations prescribing matters required or permitted by the Act to be prescribed or necessary or convenient to be prescribed for carrying out or giving effect to the Act.

Section 5 of the Imposition Act provides a rate of levy for containers and for vehicles and allows a lower rate to be prescribed by regulation. It also allows the regulations to prescribe different rates of 'levy for different classes of containers or vehicles and to prescribe a zero rate or rates.

The Stevedoring Levy (Imposition) Regulations 1998 (the Imposition Regulations) provide in Regulation 4 that the levy on the loading and unloading of a container is $12 per container and on a vehicle is $6 per vehicle.

The purpose of the amendments to the Imposition Regulations is to:

*       prescribe a lower rate of levy in relation to multiple containers fastened together and loaded or unloaded as a single unit so that the total levy payment for the single unit is $ 121, as permitted under Subsection 5(4) of the Imposition Act; and

*       prescribe a zero rate of levy for a vehicle other than a "road vehicle", as permitted under Subsection 5(4) of the Imposition Act. "Road vehicle" is defined as a vehicle that is designed solely or principally for transport of people, animals or goods on public roads.

Under the existing Imposition Regulations, if a number of containers are fastened together and loaded or unloaded as a single unit, the rate of levy prescribed by Regulation 4 for the loading or unloading of a container ($12 per container) applies to each component container in the single unit.

It is the practice for stevedoring companies to transport empty containers by fastening them together so they can be loaded and unloaded in a single stevedoring operation, similar to the loading and unloading of a single container. It was not intended that the rate of levy applying to the loading and unloading of a single container should apply at the same rate to each component container in a multiple container unit.

The amendment to Regulation 4 reduces the rate of levy on each component container so that the total levy payment is the same as the rate of levy on the loading and unloading of a single container ($12 per container).

The existing Regulation 4 provides for the rate of levy on the self-propelled loading and unloading of a vehicle ($6 per vehicle) to apply to all types of vehicles. It was intended that the levy apply to road vehicles, such as cars, vans and trucks, which are usually loaded and unloaded in relatively significant numbers onto and from specialised car carrier ships or roll on/roll off ships.

However, the levy also applies to motorised machinery and equipment which fulfils the common meaning of vehicle and can be loaded and unloaded by being driven onto and from a ship. The amendment to Regulation 4 reduces the rate of levy on vehicles other than road vehicles to zero so eliminating the added administrative costs to stevedoring companies in accruing the levy and maintaining records for stevedoring of individual items of motorised machinery and equipment.

The Regulations commenced on the date of gazettal.