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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 7 Hansard (28 June) . . Page.. 2149 ..
MR HARGREAVES
: Mr Speaker, I have a supplementary question. If that is so, minister, how is it that the persons I have just described had not received theirs as of this morning? Also, besides the GST, can the minister tell the Assembly whether there will be an increase in vehicle registration fees, excluding heavy vehicles, on 1 July? If so, what will they be? I have just been passed some additional information. For the minister's information, the vehicle was a Pulsar, so we are looking at ordinary vehicles, not heavy vehicles.MR SMYTH
: Mr Speaker, if Mr Hargreaves provides the details of that case, I will look into it. I have been told by the department that any outstanding renewal notices have now been despatched.MR OSBORNE
: My question is to the minister for fair trading, Mr Humphries. It is about the legislation we passed last year regarding temperature correction of fuel. It has been nearly a year, 25 August 1999, since the Assembly unanimously passed legislation providing for local service stations to prevent substantial financial losses due to the shrinkage of fuel in Canberra's cold winter climate. Given that scientific formulas are available to the oil companies-ones they use themselves in calculating the fuel excise they owe the Commonwealth-and the wide availability of temperature measuring equipment should any local wholesale outlet need such equipment, what has your government done over the past 10 months to implement this legislation?MR HUMPHRIES
: Mr Speaker, the legislation is a requirement, as I recall, of providers of fuel-if not the retailers, then the distributors of fuel-to provide for temperature adjustment processes to occur in the supply of the fuel. I am open to correction, but I do not recall there being any obligation on the government to provide the equipment that will make sure that proper fuel temperature conversion is taking place.Certainly, there is an obligation on either the retailers or the distributors, I forget exactly which. The obligation of government in those circumstances is to ensure that the law is being observed by those parties on whom the obligation falls under the law. I have had some correspondence from representatives of fuel companies arguing against the legislation itself. The government has resisted the requests for the legislation to be changed and indicated that the legislation needs to be given a chance to work.
I am not aware of any complaints being received by my office or by the Office of Fair Trading about the effect of the legislation, that is, that it not being observed. I will check to make sure that that is the case, but I certainly do not recall having any letters across my desk on the subject.
I believe the government is taking on the process of observing and enforcing any laws in relation to this area. I do not know how many inspections have been conducted, for example, to ascertain whether appropriate conversion processes are going on. I will certainly find out from my department for Mr Osborne what the state of affairs is with that. As I say, I have not had any complaints on the subject, so I have assumed that the area is one where the law is being observed.
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