That this bill be agreed to in principle.

Mr Speaker, the Electronic Transactions Bill represents a remarkable achievement by all Australian jurisdictions to commit legislatively to the development of a uniform national scheme to promote electronic commerce in Australia and across the world.

Electronic commerce opens up new competitive horizons with the promise of exciting new business prospects and greater choice for ACT consumers. This is why all jurisdictions agreed to develop regulatory initiatives consistent with national and international best practice. The Bill is modelled on the Commonwealth Electronic Transactions Act 1999 which in turn adopts most provisions of the United Nations Model Law on Electronic Commerce 1996. The model law has been endorsed by a number of international jurisdictions.

Mr Speaker, this Bill will complement the Government's Electronic Service Delivery Strategy earmarked in the recent ACT Budget to receive $18 million for the delivery of online Government services to the ACT community by the year 2001.

This Government is fully committed to delivering its services to the public electronically.

The growth of the Internet and other electronic communication technologies heralds great opportunities and benefits for our community. In the business sector, companies will be able to use e-commerce to increase efficiency, access new markets and respond creatively to business opportunities and customer needs.

The Bill will also enable business and the community to deal electronically with government. The Bill will remove existing legal obstacles to conducting electronic transactions and put in place default rules for the time and place of sending and receipt of electronic communications.

The Bill will facilitate and promote business and community confidence in the use of electronic transactions. ACT firms, the community and government will be able to deal with each other, via electronic means, in the knowledge that their communications have the clear support of the law. It will enable contractual dealings, such as offers, acceptances and invitations to be conducted electronically.

Mr Speaker, this legislation is founded on two basic principles. The first of these is the principle of media neutrality which means that traditional paper type transactions and transactions conducted using electronic communications are treated equally by the law. The second principle is technology neutrality which means that the law should not provide advantages to or favour any particular style of