Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 03 Hansard (Thursday, 11 March 2004) . . Page.. 1111 ..

requires the registrar to assess whether outstanding money is owed. The registrar is then required to seek payment of outstanding moneys into a trust before issuing the order. We are creating a new level of complexity and conflict if we are going to drag the registrar into contractual disputes. What we are putting in place here is a licensing regime, and it is not appropriate to muddy the waters in this way.

It is also important to point out that the registrar needs to have reasonable grounds on which to proceed in regard to rectification orders and that licensees can dispute the order to be issued. Of course, nothing in the process prevents the licensee from fixing a defect that has been brought to their attention informally by their clients before it even gets to the registrar. These amendments make it explicit that the registrar must consider the impact of a contravention that has led to the possible issue of a rectification order—such as injury, loss or damage—and the impact of a proposed rectification.

MRS DUNNE (5.15): The Liberal opposition will be supporting this series of amendments of which this is the first. I welcome the advice of the scrutiny of bills committee on this because it raised similar concerns to those raised with me by industry. I suppose it boils down to the fact, as Ms Tucker said, that there is scope for contractual disputes. When one gets to the end of a building process there might be a dispute about the final payment.

This amendment gives clarity to that situation so that there is less likelihood of someone using the demerit system as a means of holding sway over a contractual dispute. I am reasonably confident that that is what this amendment will do, but we will only really see that over time. Legislators and officials need to keep that in mind in the application of the laws. It is something that will need to be kept in mind, when this bill is reviewed in the future, to ensure that the demerit point system is not used as a blunt instrument in contractual disputes.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 34, as amended, agreed to.

Clause 35.

MR CORBELL (Minister for Health and Minister for Planning) (5.17): I move amendment No 4 circulated in my name [see schedule 2 at page 1178]. This amendment is the same as note 1 in amendment 3. It provides a signpost to the requirement of the registrar to take account of and consider proposed clause 35A before making a decision on a rectification order. The inclusion of note 2 in this amendment responds to scrutiny of bills report 45, which included advice in response to requests from Mrs Dunne in relation to the operation of clause 146, which relates to rectification orders.

While the scrutiny of bills committee confirms that the clause does not have retrospective effect, it made recommendations on the inclusion of some cross-reference notes. In order to ensure that the definition of contraventions of the act with respect to the rectification orders is clear, a new note 2 at clause 35 directs the reader to the extended meaning of contravention at clause 146. I am also moving amendments to insert the same note at clause 36 and clause 53.

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .