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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 08 Hansard (Tuesday, 3 August 2004) . . Page.. 3292 ..

operation can be made to happen only if that is expressly stated and a prejudicial part of a law can be made to commence only if section 76 (2) of the Legislation Act is displaced by, or under authority given by, an act.

MR STANHOPE (Chief Minister, Attorney-General, Minister for Environment and Minister for Community Affairs) (10.47), in reply: This bill carries on the technical amendments program that continues to develop a simpler, more coherent and accessible statute book for the territory through minor legislation changes. It is an efficient mechanism to take care of non-controversial, minor or technical amendments to a range of territory legislation while minimising the resources needed if the amendments were dealt with individually.

I would like to highlight the more significant amendments to the bill. An important feature is the amendment of the Poisons Act 1933, the need for which emerged during the January 2003 bushfires. The amendments allow pharmacists to supply a small quantity of certain prescription medicines to a person without a doctor’s or dentist’s prescription if an emergency makes it impractical for the person to obtain a prescription for the medicine. The amendments do not authorise the supply of drugs of dependence or anabolic steroids. The Drugs of Dependence Act 1989 has also been amended, which will allow dentists to administer fentanyl, a pain medication.

Schedule 1 amends the Magistrates Court Act 1930 to make it clear that the act’s infringement notice scheme does not allow an infringement notice to be served for an offence, or for an infringement notice offence to be prosecuted, after the end of the one-year period within which prosecution must normally be brought for a summary offence. The amendments are technical in nature and resolve some possible uncertainties about the operation of the scheme in favour of the individual.

Also worth mentioning are the amendments to the Legislation Act 2001 to ensure that the overall structure of the statute book is cohesive and consistent, and kept up to date with best practice. In particular the act is amended to provide that if the parliamentary counsel adds a name to, or amends the name of, a registrable instrument the parliamentary counsel may also make related changes to the instrument’s explanatory statement or regulatory impact statement. This addresses concerns raised by the Scrutiny of Bills and Subordinate Legislation Committee that discrepancies between instruments and their explanatory documentation may cause confusion to people when tracking legislation on the register.

Finally, I would like to express my ongoing appreciation for members’ continuing support for the technical amendments program. It is another example of the territory leading the way and striving for the best—in this case a modern, high quality, up-to-date, easily accessible statute book. Legislation of this sort, and other legislation, is a credit to our parliamentary counsel and his officers. I thank members for their support of this bill.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

Bill agreed to in principle.

Leave granted to dispense with the detail stage.

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