Page 3737 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 24 August 2011
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The issue of consistency has been raised by Mr Hanson and also by Ms Gallagher. I also would thank the department for their cooperation in meeting with us and discussing this as well. We did have confirmation from the department—this was a point Ms Hunter raised in her speech—that this bill is consistent with the national principles that have been discussed at the national level. We had confirmation of that. We had confirmation that that jurisdictions will actually need to introduce the sort of scheme that this bill introduces.
So it is actually just about, as Ms Hunter said, being a leader in this. I think that this is something we should be really embracing and be proud of—that we will have this sort of legislation here in the ACT. As I said, we know that New South Wales already has it and we will be able to build on that and what they did there. That is obviously something which the Chief Minister will mention in one of her amendments around the review process. Also, South Australia are doing it. They are actually doing it through regulation, not through legislation. So that is something they are just going ahead with and implementing. We know that Victoria is considering it as well.
It is actually timely for the ACT to be doing it while other states are. Because we essentially sit within New South Wales as well, it makes sense that if businesses in New South Wales are introducing this sort of scheme, they can then just go ahead and do it also for the ACT. It makes absolute sense and I think it actually benefits those businesses in that they can do that process now and not have to go through a staged process.
Mr Hanson raised the issue of service stations. This is one difference to New South Wales. I have indicated on more than one occasion to Mr Hanson that I was actually happy to discuss this particular inclusion, but it was not something that we received feedback from their office on. However, it was something that I was more than happy to discuss with him, and I did make him aware of that.
In terms of the timing of it coming into effect, New South Wales legislation came into effect about one year after it was implemented. This bill also allows time, as the New South Wales bill does and as bills commonly do. It allows time for businesses to put it in place, which is why it comes into effect in early 2013. That is common practice, as I have just noted, with legislation particularly around this sort of scheme. It is common with other legislation that has come into the ACT. I thought that Mr Hanson would have been aware of that fact.
Again on the numbers—Ms Hunter has addressed this but I do want to reinforce this point—we are talking about primarily chains that are going to be impacted by this. As I said, we have the figure of 50 nationally or seven in the ACT. As Ms Hunter mentioned, this is based on what New South Wales has done. It is based on extensive research that has been done by the Heart Foundation in terms of looking at numbers. I do think it is something which has been looked at very thoroughly in terms of the numbers that will be impacted.
There is also an exemption provision in the bill. This could be potentially used if there are businesses which think it will be an unreasonable impost on them. But I think
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