Page 3558 - Week 11 - Thursday, 23 October 2014
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
Regulatory reform and red tape reduction will continue to be ongoing priorities for the government, and I look forward to seeing further reforms that will arise through our continuing engagement with the business community. I would, however, caution against people seeing red tape reduction or the cutting of red tape as something that always needs to happen. I think it needs to be part of standard government and business processes, but there are also at times very good reasons to have what has now become colloquially known as red tape, for example, in areas like food safety, industrial rights, occupational health and safety and professional standards. These are all areas where regulation exists for good reason. We should not just get suckered into thinking that all reduction of red tape is necessary or required or that it is all good. We have regulation for a purpose.
The explanatory statement for the bill that was tabled has been amended to reflect some changes that were requested by the scrutiny committee in scrutiny report No 20, and there are two minor amendments to move in the detail stage. I present a revised explanatory statement to the bill.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
Bill agreed to in principle.
Detail stage
Bill, by leave, taken as a whole.
MS GALLAGHER (Molonglo—Chief Minister, Minister for Health, Minister for Higher Education and Minister for Regional Development) (11.46): by leave: I move amendments Nos 1 and 2 circulated in my name together [see schedule 1 at page 3608]. I present a supplementary explanatory statement to the government amendments.
The amendments remove the requirement under the Registration of Deeds Act for statutory declarations verifying execution of a deed when lodging a deed for registration. These amendments build on those contained in the bill relating to statutory declarations attached to the deed when lodging a deed for registration of powers of attorney. Minor technical amendments are included to clarify an existing provision of the Registration of Deeds Act 1957 and update drafting of references to the Registrar-General and entry of deeds on the register.
The second amendment removes the requirement under the Registration of Deeds Act to provide a statutory declaration verifying due execution for registration. This will include powers of attorney executed by companies where the certificate is not required or not available. Powers of attorney executed by companies are executed in accordance with section 127 of the commonwealth Corporations Act 2011 where no witness is required to execute the document. Other deeds, such as retirement and appointment of trustees, are required to be registered under the Registration of Deeds Act pursuant to the Trustee Act. The opportunity to remove additional unnecessary requirements in relation to deeds was raised by industry, the Property Council and the Law Society following presentation of the bill. We have worked with industry to develop these amendments.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video