Page 4252 - Week 13 - Thursday, 27 November 2014
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The bill applies to the provision of water, sewerage, electricity and gas. The community expects that these networks will be reliable and safe. Unreliable or contaminated utilities can cause significant harm to the community. It is for this reason that it is very important that these networks are well regulated and managed.
Under the current regulations, technical regulation is included in the Utilities Act 2000. This bill will make a separate piece of legislation to license and regulate larger utilities in the Utilities (Technical Regulation) Act.
Traditional utility networks involved a provider and customers. Changes in the way utilities are generated and distributed mean that networks are now much more complicated, with traditional customers involved in the generation of electricity too. This means that the legislation governing the networks must be expanded to cope with the more complex set-up.
The bill expands the definition of a regulated utility from the Utilities Act to include electricity generation, electricity transmission and district energy services.
The bill also regulates the ACT’s dams and includes updates to dam safety requirements. This ensures that the ACT requirements are consistent with other jurisdictions around Australia.
The bill also creates the position of a technical regulator, a statutory office holder whose job is to administer this act. The director-general of the directorate will hold the position of the technical regulator. The technical regulator will have the power to appoint technical inspectors as well as exercise auditing and investigation functions. The regulator and inspectors will be able to use formal warning notices and directions, conditions on licences and conditions on and revocation of certificates as tools to enforce the necessary standards.
Much of the regulatory power for utilities is held by the national regulator. This power was transferred to the commonwealth agencies—the Australian Energy Regulator and the Australian Energy Market Commission—by the states and territories back in 2012. The transfer of power led to changes in ACT energy legislation. However, the technical regulation of the network remains the responsibility of states and territories.
Keeping this brief, in conclusion, the opposition are pleased to support this legislation, which more accurately reflects the changing nature of energy networks in the ACT.
MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo) (5.59): The Greens will be supporting this bill today. The Utilities (Technical Regulation) Bill 2014 essentially establishes a stand-alone piece of legislation for the functions of technical regulator and extends the role of the technical regulator to include the regulation of a range of utilities services.
At 6 pm, in accordance with standing order 34, the debate was interrupted. The motion for the adjournment of the Assembly having been put and negatived, the debate was resumed.
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