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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 9 Hansard (2 September) . . Page.. 2722 ..

MR KAINE (continuing):

It may have to do with the condition of equipment. It may have to do with the ability of a person to operate certain equipment in strange circumstances; for example, a farmer using a tractor with a lifting attachment to it. In normal circumstances, before he could use that lifting attachment, he would be required to have a crane operators licence. Are we going to say to every farmer in the nation, or at least in the Territory, "You cannot operate that lifting device on your tractor until you have a crane operators licence."? That is an absurdity. Of course, the Minister ought to be allowed, having due regard for safety and occupational health on the job, to issue an exemption where it is warranted.

There are all sorts of ways in which exemptions can be raised. They can be raised under the existing machinery regulations, under the inspection of machinery regulations and under the existing scaffolding and lifts regulations. There are many circumstances in which a Minister can be asked to make an exemption or may consider that an exemption is appropriate. The Minister having made that determination whether or not such an exemption will be granted, that person ought to have the right of appeal. The third of Mr Moore's foreshadowed amendments seems to me to have just the opposite effect. Where the Minister has declined to make an exemption, it removes the right of the person concerned to appeal. I do not know whether that was Mr Moore's intention.

Mr Moore: It is. I will explain it.

MR KAINE: Why, then, does Mr Moore want every instrument to be disallowable, so that he can have a shot at challenging it, yet the person concerned, who has been denied an exemption, Mr Moore says, should not have the right of appeal? I do not see the logic of Mr Moore's position on that. However, as I said, Mr Speaker, our intention is to repeal outdated regulations and outdated law, to bring the relevant aspects of those obsolete laws into the Occupational Health and Safety Act, in the context of today's world rather than in the context of the world of 1949 or 1957. I believe that there are great advantages in our doing so.

Mr Moore made an off-the-cuff remark about trade unions. The ACT Occupational Health and Safety Council is not a trade union body. It is a tripartite body, representing employers, employees and the Government. It fully endorses the amendments that I am putting forward. There will be regulations required once these amendments are incorporated into the Act and the revised Act becomes operational. The Occupational Health and Safety Council will advise me on the form and content of those regulations. Since the people involved at the operating level have all agreed to this, I do not see what objection Mr Moore could have, unless he has spoken to these people and finds that there are some areas of disagreement. I know of none. So, Mr Speaker, I can only commend the Bill to the Assembly. We will debate Mr Moore's amendments in the detail stage, but I urge the Assembly to adopt the new Bill in principle.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

Bill agreed to in principle.

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