The Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF)’s ‘Have Your Say’ consultation is now open on modernising levies legislation. Levies help to keep our agricultural industries at the cutting edge as technologies, supply chains and markets change over time. This consultation will provide an opportunity for stakeholders to consider and provide feedback on the proposed Bills and draft legislative framework.
DAFF has been conducting a series of ‘Have Your Say’ forums – recently we reported on their consultation about fee increases and, as we wrote last week, Biosecurity fees are likely to be increased in the Federal Budget this month.
The legislation in question is going to be simplified and streamlined after 30 years in operation. The work by the Australian Government aims to reduce the legislation underpinning levies to five key Bills, while maintaining the key features of the levy system. Existing levies will not be changed through this process.
The five Bills open for consultation from 01 May 2023 include:
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- Excise Levies Bill – imposes levies on agricultural commodities produced domestically
- Customs Charges Bill – imposes charges on agricultural commodities that are imported or exported.
- Services Levies Bill – enables levies to apply to some agricultural services
- Collection Bill – regulates collection of levies and charges
- Disbursement Bill – disburses collected monies to levy recipient bodies and provides Commonwealth matching funding for eligible research and development expenditure.
Since the 1990s Australia’s levy system has grown in size and complexity. There are currently more than fifty pieces of legislation supporting the agricultural levy system.
The new legislation aims to provide a simpler, clearer legislative framework so industries can keep benefiting from their investments in research and development, marketing, biosecurity, emergency responses, and residue testing.
A critical part of this process is getting input from those with an interest in how levies work. The core of the proposed legislative framework, five draft Bills as outlined above, is available for public consultation until 05 June 2023.
These draft Bills correspond to an extensive engagement with industry bodies and research and development corporations over recent years, to understand the strengths and weaknesses in the current agricultural levies legislation.
Draft regulations and rules that sit under the draft Bills are also available for comment. These include the operational details of some, but not all, existing levies and charges.
Interested stakeholders will be able to comment on the draft Bills, regulations and rules until 05 June 2023 through DAFF’s ‘Have your Say’ platform: https://haveyoursay.agriculture.gov.au/modernising-agricultural-levies.
The details for remaining levies in the draft regulations and rules will be available for consultation in late 2023 or early 2024.
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