With the continued strong economic growth in our region demanding a steady supply of Australian natural resources, we must do all that we can to give our exporters the best chance of economic success,” Mr Frydenberg told The Australian Pipeliner.
“This will require Australia to adopt world’s best practice when it comes to taxation, work place relations and regulations.”
As part of that plan, there will be two parliamentary repeal days every year to cut unnecessary and costly legislation and regulation, with the first repeal day already held in the House of Representatives on 26 March 2014.
The Government introduced legislation and tabled documents to repeal more than 10,000 pieces and more than 50,000 pages of legislation and regulations, saving over $700 million of compliance costs from across the economy.
“The government is determined to dramatically cut the number of regulations in the economy and to ensure that when new regulations come into practice, they are only a means of last resort and only after their true cost is understood and minimised,” Mr Frydenberg said.
“Moving to one-stop-shops for environmental approvals is a good example where we are already making a difference. There is a long way to go, but we are on our way to a less regulated more competitive national economy.”
And the effects on Australia’s resources industry are already coming to fruition.
The National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority (NOPSEMA) has now become a one-stop-shop for offshore petroleum environmental approvals, which has streamlined approval of projects that include offshore petroleum and greenhouse gas activities in Commonwealth waters.
NOPSEMA is now empowered to make determinations required under the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Act without the need to get approval from a second, separate Commonwealth regulator.
Australia’s resources sector has welcomed the deregulation agenda, saying it hopes the repeal of legislation marks the start of a concerted effort to boost the sector’s global competitiveness.
In a statement by the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association (APPEA) and the Minerals Council of Australia in March, the representative bodies said industry had long argued that duplicative requirements both within and between jurisdictions can be streamlined while maintaining the highest of environmental standards.
The statement noted that Mr Frydenberg deserved acknowledgement for his work on Repeal Day legislation, and that both associations encouraged the Government to revisit legislative amendments such as the “˜water trigger’, as recommended by the Productivity Commission, to remove roadblocks to further investment in resource projects.
“Industry supports strong environmental standards and a world-class safety regime; two goals that can be achieved without onerous conditions that threaten performance and competitiveness,” concluded the statement.
“Stakeholders from across the economy have been conveying a consistent message to the Government that there needs to be an urgent and significant reduction in regulation to improve Australia’s productivity and competitiveness,” Mr Frydenberg said in March.
“The Coalition is committed to driving a cultural change to regulation across government. Labor’s default position was to introduce thousands of new regulations without consultation and without understanding their true impact on innovation, investment and jobs. In contrast, the Coalition is committed to a more efficient and effective approach that includes cutting $1 billion of red and green tape and only introducing new regulations when it is absolutely necessary to do so.”
The next Repeal Day will be held later in 2014.
Visit www.cuttingredtape.gov.au for more information about the Coalition’s deregulation agenda.
Visitors can leave a comment or make a submission on more ways to cut unnecessary and costly red tape.