New South Wales Consolidated Acts

BANANA INDUSTRY ACT 1987 - SECT 7

7 Power to impose charges in relation to services

(1) The Committee may determine the cost or estimated cost of providing any service which it is authorised by this Act to provide and may impose on banana growers a charge in relation to the provision of any such service.

(2) A charge imposed under this section:

(a) shall be at the same rate in relation to all banana growers in a particular locality declared under section 6 (i), and

(b) may be at different rates in relation to banana growers in different localities so declared.

(3) The Committee shall not impose a charge under this section unless:

(a) it has given notice by advertisement of its intention to impose the charge and has specified in the advertisement the amount of the proposed charge,

(b) it has taken a poll of those banana growers on whom it is proposed to impose the charge, if it is requested to do so by a petition, lodged with the Committee within 30 days after the publication of the advertisement, by not less than 100 banana growers,

(c) the poll is in favour of the imposition of the charge, and

(d) not earlier than 30 days after the publication of the advertisement, a further advertisement is published identifying (by name or general reference) the banana growers by whom the charge is payable and specifying:

(i) the amount of the charge,

(ii) the day (being a day not earlier than the day of publication of the further advertisement) on and from which the charge shall be imposed, and

(iii) that the requirements of this section have been complied with.

(4) A charge imposed under this section shall become due and payable by a grower not earlier than 14 days after the day on which the grower receives notice, in writing, from the Committee indicating that the charge has been imposed and not later than the date specified in the notice.

(5) The proceeds of a charge imposed under this section by the Committee shall be deposited into a special fund and applied exclusively for the provision of the service in relation to which the charge was imposed.

(6) Nothing in subsection (5) prevents the Committee:

(a) from allocating from a special fund an amount to be applied in defraying the proper costs and expenses of the Committee incurred:

(i) in providing the service in relation to which the charge was imposed, or

(ii) in the exercise of the functions conferred or imposed on it by this Act in relation to the provision of the service, or

(b) from allocating from a special fund:

(i) to another special fund, or

(ii) to the general fund of the Committee,

any amount which is no longer required to be applied for the provision of the service in relation to which the charge was imposed.