New South Wales Consolidated Acts

SYDNEY WATER CATCHMENT MANAGEMENT ACT 1998 - SECT 11

11 Ministerial directions

(1) The SCA is subject to the control and direction of the Minister, except in relation to the contents of any report or recommendation made by the SCA.

(2) Subject to this section, the Board and the Chief Executive must ensure that the SCA complies with any direction given to the SCA by the Minister.

(3) If the Board considers that:

(a) the SCA would suffer a significant financial loss as a result of complying with any such direction, and

(b) the direction is not in the commercial interests of the SCA,

the Board may request the Minister to review the direction.

(4) However, a request for a review may not be made on the grounds specified in subsection (3) in relation to a direction given in respect of any alienation, mortgage, charge or demise of land in a special area that is owned by or vested in the SCA.

(5) The Board may also request the Minister to review a direction if the Board considers that compliance with the direction is likely to result in environmental degradation, or that the direction is otherwise inconsistent with the principles of ecologically sustainable development referred to in section 14 (1) (c).

(6) A request for a review must be made within 7 days after the direction is given or within such other reasonable period as the Minister determines.

(7) If the Board requests a review, the SCA is not required to comply with the direction until notified of the Minister’s decision following the review.

(8) Following the review the Minister may confirm or revoke a direction of the kind referred to in subsection (3), but the Minister must not confirm the direction unless:

(a) the Minister has estimated the financial loss concerned from information supplied by the SCA or from other sources, and

(b) the Minister has referred the matter to the Treasurer, and

(c) the Treasurer has approved of the financial loss being reimbursed from public revenue.

(9) The amount to be reimbursed to the SCA is to be paid, from money advanced by the Treasurer or appropriated by Parliament for that purpose, at such times and in such amounts as the Treasurer determines after receiving advice from the Minister on the estimated financial loss incurred by the SCA from time to time.

(10) For the purposes of this section, the amount of the financial loss that the SCA suffers as a result of complying with a direction includes the amount of expenditure that the SCA incurs, and the amount of revenue that the SCA forgoes, as a result of complying with the direction which it would not otherwise incur or forgo.

(11) The Minister is to publish a direction given under this section in the Gazette (and is to make it available on the Internet) as soon as practicable after it is given.

(12) A direction given under this section is of no effect to the extent that it is inconsistent with the terms and conditions of the SCA’s operating licence unless the Minister certifies in the direction that it is given on such grounds, specified in the direction and involving urgency, public health or public safety, as justify the direction’s prevailing over those terms and conditions.