Transport Legislation Amendment (Rail Safety Local Operations and ...

These considerations led Victoria to agree with the Commonwealth and other
States and Territories to exclude the State's tram and light rail operations and
seven tourist and heritage operators that operate on stand-alone lines from the
national rail safety scheme and to retain them under local regulation overseen
by the Director, Transport Safety or Transport Safety Victoria established
under Part 7 of the Transport Integration Act 2010.
General
The prime purpose of the Bill is therefore to confine the scope of the State's
Rail Safety Act 2006 to domestic rail operations. A natural consequence of
the change is that the Bill renames the Act the Rail Safety (Local
Operations) Act 2006 in recognition of its abridged coverage.
A secondary purpose of the Bill is to update Victoria's Rail Safety Act as a
result of changes to rail safety regulation negotiated by Victoria and other
jurisdictions during the development of the national law. The national law
retains and updates the State's existing regulatory framework. While the key
features of the local scheme remain unchanged, adjustments and
improvements are made to definitions, offences, penalties and other
provisions.
A third purpose of the Bill is to make sure that the drug and blood alcohol
control provisions in the national law for rail safety workers such as train
drivers and signal operators is fused with the drug and alcohol control
scheme in Victoria's existing legislation. This is needed so that satisfactory
national and local schemes are in place as the national provisions are skeletal
and unsatisfactory in this important area. They require extensive
supplementation from the State scheme in respect of offences, compliance
and enforcement powers and testing requirements in order to set enforceable
and workable standards and to maintain proper drug and alcohol controls in
the rail industry.
Structure of the Bill
The Bill is divided into 4 parts.
Part 1 deals with formal matters such as purpose, commencement and the
identification of the Principal Act amended by the Bill, the Rail Safety Act
2006.
Part 2 contains over one hundred clauses which change Victoria's current
statute, the Rail Safety Act 2006. The changes cover much of the ground of
the statute and include modifications to interpretative material such as the
purpose, objects and definitions, changes to provisions dealing with general
duties and accreditation, safety interface agreements, the drug and alcohol
management scheme and other matters.
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