The Senator described one of his amendments as a kind of an alternative. I think that this could be a fair description of many of his other amendments — kinds of alternatives. Do we need an alternative? This is really the question for which an answer must be sought. The Senator should himself have sought to get the answer to that question if he was to do justice to the kind of alternative he suggests one of his amendments is.
Subsection (3) of section 2 provides:
"subsections (4) and (2) of this section shall come into operation on such day as the Minister may appoint". That means that, on such day as the Minister may appoint, licensing can be brought into force.
We go on, then, to subsection (8) of section 3 which is the one now under the discussion. Despite what the Senator says, the bringing into operation of the licensing provision which is in subsection (2), the regulation about which he talks so much and which he visualises as creating so much unnecessary and indeed unjustified difficulty for mart owners is subject to this particular stop, as it were.
In subsection (1) of section 6, the first words are "The Minister may..." Reading down that subsection, we see that the Minister may make general regulations. Then, subsection (2) goes on to refer to dimensions, size, lighting, and so on: "without prejudice to the generality of subsection (1) —"— that is the one that gives me power to make general regulations —"—of this section, regulations under this section may —" and we list them right down the line. Here is "may" and "may" again. The Senator seems to have missed these two little words in both subsection (1) and subsection (2) which, I think, will, to any reasonable person, suggest, and indeed imply and make very clear, that the Minister is not obliged to make regulations, either generally or specifically, either under subsection (1) or subsection (2) in relation to any or all of the things that are covered there. He certainly is not obliged by anything in this Bill to make these regulations before a certain date. However, he is empowered — going back to where I began — to bring in the licensing provisions of the Bill under subsection (3) of section 2 and this, in fact, is what the Minister proposes to do.
If it should be that there are certain things that might not lend themselves to clear elucidation in advance of the bringing into effect of the licensing provisions, that is, in relation to regulations in regard to some of the more minute things in subsection (2) of section 6, the Minister is not obliged to bring in regulations either to obscure the Act as a whole or to make it unworkable from the point of view of any of those who will come to be licensed after the day he has nominated for the licensing provision to come in, that is, the people now in business and operating at present.
The Senator foresees difficulties in regard to the regulations from the point of view of people who will be entitled to get their licences — people who are now in business and in operation. Surely those people need not suffer from any of the disabilities the Senator talked about. The Minister is under no obligation to tie the mart-owners or himself up in knots by unnecessary, unwieldy or stupid regulations. We are not obliged to do any of these things and we shall not do them in that way. Therefore, I can assure the Senator, in relation to all his worry and fear expressed in regard to this difficulty about regulations, and how they would affect people who are already in business, that these need not necessarily affect them in any degree immediately and, in fact, they need not even be made if it is found, on examination, that this in itself would make things difficult or unwieldy of operation.
These are the matters that will have to be considered and in consultation with the two marts associations and, indeed, with anybody else who has any information that can add to our knowledge and who can help us to make better regulations under the provisions. If the Senator looks at the matter in this light, he will realise that his fears are groundless in so far as this particular section that he would have deleted is concerned and, indeed, that his substitution of another for this section, again, does not necessarily improve it in the slightest degree.
I shall go on to amendment No. 34 which we have here as well. Even if the first amendment to delete subsection (8) of section 6 is not carried, even if amendment No. 33, which would be the substitute, as it were, for subsection (8), is not inserted then the third leg of the treble would be to add the word "substantially" before the word "complied". I say that this word "substantially", put before the word "complied" in subsection (8), line 56, would not make for anything other than some vagueness and I think that this is a reasonable interpretation of what "substantially" added in as suggested would do. Criticism of this Bill has in many cases taken the form that it is too vague and, by its vagueness, that it is too embracing. Here we have, as I say, a word proposed to be inserted here before the word "complied" that would, I think, without a doubt make for vagueness.
