25th Jun 2014, 12:32 PM – Senate Agricultural and Veterinary Chemicals Legislation Amendment (Removing Re-approval and Re-registration) Bill 2014 - Second Reading - Read a second time

The question now is that the motion moved by Country Liberal Senator Nigel Scullion, as amended,(See that amendment to the original motion (which was "That the bill be now read a second time") here. ) be agreed to. The amended motion was:

"That this bill be now read a second time but the Senate calls on the government to:

(a) explore the establishment of a systematic process of assessment within the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority (APVMA) for existing agriculture and veterinary chemicals similar to the Inventory Multi-tiered Assessment and Prioritisation process established under National Industrial Chemicals Notification and Assessment Scheme; and

(b) appropriately resource the APVMA to apply the framework and conduct reviews."

Passing this motion means that the bill has now been read for a second time, which means that the majority agree with its main idea.(Read more about the stages that a bill must pass through to become law here. ) The Senate can now discuss the bill in more detail.

Background to the bill

The bill was introduced primarily to remove the requirement for applications to be made to re-approve active constituents or re-register chemical products.(Read more about the bill and its background on its bills digest.)

This requirement was inserted into the Agricultural and Veterinary Chemicals Code Act 1994 by the Agricultural and Veterinary Chemicals Legislation Amendment Act 2013.