{"id":"BILL-r7473","name":"Appropriation (Fuel Security Response) Bill (No. 2) 2025-2026","slug":"appropriation-fuel-security-response-bill-no-2-2025-2026","collection":"bill","jurisdiction":"commonwealth","status":"in_force","isInForce":true,"actNumber":null,"makingDate":null,"administeringDepartment":null,"currentVersion":{"id":446061,"registerId":"commonwealth-BILL-r7473-current","compilationNumber":null,"startDate":"2026-05-05","status":"royal_assent","reasons":null,"registeredAt":null},"sections":[],"analysis":{"summary":{"status_summary":"The Act received royal assent on 1 April 2026 as Act No. 24 of 2026.","complexity_score":2,"likely_questions":["What expenditure qualifies for the advance to the Finance Minister?","Which ministers determine conditions for state and territory payments?"],"complexity_factors":["Advance to the Finance Minister capped at 1200 million dollars","Repeal scheduled for 1 July 2028"],"plain_english_summary":"The Act authorises time‑limited additional expenditure from the Consolidated Revenue Fund to support a national Fuel Security Response, including an advance to the Finance Minister of up to $1.2 billion for urgent or unforeseen fuel security spending. It covers payments to Commonwealth entities, states, territories and local governments under minister‑set terms, treats inter‑entity notional transactions as real for appropriation purposes, and applies across multiple portfolios. Ministerial determinations altering schedules are legislative instruments exempt from disallowance; the Act expires 1 July 2028."},"flash_summary":{"complexity_score":6,"scope_assessment":{"changed":false,"description":"This Act remains focused on financing measures tied to a Fuel Security Response: allocating funds to departments, enabling payments to subnational governments, and creating a limited urgent‑spend power for the Finance Minister (s 12). The measures and schedules are within that stated aim. The Act does increase executive discretion over certain additions to appropriations and the terms of intergovernmental payments (not a change of policy scope but a change in decision‑making and oversight mechanisms), but it does not materially broaden the subject‑matter beyond responding to fuel security."},"complexity_factors":["Multiple appropriation types across Schedule 2 (administered items, administered assets and liabilities, other departmental items, corporate entity items, payments to States/ACT/NT/local government).","Cross‑references to multiple Acts: Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013, Acts Interpretation Act 1901, Legislation Act 2003 (affects interpretation and oversight).","Ministerial discretion with atypical oversight: s 12 determinations are legislative instruments but excluded from disallowance and sunsetting (s 12(5)), and s 14 ministerial determinations about payment conditions are not legislative instruments (s 14(4)).","Large numeric schedules with portfolio breakdowns and mixed year‑labels (2024‑25 actuals, 2025‑26 appropriations), increasing reading complexity.","Notional transaction rule (s 5) affects internal accounting treatment (subtle effect across departments).","Mixed temporal rules and repeal date (Act self‑repeals on 1 July 2028) require readers to track time‑limited authorisations (s 16).","Advance power conditional logic: applies only to current year, only for urgent/unforeseen expenditure related to fuel security, and subject to an overall cap (s 12)."],"plain_english_summary":"**What this Act does, in plain English**\n\n- The Act provides extra Commonwealth funding and authority to spend for government activity described as the \"Fuel Security Response.\" It sets out which departments and kinds of spending the money can be used for, and how certain payments to states, territories and local governments are to be managed. (Key provisions: Schedule 2; Part 3; s 14.)\n\n- Mechanically, the Act: \n  - Lists appropriation items (Schedule 2) that allocate money to several portfolios and departments for outcomes tied to the Fuel Security Response (see Schedule 2 tables). \n  - Gives the Finance Minister a limited power to amend Schedule 2 to add urgent, unforeseen fuel‑security expenditure in the current financial year, capped at $1,200 million (s 12). The Minister’s determinations under that power are a type of legislative instrument but are expressly excluded from ordinary disallowance and sunsetting procedures (s 12(5)).\n  - Declares the portfolio budget and additional estimates statements relevant for interpreting what work the money can be used for (s 4). \n  - Treats notional payments between Commonwealth non‑corporate entities as if they were real for appropriation accounting purposes (s 5). \n  - Allows amounts to be credited to special accounts when the special account purpose overlaps with an appropriation item (s 13). \n  - Requires payments to States/ACT/NT/local governments listed in Schedule 1 to be made on terms and conditions determined in writing by the ministers named in that Schedule; those determinations are not legislative instruments and therefore are not subject to parliamentary disallowance (s 14).\n  - Appropriates the Consolidated Revenue Fund for the Act’s purposes and provides a sunset (the Act repeals itself 1 July 2028) (ss 15–16).\n\n**Who is affected**\n\n- The Commonwealth (taxpayers ultimately fund the Consolidated Revenue Fund). \n- Commonwealth departments and corporate/non‑corporate entities named in Schedule 2 (they receive administered payments, equity injections, or assets & liabilities items). \n- State, territory and local governments that may receive payments under items in Schedule 1 and Schedule 2. \n- Ministers (the Finance Minister and the ministers named in Schedule 1) who decide the timing, amounts and conditions of a range of payments.\n\n**Why it matters (official purpose claim, and what to watch for)**\n\n- Officially, the Act exists to make money available quickly and flexibly to respond to circumstances relating to fuel security. That is explicit in the Act’s title and in s 12(3), which limits the Finance Minister’s additional spending power to expenditure “for the purposes of responding to circumstances relating to fuel security.” \n\n- Practical implications and implementation trade‑offs: \n  - Who pays: the money comes from the Consolidated Revenue Fund (s 15). That means fiscal cost to the Commonwealth budget and, in the aggregate, to taxpayers. \n  - Who decides: the Finance Minister can add up to $1.2 billion in current‑year spending for urgent fuel‑security needs (s 12). Specified portfolio ministers decide terms and timing of payments to subnational governments (s 14; Schedule 1). \n  - Parliamentary oversight and timing: the Finance Minister’s determinations under s 12 are a legislative instrument but are exempted from disallowance and sunsetting (s 12(5)), and ministerial determinations about State payments are not legislative instruments (s 14(4)). That reduces formal parliamentary review of those future spending decisions relative to ordinary instruments. \n  - Flexibility vs clarity: the Act gives administrative flexibility (allowing later ministerial determinations and use of portfolio statements for interpretation, s 4), which speeds deployment but shifts some detail and discretion to the executive and departments. \n  - Compliance and conditionality: payments to states/territories/local government must be made on ministerially determined terms and conditions (s 14). Recipients will face administrative conditions that could change by ministerial determination before or after commencement (s 14(3)).\n\n**Concrete behaviour changes the Act enables**\n\n- Departments can record and treat internal, notional transfers between Commonwealth entities as appropriation debits (s 5), which affects departmental accounting and internal resource flows.\n- The Finance Minister can rapidly create or adjust appropriation items related to fuel security within the $1.2 billion cap without the usual disallowance or sunset checks (s 12). This lowers the time and procedural barriers to extra spending in the current year.\n- States, territories and councils that accept Commonwealth payments under this Act will be bound by written ministerial conditions rather than by legislative instrument procedures (s 14).\n\n**Implementation risk, incentive and cost observations**\n\n- Concentrated benefits: the primary, concentrated financial gains flow to recipient departments, corporate entities and subnational governments named in the schedules (Schedule 2; Schedule 1). \n- Diffuse costs: the Commonwealth budget and taxpayers bear the cost via the Consolidated Revenue Fund appropriation (s 15). \n- Decision‑maker discretion: substantial discretion is vested in ministers (Finance Minister and portfolio ministers). That concentrates decision power in the executive, especially for urgent current‑year spending (s 12) and conditions on intergovernmental payments (s 14). \n- Oversight trade‑off: the statutory exclusion of disallowance and sunsetting for s 12 determinations reduces parliamentary process but increases speed and executive control; similarly, not treating payment conditions as legislative instruments limits parliamentary review (s 14(4)). \n- Administrative burden: recipients may face variable conditions and timing determined by ministers; departments must manage and account for a mix of administered items, assets & liabilities, equity injections and non‑operating items (Schedule 2), which increases administrative complexity.\n\nKey provisions cited: s 4 (portfolio statements), s 5 (notional transactions), s 12 (Finance Minister advance power; cap $1,200m; disallowance/sunset exclusion), s 13 (special accounts), s 14 (conditions for State/territory/local payments), ss 15–16 (appropriation of CRF and repeal date)."}},"importantCases":[],"_links":{"self":"/api/acts/appropriation-fuel-security-response-bill-no-2-2025-2026","history":"/api/acts/appropriation-fuel-security-response-bill-no-2-2025-2026/history","analysis":"/api/acts/appropriation-fuel-security-response-bill-no-2-2025-2026/analysis","conflicts":"/api/acts/appropriation-fuel-security-response-bill-no-2-2025-2026/conflicts","importantCases":"/api/acts/appropriation-fuel-security-response-bill-no-2-2025-2026/important-cases","documents":"/api/acts/appropriation-fuel-security-response-bill-no-2-2025-2026/documents"}}