{"id":"C1973A00096","name":"Australian National University Act 1973","slug":"australian-national-university-act-1973","collection":"act","jurisdiction":"commonwealth","status":"repealed","isInForce":false,"actNumber":"96 of 1973","makingDate":null,"administeringDepartment":null,"currentVersion":{"id":2558,"registerId":"commonwealth-C1973A00096-current","compilationNumber":null,"startDate":"2026-03-29","status":"Repealed","reasons":null,"registeredAt":null},"sections":[{"sectionNumber":"1","sectionType":"section","heading":"Australian National University Act 1973","content":"Australian National University Act 1973\n\nNo. 96 of 1973\n\nAN ACT\n\nRelating to the Regulation by the Australian National University of Traffic and the Parking of Vehicles.\n\n\\[Assented to 6 September 1973\\]\n\nBE IT ENACTED by the Queen, the Senate and the House of Representatives of Australia, as follows:—\n\nShort title and citation.\n\n1. (1) This Act may be cited as the Australian National University Act 1973.\n\n(2) The Australian National University Act 1946–1971 is in this Act referred to as the Principal Act.\n\n(3) The Principal Act, as amended by this Act, may be cited as the Australian National University Act 1946–1973.\n\nCommencement.\n\n2. This Act shall come into operation on the day on which it receives the Royal Assent.\n\n  \n\nStatutes: general.\n\n3. Section 27 of the Principal Act is amended by adding at the end thereof the following sub-section:—\n\n“(3) Notwithstanding sub-section (2), by-laws, rules or orders shall not be made—\n\n(a) for regulating, or providing for the regulation of, a matter referred to in sub-section (2) of section 27a; or\n\n(b) for carrying out or giving effect to a Statute dealing with such a matter, except to the extent that they are by-laws, rules or orders with respect to the discipline of the University and provide for the enforcement of such a Statute.”.\n\n4. After section 27 of the Principal Act the following section is inserted:—\n\nStatutes relating to traffic.\n\n“27a. (1) In this section—\n\n‘land occupied by the University’ means land occupied by the University in the Australian Capital Territory;\n\n‘parking’, in relation to a vehicle, means causing or permitting the vehicle to remain stationary while not under the control of the driver, and ‘ parked’ has a corresponding meaning;\n\n‘vehicle’ includes an object that was designed or adapted for use as a vehicle but is incapable of being so used by reason that—\n\n(a) a part has, or parts have, been removed from it; or\n\n(b) it is in a wrecked or damaged condition.\n\n“(2) The Statutes may make provision—\n\n(a) for or in relation to the regulation of traffic, or of the parking of vehicles, on land occupied by the University, including provision authorizing, and providing for the effect of, signs, traffic lights and markings;\n\n(b) for or in relation to the regulation of access by vehicles to land occupied by the University;\n\n(c) for the imposition and collection of charges for the parking or stopping of vehicles on land occupied by the University and for the erection, management and protection of parking meters for the purposes of those charges;\n\n(d) authorizing the removal of vehicles from places where they have been parked or stopped in contravention of a Statute;\n\n(e) to the effect that, where a contravention of a provision of a Statute relating to the parking or stopping, of vehicles occurs in respect of a motor vehicle, the person who is to be regarded as the owner of the motor vehicle for the purposes of the Statute (who may, in accordance with the Statute, be or include the person in whose name the motor vehicle is registered under the law of a State or of a Territory of the Commonwealth) is to be,, except as provided otherwise, deemed to have committed an offence against the provision so contravened, whether or not he in fact contravened that provision;\n\n  \n\n(f) enabling a person who is alleged to have contravened a provision of a Statute relating to the parking or stopping of vehicles to pay to the University a specified penalty, not exceeding Five dollars, as an alternative to undergoing prosecution;\n\n(g) for the punishment, on summary conviction, by a fine not exceeding One hundred dollars, of offences against a Statute dealing with a matter referred to in this sub-section;\n\n(h) relating to the powers to be exercised by persons appointed by the Council for the purposes of carrying out or giving effect to Statutes dealing with matters referred to in this sub-section; and\n\n(i) for matters ancillary or incidental to matters referred to in this sub-section.\n\n“(3) Where a Statute contains a provision dealing with a matter referred to in sub-section (2), that provision does not have any force or effect to the extent to which it is inconsistent with a law of the Australian Capital Territory, but a provision of a Statute shall not be taken for the purposes of this sub-section to be inconsistent with a law if it can be complied with without contravention of that law.\n\n“(4) A Statute may make provision for or in relation to a matter referred to in sub-section (2) by applying, adopting or incorporating, with or without modification, a provision of a law for the time being in force in the Australian Capital Territory relating to motor vehicles or motor traffic.\n\n“(5) Where a Statute makes provision for or in relation to the regulation of access by vehicles to land that would, but for that provision, be a public street or a public place within the meaning of a law in force in the Australian Capital Territory, that land does not cease to be a public street or a public place, as the case may be, within the meaning of that law by reason only of that provision.\n\n“(6) A Statute dealing with a matter referred to in sub-section (2) applies, except to such extent (if any) as that Statute or another Statute provides otherwise, to any person whether or not that person has any connexion with the University.\n\n“(7) In any proceedings for a contravention of a Statute dealing with a matter referred to in sub-section (2)—\n\n(a) evidence that—\n\n(i) a sign, signal, flag, notice, beacon or other device was erected, placed or displayed on, near or above land occupied by the University;\n\n(ii) a line, symbol, sign or other device was marked on the carriageway or kerb of a road or on any part of a parking area or loading area, being a road or area on land occupied by the University; or\n\n  \n\n(iii) an island or dome was erected on a road on land occupied by the University or at a junction or intersection of two or more such roads,\n\nis prima facie evidence that it was so erected, placed, displayed or marked, as the case may be, in accordance with a Statute; and\n\n(b) an averment of the prosecutor contained in the information or complaint and stating that specified land was land occupied by the University shall, in the absence of proof to the contrary, be deemed to be proved.”.","sortOrder":0}],"analysis":{"issue_detection":{"absurdities":[{"type":"other","section":"Section 1(1) and long title","severity":"low","reasoning":"This is a common but genuine drafting absurdity in Australian legislation of this era, where amending acts adopted the name of the principal act rather than a descriptive name. The short title 'Australian National University Act 1973' implies comprehensive ANU legislation, yet the Act does nothing but add traffic and parking powers. It is misleading rather than logically impossible, but it creates real navigability problems.","confidence":0.85,"description":"The Act is titled the 'Australian National University Act 1973' but its long title describes it as an act 'Relating to the Regulation by the Australian National University of Traffic and the Parking of Vehicles.' The short title gives no indication whatsoever of the Act's subject matter — a person searching for traffic and parking legislation at the ANU would have no reason to look here, and a person reading the short title would have no idea what the Act actually does."},{"type":"circular_definition","section":"Section 27a(1) — definition of 'vehicle'","severity":"medium","reasoning":"If a vehicle is incapable of being used as a vehicle, it can never have a 'driver' in any meaningful sense, yet the definition of 'parking' relies on the concept of a driver's control. Applying the parking definition to an immovable wreck produces a logical loop: the object is always 'not under the control of the driver' because there is no driver and cannot be one, meaning it is perpetually 'parked' from the moment it arrives — but it also cannot be 'caused or permitted to remain stationary' in any volitional sense. The interplay of these two definitions is self-defeating.","confidence":0.88,"description":"The definition of 'vehicle' expressly includes objects that are 'incapable of being used as a vehicle' due to removed parts or wreckage. The Act therefore regulates the 'parking' of things that cannot, by definition, be driven, moved under their own power, or parked in any conventional sense — yet 'parking' is defined as 'causing or permitting the vehicle to remain stationary while not under the control of the driver.' A wrecked hulk incapable of movement has no driver and can never be 'under the control of the driver,' making the parking definition internally incoherent when applied to this class of 'vehicle.'"},{"type":"other","section":"Section 27a(2)(e)","severity":"high","reasoning":"Deemed liability provisions exist in traffic law (e.g. speed camera offences) but they typically operate as rebuttable presumptions allowing the owner to identify the actual driver. This provision says the owner 'is to be deemed to have committed an offence' — framed as a guilt-attribution rather than merely an evidentiary presumption — 'whether or not he in fact contravened that provision.' The phrase 'except as provided otherwise' does leave room for the Statute itself to carve out exceptions, but on its face the default rule is that provable innocence is irrelevant. This risks being constitutionally invalid under Chapter III principles as recognised in later High Court jurisprudence.","confidence":0.82,"description":"The provision deems the registered owner of a motor vehicle to have committed an offence 'whether or not he in fact contravened that provision.' This creates strict deemed liability on a person who may have had absolutely no involvement, knowledge, or connection with the offending conduct. The section contains a double comma ('stopping, of vehicles') suggesting hasty drafting, and more substantively, it allows a person to be found guilty of an offence they provably did not commit, which sits in deep tension with fundamental principles of criminal liability and the presumption of innocence."},{"type":"other","section":"Section 27a(2)(f)","severity":"low","reasoning":"While dollar amounts in older legislation become outdated, the structural absurdity here is that the infringement penalty is set at 5% of the maximum court fine, with no mechanism in the Act to update it. The Act has never been repealed, meaning these nominal amounts — if the provisions were ever directly operative — would remain at $5 and $100 indefinitely unless amended. This is a genuine (if low-severity) legislative absurdity rather than mere inflation erosion.","confidence":0.78,"description":"The maximum penalty payable as an alternative to prosecution is 'Five dollars.' At 1973 values this was modest but not trivial; by any modern measure it is so nominal as to be meaningless. More critically, the maximum court-imposed fine under s27a(2)(g) is 'One hundred dollars' — twenty times the infringement amount — creating a perverse incentive structure where paying the infringement notice is always rational regardless of guilt, effectively converting a criminal penalty regime into a negligible tax on parking violations."},{"type":"self_contradicting","section":"Section 27a(5)","severity":"medium","reasoning":"The provision seems designed to prevent the University from privatising public roads merely by regulating them — a sensible policy goal. However, the drafting creates a logical tension: if a Statute can validly restrict or deny vehicular access to the land (per s27a(2)(b)), but that land remains a public street under ACT law (per s27a(5)), then compliance with the University Statute may simultaneously constitute a breach of the public's rights under ACT law. Section 27a(3) partially addresses inconsistency but only invalidates University provisions to the extent of inconsistency — creating an uncertain boundary.","confidence":0.75,"description":"This section provides that where a Statute regulates vehicle access to land that would otherwise be a 'public street or public place,' that land does 'not cease to be a public street or a public place' by reason of the access regulation. In other words, the University can restrict access to a public street — but the street remains legally public. This creates an impossible compliance scenario: a road can simultaneously be subject to University access restrictions (presumably including the power to exclude the public) while legally remaining a public street to which the public presumably has rights of access under ACT law."},{"type":"other","section":"Section 27a(7)(b)","severity":"medium","reasoning":"Averment clauses were common in regulatory offences of this era but their application to jurisdictional facts (the locus of the offence) is particularly problematic. Whether land is 'occupied by the University' is not a peripheral matter — it is the entire basis for the University's legislative competence to regulate. Shifting the burden of disproving this to the defendant, in what is a criminal prosecution with potential fines, creates a genuine due process concern that later High Court authority on reverse onus provisions would scrutinise carefully.","confidence":0.8,"description":"An averment by the prosecutor that specified land 'was land occupied by the University shall, in the absence of proof to the contrary, be deemed to be proved.' This places the burden of disproving a jurisdictional fact — whether the relevant land is University land — on the defendant. In criminal proceedings, requiring a defendant to disprove a fact that goes to the very jurisdiction of the court to hear the matter inverts the ordinary burden of proof on what is arguably not a mere evidentiary matter but a foundational element of the offence."}],"contradictions":[{"severity":"high","section_a":"Section 27a(2)(b) — regulation of access by vehicles","section_b":"Section 27a(5) — land not ceasing to be a public street","confidence":0.8,"description":"Section 27a(2)(b) empowers the University to make Statutes regulating or restricting vehicular access to University land. Section 27a(5) provides that where such a Statute applies to land that would otherwise be a public street or public place, that land does not cease to be a public street or public place. These provisions are in direct tension: the University may lawfully restrict access to land, yet that same land simultaneously retains its legal status as a public road to which the public has access rights under ACT law. A motorist excluded by a University Statute may be complying with University law while simultaneously having a legal right of access under ACT law, and vice versa."},{"severity":"medium","section_a":"Section 27a(2)(e) — deemed guilt of registered owner","section_b":"Section 27a(2)(f) — alternative penalty payment by 'person alleged to have contravened'","confidence":0.75,"description":"Section 27a(2)(e) deems the registered owner to have committed the parking offence regardless of who actually committed it. Section 27a(2)(f) enables 'a person who is alleged to have contravened' the provision to pay an infringement penalty as an alternative to prosecution. If the owner is already deemed to have committed the offence by operation of law, it is logically inconsistent to then describe them as merely 'alleged' to have contravened the provision in the infringement context — they are, by statutory fiction, already guilty. Conversely, the actual driver who did contravene the provision is not 'alleged' to have done anything (since liability has been attributed to the owner), yet presumably could also pay the infringement."},{"severity":"medium","section_a":"Section 3 (amending s27(3) of the Principal Act) — by-laws shall not be made for matters in s27a","section_b":"Section 27a(2)(h) — powers exercised by persons appointed by the Council","confidence":0.7,"description":"Section 3 inserts a new s27(3) into the Principal Act prohibiting by-laws, rules or orders from being made for matters covered by s27a(2), except as they relate to discipline and enforcement of a Statute. However, s27a(2)(h) empowers Statutes to provide for the powers of persons 'appointed by the Council' — the Council being the same body that makes by-laws. This creates ambiguity about whether the Council can appoint enforcement officers under a Statute (which is permitted) while being simultaneously prohibited from regulating those same persons' powers through by-laws or rules. The line between a 'Statute' and a 'rule' made by the Council in regulating its own appointees is not defined and could easily be blurred in practice."},{"severity":"medium","section_a":"Section 27a(3) — Statute provisions yield to ACT law to extent of inconsistency","section_b":"Section 27a(4) — Statutes may apply ACT law with modification","confidence":0.82,"description":"Section 27a(3) provides that a University Statute has no force to the extent it is inconsistent with ACT law, but is saved if it can be complied with without contravening ACT law. Section 27a(4) permits a Statute to adopt ACT law 'with or without modification.' A modified adoption of an ACT law could produce a Statute provision that diverges from the ACT law it was based on — which under s27a(3) would be rendered inoperative to the extent of the inconsistency. Section 27a(4) thus grants a power that s27a(3) can immediately negate, making the 'with modification' limb of s27a(4) potentially illusory whenever any modification creates an inconsistency with the very ACT law being modified."}]},"summary":{"complexity_score":4,"scope_assessment":{"changed":false,"description":"This Act does precisely what its title and preamble promise — it amends the ANU Act to deal with traffic and parking regulation on University land. The scope is narrow and well-contained. There is no evidence of scope creep: every provision in the new section 27A directly serves the stated purpose of regulating vehicles on ANU land. The amendment to section 27 (preventing general by-laws from covering traffic matters) actually narrows the existing framework to keep it consistent with the new dedicated regime, which is tidy legislative housekeeping rather than scope expansion."},"complexity_factors":["Amending Act structure — requires cross-referencing back to the 1946 Principal Act to understand full context","Layered interaction between ANU Statutes, ACT law, and Commonwealth law creates a three-tier legal framework","Deeming provisions (registered owner deemed liable for parking offences) introduce conditional legal fiction","Evidentiary rules in subsection (7) add procedural complexity with prima facie and averment provisions","Subsection (3) inconsistency rule requires legal interpretation to determine when ANU rules yield to ACT law","Circular definitions (e.g. 'parking' defined by reference to driver control)","Expanded definition of 'vehicle' to include non-functional objects adds interpretive nuance","Multiple cross-references between new section 27A and amended section 27, requiring readers to trace amendments across sections"],"plain_english_summary":"## Australian National University Act 1973 — Plain English Summary\n\nThis legislation is a **short amending Act** that gives the Australian National University (ANU) the legal power to make and enforce its own **traffic and parking rules** on land it occupies in the Australian Capital Territory.\n\n---\n\n### What does it actually do?\n\nIt inserts new provisions into the existing ANU Act (from 1946) to allow the ANU's governing body (the Council) to create **Statutes** (that is, the University's own formal internal rules, similar to by-laws) covering things like:\n\n- **Traffic management** on University land — including signs, traffic lights, and road markings\n- **Parking controls** — where you can and can't park, and for how long\n- **Parking meters** — allowing the University to charge for parking\n- **Towing** — authorising the removal of illegally parked or stopped vehicles\n- **Owner liability** — if a car is illegally parked, the *registered owner* of the vehicle can be treated as responsible, even if they weren't actually driving it at the time\n- **On-the-spot fines** — allowing people caught breaking the parking rules to pay a fixed penalty (up to $5) instead of being taken to court\n- **Court fines** — setting a maximum fine of $100 for offences proven in court\n- **Enforcement officers** — allowing the ANU Council to appoint people specifically to enforce these traffic and parking rules\n\n---\n\n### Who does it affect?\n\n**Anyone** who drives or parks a vehicle on ANU land in the ACT — not just students and staff. The rules apply to all members of the public who use University roads and car parks.\n\n---\n\n### Key safeguards built in\n\n- **ANU rules cannot override ACT law**: If an ANU traffic Statute conflicts with an ACT law, the ACT law wins. The ANU's rules only operate in the space that ACT law leaves available.\n- **Public streets stay public**: If the ANU regulates access to a road that would otherwise be a public street, that road doesn't stop being a public street under ACT law — other legal rights on public streets are preserved.\n- **Evidentiary shortcuts**: In enforcement proceedings, if a sign or road marking is shown to exist on ANU land, it is *presumed* to have been lawfully placed there (the person contesting it would need to prove otherwise). Similarly, a prosecutor's statement that land belongs to the ANU is taken as correct unless disproved.\n\n---\n\n### Why does this matter?\n\nBefore this Act, the ANU had no clear legislative authority to run its own traffic and parking regime separate from the general ACT road laws. This Act plugs that gap, giving the University a tidy, self-contained legal framework to manage the roads and car parks on its campus."}},"importantCases":[],"_links":{"self":"/api/acts/australian-national-university-act-1973","history":"/api/acts/australian-national-university-act-1973/history","analysis":"/api/acts/australian-national-university-act-1973/analysis","conflicts":"/api/acts/australian-national-university-act-1973/conflicts","importantCases":"/api/acts/australian-national-university-act-1973/important-cases","documents":"/api/acts/australian-national-university-act-1973/documents"}}