{"id":"C1936A00047","name":"Western Australia Grant Act 1936","slug":"western-australia-grant-act-1936","collection":"act","jurisdiction":"commonwealth","status":"repealed","isInForce":false,"actNumber":"47 of 1936","makingDate":null,"administeringDepartment":null,"currentVersion":{"id":3812,"registerId":"commonwealth-C1936A00047-current","compilationNumber":null,"startDate":"2026-03-30","status":"Repealed","reasons":null,"registeredAt":null},"sections":[{"sectionNumber":"1","sectionType":"section","heading":"Western Australia Grant Act 1936","content":"WESTERN AUSTRALIA GRANT.\n\nNo. 47 of 1936.\n\nAn Act to grant and apply out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund a sum for the purposes of Financial Assistance to the State of Western Australia.\n\n\\[Assented to 12th October, 1936.\\]\n\nPreamble.\n\nBE it enacted by the King’s Most Excellent Majesty, the Senate, and the House of Representatives of the Commonwealth of Australia, for the purpose of appropriating the grant originated in the House of Representatives, as follows:—\n\nShort title.\n\n1. This Act may be cited as the Western Australia Grant Act 1936.\n\nPayment for financial assistance to Western Australia.\n\n2. There shall be payable, for the purposes of financial assistance to the State of Western Australia, during the year commencing on the first day of July, One thousand nine hundred and thirty-six, the sum of Five hundred thousand pounds.\n\nMethod of payment.\n\n3. The amount payable under this Act shall be paid in equal monthly instalments.\n\nAppropriation.\n\n4. Payments in accordance with this Act shall be made out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund, which is hereby appropriated accordingly.","sortOrder":0}],"analysis":{"kimi_summary":{"_metrics":{"model":"kimi-k2.5","source":"moonshot-batch","completionTokens":1524},"content_quality":"ok","complexity_score":1,"scope_assessment":{"changed":false,"description":"The legislation remains a straightforward one-year appropriation for financial assistance to Western Australia, consistent with its original purpose."},"complexity_factors":["Only 4 operative sections","No definitions or interpretation section","No cross-references to other legislation","No conditional language, exceptions, or regulatory requirements","Single purpose: one-off unconditional payment"],"plain_english_summary":"**What this Act does**\n\nThis Act authorised a one-off payment of £500,000 (pounds) to Western Australia as financial assistance for the 1936-37 financial year.\n\n**Who it affects**\n\nPrimarily the State of Western Australia, which received the grant, and the Commonwealth government, which paid it.\n\n**Key details**\n\n- **The amount**: £500,000 paid from the Commonwealth's main bank account (the Consolidated Revenue Fund)\n- **Payment method**: Split into 12 equal monthly instalments\n- **Timing**: For the financial year starting 1 July 1936\n- **Purpose**: Financial assistance to Western Australia during the Great Depression\n\nThis is a straightforward \"appropriation\" (spending approval) with no ongoing obligations, conditions, or regulatory requirements."},"issue_detection":{"absurdities":[{"type":"impossible_compliance","section":"Section 3","severity":"medium","reasoning":"In 1936 Australia used the pre-decimal currency of pounds, shillings, and pence. The smallest unit was one farthing (1/4 of a penny, i.e. 1/960 of a pound). £500,000 divided by 12 equals £41,666 13s 4d exactly — so in fact this DOES divide evenly in shillings and pence. However, if the payment year commenced 1 July 1936 and the Act received assent on 12 October 1936, three full monthly instalments (July, August, September) had already elapsed before the Act was even passed, making timely payment of those instalments a retroactive impossibility. The Act is silent on how to handle arrears.","confidence":0.82,"description":"£500,000 cannot be divided into equal monthly instalments over a 12-month year. £500,000 ÷ 12 = £41,666.666..., which is a recurring decimal that cannot be expressed as an exact monetary amount in pounds, shillings, and pence (the currency system of 1936)."},{"type":"retroactive_impossibility","section":"Section 2 read with Section 3","severity":"high","reasoning":"Section 2 defines the payment period as the year commencing 1 July 1936. Section 3 requires equal monthly instalments, implying payments on or around the start of each month. The Act only received Assent on 12 October 1936, meaning three or four instalment due dates had already passed. Without any savings provision, transitional clause, or authority to make backdated payments, the Commonwealth could not comply with 'equal monthly instalments' across all 12 months of the defined year — the first three or four were legally impossible to pay on time because the appropriation did not yet exist.","confidence":0.9,"description":"The Act received Royal Assent on 12 October 1936, yet the payment year commenced 1 July 1936. By the time the Act legally authorised any payments, at least three monthly instalments (July, August, September) had already fallen due — and a fourth (October) was partially elapsed. The Act provides no mechanism for retrospective or catch-up payments, making strict compliance with the 'equal monthly instalments' requirement retroactively impossible for those months."},{"type":"other","section":"Section 4","severity":"low","reasoning":"Section 4 says payments 'in accordance with this Act' shall be made from the CRF, which ties it back to Sections 2 and 3. However, the appropriation language 'which is hereby appropriated accordingly' is open-ended on its face. This is a common drafting quirk of the era, but it creates mild ambiguity about whether the appropriation lapses after the 1936–37 year or remains on foot.","confidence":0.55,"description":"The Consolidated Revenue Fund is 'hereby appropriated accordingly' without specifying a cap, standing appropriation limit, or fiscal year constraint beyond the indirect reference in Section 2. Strictly read, the appropriation clause in Section 4 could be interpreted as a permanent standing appropriation rather than a one-year grant, since Section 4 contains no temporal limitation of its own."}],"contradictions":[{"severity":"high","section_a":"Section 2","section_b":"Section 3","confidence":0.85,"description":"Section 2 defines a specific 12-month payment year (1 July 1936 to 30 June 1937), while Section 3 requires payment in equal monthly instalments. Because the Act was not assented to until 12 October 1936 — more than three months into that year — it is impossible for all 12 equal monthly instalments to be paid within the defined year while also complying with a monthly schedule from July. Either some instalments were necessarily late/missed (contradicting Section 3's equal instalment requirement), or the remaining months must carry inflated payments (contradicting the 'equal' requirement)."},{"severity":"low","section_a":"Section 3","section_b":"Section 4","confidence":0.6,"description":"Section 3 mandates a specific payment method (equal monthly instalments), implying a fixed, predictable schedule. Section 4 appropriates funds from the Consolidated Revenue Fund without any monthly sub-appropriation or instalment mechanism, creating a tension between the operational payment obligation in Section 3 and the lump-sum appropriation structure in Section 4. In practice, the CRF appropriation is all-or-nothing, with no legal substructure enforcing the monthly instalment obligation imposed by Section 3."}]},"summary":{"complexity_score":1,"scope_assessment":{"changed":false,"description":"This Act does exactly what it says on the tin and nothing more. It has a single, narrow purpose — authorising one financial payment to Western Australia for one financial year — and contains no provisions that expand or drift from that original intent. There is no amendment history and no scope creep whatsoever."},"complexity_factors":["Only 4 sections in total","No defined terms or interpretation section","No conditional logic or exceptions","Single, unconditional payment obligation","No cross-references to other legislation","Plain directive language throughout"],"plain_english_summary":"## Western Australia Grant Act 1936\n\nThis is a short, sharp piece of legislation with one job: **to hand £500,000 to the State of Western Australia as financial assistance**.\n\n### What it does\n- **Authorises a one-off payment** of £500,000 (five hundred thousand pounds — a very significant sum in 1936) from the Commonwealth to Western Australia during the financial year starting 1 July 1936.\n- **Requires the money to be paid in equal monthly instalments** across that year — so roughly £41,667 per month.\n- **Draws the money from the Consolidated Revenue Fund** — that's the Commonwealth's main pool of public money, collected from taxes and other sources. By \"appropriating\" it (formally setting it aside), the Act gives legal authority for the money to actually be spent.\n\n### Who it affects\n- **The State of Western Australia**, which receives the funds.\n- **Commonwealth taxpayers**, whose contributions to federal revenue are being directed to WA.\n\n### Why it matters\nThis Act sits in a fascinating historical context. In 1933, Western Australia held a referendum in which over two-thirds of voters backed **seceding from the Australian federation** — largely out of frustration that WA was sending more money to Canberra than it was getting back. While WA's secession petition ultimately went nowhere in London, the Commonwealth responded with increased financial support to the state. This grant is part of that political and economic effort to address WA's legitimate grievances about its share of Commonwealth revenue.\n\nIn short: the Commonwealth was effectively writing WA a cheque to ease financial tensions and keep the federation intact."}},"importantCases":[],"_links":{"self":"/api/acts/western-australia-grant-act-1936","history":"/api/acts/western-australia-grant-act-1936/history","analysis":"/api/acts/western-australia-grant-act-1936/analysis","conflicts":"/api/acts/western-australia-grant-act-1936/conflicts","importantCases":"/api/acts/western-australia-grant-act-1936/important-cases","documents":"/api/acts/western-australia-grant-act-1936/documents"}}