Electronic Communications Regulations 2017

The regulations rest on a small set of recurring legal concepts. They define and operate through those concepts without restating the substantive provisions of the Act. The principal concepts are:

• Prescribed legal proceedings (regulation 4). The regulations prescribe particular classes of proceedings for the purpose of Part 2 Division 2 of the Act. That prescription identifies where the Act’s Division 2 rules do not operate. The prescribed classes include Summary Procedure Act 1921 proceedings relating to summary or indictable offences (reg 4(1)(a)); proceedings and administrative processes relating to sentence enforcement, fines enforcement and recovery, and expiation fees (reg 4(1)(b)); and proceedings concerning restrictive court orders under either the Summary Procedure Act 1921 or the Intervention Orders (Prevention of Abuse) Act 2009 (reg 4(1)(c)). The prescription is subject to two targeted qualifications in the same regulation: a court order that must be served in a specified way under the relevant Act must still be served in that specified way (reg 4(2)), and information that is “sensitive material” for the purposes of section 67H of the Evidence Act 1929 is not required to be given electronically (reg 4(3)).

• Exclusions from the Act’s default treatment (regulations 5 and 6). The regulations identify categories of statutory requirements and permissions where the Act’s provisions allowing electronic communication or electronic forms do not displace or override existing statutory obligations. Regulation 5 removes the operation of section 7(1) of the Act for particular matters, including statutory requirements for a document to be witnessed by a person other than the author, statutory requirements that delivery be by personal service, and section 13 of the Second-hand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Act 1996 (reg 5(1)(a)-(c)). Regulation 6 operates similarly but in terms of requirements and permissions excluded from Part 2 Division 2 itself (reg 6(1)). Both regulations then qualify the reach of those exclusions so they do not apply to laws dealing with land or to prescribed legal proceedings (reg 5(2), reg 5(3), reg 6(2), reg 6(3)).

• The Government Printer as a government agency (regulation 3A). For the specific definitional purpose of paragraph (g) of the definition of government agency in section 5(1) of the Act, the Government Printer is declared to be a government agency. This is a classification that imports the Government Printer into the Act’s governmental taxonomy for whatever operational consequences attach to that paragraph in the Act.

• Software-specific exception (regulation 7). The regulations create a narrow regime where section 10(1)(c) of the Act does not apply if the electronic form is produced using an application authorised by the Minister known as mySA GOV. That ties the non-application of a subsection of the Act to the use of a named and Minister-authorised digital platform.

• Preservation of statutory service and sensitive evidence rules (regulation 4(2)-(3)). The regulations preserve statutory commands about how specified orders must be served and preserve protections where material qualifies as “sensitive” under the Evidence Act 1929, so that the move to electronic processes does not require or compel electronic delivery of such material.

These concepts function together. The regulations do not universally disable the Act; rather, they create bounded exceptions and carve-outs that preserve certain traditional processes and create a single, Minister-authorised pathway for a different treatment under a specified software application (mySA GOV). The regulations therefore operate by mapping where paper, witnessing, personal service and prescribed processes remain the controlling rules, and where the Act’s electronic facilitation remains operative, notably for land-related laws and outside the classes of prescribed legal proceedings set out in regulation 4.

The regulations identify discrete categories of actors and transactions that will be treated differently under the Act because of the prescribed carve-outs. The parties most directly affected are:

• Persons and entities involved in the classes of “prescribed legal proceedings” listed in regulation 4. That includes participants in criminal proceedings under the Summary Procedure Act 1921 where the proceedings relate to a summary or indictable offence (reg 4(1)(a)); participants in administrative or enforcement processes for sentence enforcement, fines enforcement and expiation fees (reg 4(1)(b)); and persons affected by restrictive court orders made under the Summary Procedure Act 1921 or the Intervention Orders (Prevention of Abuse) Act 2009 (reg 4(1)(c)). For these actors the Act’s Part 2 Division 2 rules are prescribed, meaning the Division’s mechanisms do not operate to change or replace statutory or procedural requirements in those contexts.

• People who are required by law to receive documents by specified methods or who are served with court orders that must be served in a particular manner. Regulation 4(2) preserves statutory commands about specified service methods where the relevant Act imposes such a requirement. That directly affects litigants, defendants, victims, witnesses and other persons who must be served with restraining orders or other specified court documents in mandated ways.

• Parties to transactions and statutory processes that require a document to be witnessed, attested, verified or authenticated under a signature other than the author’s signature, or that require personal service only. Regulation 5(1)(a)-(b) and regulation 6(1)(a)(i)-(ii) and (b)(i)-(ii) withdraw the Act’s section 7(1) and Part 2 Division 2 from operating to permit electronic alternatives for those requirements or permissions. This affects professional witnesses, notaries, statutory officers, businesses and individuals who must comply with witness or personal-service requirements in specified statutes.

• Second-hand dealers and pawnbrokers to the extent section 13 of the Second-hand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Act 1996 is relevant. Regulations 5(1)(c) and 6(1)(a)(iii) exclude the operation of the Act for that provision; the regulations therefore affect operators in that industry where section 13 imposes a particular statutory requirement.

• Parties dealing with land. Importantly, the regulations expressly exclude their carve-outs in relation to laws dealing with land. Regulation 5(2) and regulation 6(2) state that the exclusions in subregulation (1)(a) and subregulation (1)(b) do not apply to laws relating to the disposition of land, the creation or disposition of an interest in land, or other dealings relating to an interest in land. The consequence is that, for land-related laws, the Act’s section 7(1) and Part 2 Division 2 remain available unless excluded elsewhere. Practitioners in property law, conveyancing, mortgages and land registration must therefore treat the Act as operative for those land matters, while other transactions involving witnessing or personal service remain excluded.

• The Government Printer. By regulation 3A the Government Printer is declared to be a government agency for paragraph (g) of the definition in section 5(1) of the Act. That designation affects how the Government Printer is treated within the Act’s framework, for the particular effect that paragraph has under the Act.

• Users of the mySA GOV application and the Minister. Regulation 7 makes the non-application of section 10(1)(c) contingent on the electronic form being produced by the Minister-authorised mySA GOV application. That places decision-making control with the Minister for authorisation and affects any person seeking to procure the specific benefit of section 10(1)(c) non-application via that application.

• Court administrators and agencies administering fines, expiations and sentence enforcement processes. Because the regulations prescribe proceedings that concern enforcement and collection processes, agencies responsible for operational delivery of those processes must account for the non-operation of the Act’s Division 2 in those contexts.

In short, the regulations affect both public actors and private parties. They reallocate where electronic forms and communications may stand in for statutory formalities and where statutory formalities continue to demand hard-copy, witnessed or personally served processes. The distributions are specific: criminal and enforcement contexts listed in regulation 4, witness and personal-service requirements listed in regulations 5 and 6, subject to the notable carve-in for land laws and the single software exception in regulation 7.

The regulations do not create broad novel duties or rights; instead they modify where duties and rights under the Act and other statutes do or do not apply. The key operational duties and rights to note are:

• Preservation of specified statutory service methods (duty to comply with mandated service). Regulation 4(2) imposes an operational duty: where a court order of the kind referred to in regulation 4(1)(c)(i) or (ii) must, by the relevant Act, be served on a person in a specified way, that service must be effected in the way specified in that Act. The regulation does not specify penalties, but it creates an enforceable duty to follow the prescribed mode of service set out in the underlying statute or order.

• Non-obligation to use electronic communication for sensitive material (right to withhold electronic delivery). Regulation 4(3) provides that nothing in the regulation requires information relating to prescribed legal proceedings to be given to a person by means of electronic communication if the information is sensitive material within the meaning of section 67H of the Evidence Act 1929. This operates as a protective threshold right for recipients in those proceedings: parties and agencies are not compelled by these regulations to use electronic communications for material classified as sensitive under the Evidence Act.

• Continued operation of statutory witnessing and personal-service requirements in specified contexts. Regulation 5(1)(a)-(b) and regulation 6(1)(a)(i)-(ii) withdraw the operation of the Act’s general electronic communication provisions in relation to requirements that documents be witnessed or delivered by personal service. The duty to procure witnessing and to serve documents personally under such statutes remains unless the law is about land or the transaction is not in the prescribed excluded class. That preserves the rights of recipients and third-party witnesses to insist upon the statutory formalities under the governing statute.

• Exclusion for land laws (right to rely on the Act for land dealings). Regulation 5(2) and regulation 6(2) carve land-related laws out of the exclusions. That means that, for dispositions of land and dealings in land, the general rights and duties under section 7(1) of the Act and Part 2 Division 2 remain available unless excluded by some other provision. Practitioners dealing with land are therefore entitled to consider and rely on the Act’s electronic communications regime where appropriate for land dealings.

• Ministerial authorisation as operational gate (right tied to Minister’s discretion). Regulation 7 ties the non-application of section 10(1)(c) of the Act to documents produced by an application authorised by the Minister, namely mySA GOV. This creates a right to the non-application contingent on an administrative act of authorisation by the Minister and on the use of a specified platform. The regulation therefore establishes an administrative chokepoint: the Minister’s authorisation and the use of the specified software are preconditions to the regulation’s effect.

• Declaration of Government Printer as government agency (rights attaching to agency status). Regulation 3A confers the status of a government agency on the Government Printer for the purposes of paragraph (g) of the definition of government agency in section 5(1) of the Act. Whatever rights, immunities or obligations the Act attaches to government agencies under that paragraph now apply to the Government Printer by virtue of this declaration.

• Non-creation of new penalties in the regulations. The regulations do not prescribe new criminal offences or express penalties. The duties and rights preserved or altered by the regulations will be enforced under the relevant primary statutes and under the Act as it applies. Users should therefore look to the parent statutes and the Act for any enforcement consequences of non-compliance.

These duties and rights are framed predominantly as negative carve-outs and preservation points rather than as affirmative new obligations. Practitioners and administrators should therefore treat the regulations as establishing where statutory formalities continue to govern and where an electronic alternative is unavailable except where the Act remains operative or where the Minister authorises mySA GOV.

The Electronic Communications Regulations 2017 do not themselves create new offences or set out a distinct enforcement regime. The principal enforcement consequences and mechanisms flow by reference to the statutes and orders that the regulations preserve or modify. The key points are:

• The regulations do not specify penalties. There are no express penalty provisions or contraventions created by the text of these regulations. Enforcement therefore remains a matter for the underlying statute or the Act where it continues to apply.

• Enforcement through underlying statutes and court process. Where a regulation preserves a statutory requirement, such as a requirement for personal service or for witnessing in a particular statute, any failure to comply will attract whatever consequences the underlying statute provides. Regulation 4(2) operates to preserve mandated modes of service: court orders that must be served in a specified way under their governing Act “must be served in the way specified in that Act” (reg 4(2)). The consequence of non-compliance will therefore rest with the enforcement mechanisms of that court order, the governing statutory regime, and the court’s supervisory powers.

• Enforcement via the Act where the Act remains operative. In contexts where the regulations do not exclude the Act (for example, where laws concern land per reg 5(2) and reg 6(2)), the Act’s own enforcement and evidentiary provisions continue to operate. The regulations do not displace those enforcement tools except where they expressly carve out the Act’s applicability.

• Administrative discretion and gatekeeping. Regulation 7 conditions the non-application of section 10(1)(c) on the use of the Minister-authorised mySA GOV application. Enforcement of compliance with the ministerial authorisation regime is an administrative matter: the Minister’s authorisation determines whether the specific non-application exists for a particular electronic form. Failure to use the authorised software where the non-application is desired will mean that the parties do not obtain that specific regulatory position; the enforcement consequences are therefore indirectly administrative.

• Sensitive material exception limits forced electronic delivery. Regulation 4(3) prevents the regulations from requiring that sensitive material within the meaning of section 67H of the Evidence Act 1929 be given electronically in relation to prescribed legal proceedings. This functions as a limit on any administrative pressure to accept electronic delivery for sensitive material. Enforcement of that protective boundary will involve the processes in the Evidence Act and in the relevant courts or administrative bodies responsible for the proceedings.

• No express civil cause of action or private right created. The regulations do not create a freestanding civil cause of action for breach of the regulations themselves. Disputes about compliance will be resolved by reference to the primary statutes, the Act where it applies, and the applicable court procedures.

Practitioners should therefore look to the governing statutes and the courts for enforcement consequences and to the Act for the mechanisms that remain available where the regulations do not exclude it. The regulations act primarily to allocate or preserve modes of compliance, not to create independent sanctioning machinery.

The regulations are explicitly drafted to operate alongside and to modify the effect of principal statutes. The instrument names several statutes and classes of laws and creates cross-references that determine the boundary between electronic and non-electronic modes. The principal interactions are:

• Electronic Communications Act 2000 (the Act). The regulations operate as subordinate legislation under the Act and are designed to clarify and limit aspects of the Act’s operation. They refer to specific provisions of the Act: section 7(1) (regulated by regulation 5) and Part 2 Division 2 (regulated by regulation 6) and section 10(1)(c) (regulated by regulation 7). The regulations do not supersede the Act; they delineate where the Act’s presumptions about electronic forms and communications do not displace other statutory requirements.

• Summary Procedure Act 1921. The regulations prescribe proceedings under the Summary Procedure Act 1921 that relate to summary or indictable offences as “prescribed legal proceedings” for the purposes of Part 2 Division 2 of the Act (reg 4(1)(a)). They also treat orders of a restrictive nature made under that Act, such as non-association orders and place restriction orders, as prescribed legal proceedings (reg 4(1)(c)(i)). Regulation 4(2) preserves the specified method of service where the relevant Act mandates one.

• Intervention Orders (Prevention of Abuse) Act 2009. Orders made under the Intervention Orders Act are listed in regulation 4(1)(c)(ii) as prescribed legal proceedings. That places these orders within the regulatory field where the Act’s Division 2 rules are excluded and where specified methods of service and protections for sensitive material are preserved.

• Evidence Act 1929. Regulation 4(3) relies on the definition of “sensitive material” in section 67H of the Evidence Act 1929 to exempt such material from any obligation to be delivered electronically under these regulations. The effect is to carry over the protective scope of the Evidence Act into the electronic communications configuration for prescribed legal proceedings.

• Second-hand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Act 1996. Section 13 of that Act is expressly excluded from the operation of section 7(1) of the Electronic Communications Act by regulation 5(1)(c), and is similarly excluded from Part 2 Division 2 by regulation 6(1)(a)(iii). This places the requirements in section 13 outside the Act’s electronic treatment.

• Laws dealing with land. The regulations repeatedly single out laws “relating to the disposition of land, to the creation or disposition of an interest in land, or to any other dealing or other action relating to an interest in land” and exclude those laws from the regulations’ own exclusions (reg 5(2) and reg 6(2)). The practical consequence is that the Act’s section 7(1) and Part 2 Division 2 remain operative for land laws, notwithstanding the regulations’ exclusions in other contexts. The regulations therefore preserve the Act’s applicability to land-related transactions.

• Ministerial authorisation and mySA GOV. Regulation 7 ties the non-application of section 10(1)(c) of the Act to documents produced by an application authorised by the Minister and known as mySA GOV. This creates an intersection between the regulations, the Act’s subsection, and the Minister’s administrative power to authorise software. The precise legal effect of the non-application will depend on the content of section 10(1)(c) of the Act, but the regulations specify the procedural requirement: use of the Minister-authorised mySA GOV application.

• Primary statutory modes of service and formalities. The regulations preserve existing formalities in statutes that require witnessing or personal service. Regulations 5 and 6 effectuate that preservation by excluding these formalities from the Act’s electronic presumptions. As a result, those primary statutes remain the controlling source for the formal requirements in those fields.

Overall, the regulations operate as a set of interface rules between the general electronic-communications facilitation established by the Act and several specific statutory regimes. They draw a net that preserves traditional formalities and sensitive-procedure protections in particular areas while leaving the Act operative in others, especially land law and outside the listed prescribed proceedings.

The regulations include a documented legislative history that records their origin, revocation of predecessor instruments, and later variation. The record in the instrument is the authoritative history in the text provided and shows the following timeline and changes:

• The Electronic Communications Regulations 2017 were made and are cited under the short title in regulation 1.

• The 2017 instrument revoked the earlier Electronic Transactions Regulations 2002. The legislative history entry records that the Electronic Communications Regulations 2017 revoked the Electronic Transactions Regulations 2002.

• The regulations commenced as indicated in the Gazette entry cited: 2017 No 265, Gazette 29.8.2017 p3821, with the commencement indicated in the instrument as r 2 (see Legislative history block).

• The instrument records a variation in 2021. Regulation number 53 of 2021 (Gazette 13.5.2021 p1373) varied parts of the principal regulations with a commencement date of 13 May 2021. The legislative history specifies the provisions varied and how they were varied. The entries include:

  • Regulation 1 was varied by 53/2021 r 4, commencing 13.5.2021.

  • Regulation 2 was omitted under the Legislation Revision and Publication Act 2002 as of 13.5.2021.

  • Regulation 3 (Interpretation) as varied by 53/2021 r 5, with effect from 13.5.2021.

  • Regulation 3A (Government agency) was inserted by 53/2021 r 6 on 13.5.2021. This is the regulation that declares the Government Printer to be a government agency for the purposes of the Act.

  • Schedule 1 was omitted under the Legislation Revision and Publication Act 2002 on 13.5.2021.

• The legislative history table records the principal regulations and variations, indicating that entries appeared in bold when new and that entries relating to deleted provisions would be italicised in the original record. The text as supplied notes the relevant Gazette references and commencement entries for the initial instrument (2017) and the 2021 variation (No 53).

Those changes show two discrete legislative events captured in the instrument: the substitution of the 2017 regulations for the 2002 regulations, and a targeted amendment in 2021 that inserted regulation 3A and made associated technical revisions and omissions under the Legislation Revision and Publication Act 2002.

The recorded amendments are narrow and administrative in character. The 2021 variation’s most material substantive effect recorded in the instrument is the insertion of regulation 3A, which declares the Government Printer a government agency for the Act’s definitional purpose. The legislative history in the instrument is the document’s own record of its evolution and is the source to consult when tracking those textual changes.

The text of these regulations does not record any litigation history. There are no cases, judicial determinations or reported disputes set out in the regulations themselves. The instrument contains only its provisions and a legislative history of amendment and does not purport to catalogue judicial decisions.

Practical implications for research and practice arising from that absence are:

• Absence of recorded litigation in the instrument means that users must search external sources to determine whether courts have considered the operation or interpretation of these regulations. The regulations themselves direct users seeking further information on the Act and subordinate legislation to the Index of South Australian Statutes or the official legislation website at www.legislation.sa.gov.au (Notes). Those are the points of entry for locating any judicial materials, consolidated versions, or historical instruments that might be relevant.

• Interpretive questions about how the regulations interact with specific provisions of the Electronic Communications Act 2000 or with the statutes named in the regulations (for example, the Summary Procedure Act 1921, the Intervention Orders Act 2009, the Evidence Act 1929 and the Second-hand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Act 1996) will generally be resolved by reference to the statutory text and, where available, to judicial interpretation. The regulations themselves do not include guidance on interpretive disputes or on how courts have applied them, so practitioners must consult case law databases or court records to discover any litigation history.

• The lack of litigation history in the instrument also points to the utility of checking the updated consolidated legislation and legislative materials, and to engaging in fact-specific analysis where questions of service, witnessing and the classification of sensitive material arise. Where a practitioner relies on an electronic process that the regulations exclude in a particular context, the legal consequences will be determined under the relevant primary statute and possibly by subsequent judicial interpretation.

Because the instrument does not purport to be a repository of judicial decisions, parties and advisers should treat the regulations as a statement of the statutory exclusions and consult the usual external legal research sources for any litigation, judicial guidance, or administrative determinations that bear on the regulations’ operation in practice.

The regulations contain several technical boundaries and conditional exceptions that can produce traps for those who assume that an Act enabling electronic communications automatically displaces statutory formalities. The principal “gotchas” to watch for, grounded in the text, are:

• Prescribed legal proceedings remain insulated from Part 2 Division 2. Regulation 4 prescribes particular classes of proceedings that are excluded from the Act’s Part 2 Division 2. If a practitioner or public body assumes electronic delivery, electronic service or electronic forms are acceptable for those proceedings, they may be wrong. The list includes criminal proceedings under the Summary Procedure Act 1921 (reg 4(1)(a)); enforcement proceedings for sentences, fines and expiation fees (reg 4(1)(b)); and restrictive orders under specified Acts (reg 4(1)(c)). These are contexts in which reliance on the Act’s Division 2 will not be available unless a specific statute provides otherwise.

• Sensitive material exemption. Regulation 4(3) states that nothing in the regulation requires information relating to prescribed legal proceedings to be given electronically if the information is sensitive material within the meaning of section 67H of the Evidence Act 1929. The “gotcha” is that even where the Act might otherwise permit or facilitate electronic communication, the presence of sensitive material cuts against a presumption of electronic delivery. Practitioners must check whether material qualifies as “sensitive” under the Evidence Act before electing electronic channels.

• Witnessing and personal service requirements remain non-electronic in many statutes. Regulations 5(1)(a)-(b) and 6(1)(a)(i)-(ii) and 6(1)(b)(i)-(ii) withdraw the Act’s general electronic presumptions where a statute requires witnessing by someone other than the author or requires delivery by personal service only. A routine error would be to assume that an electronic signature or electronic transmission can substitute for a statute that expressly requires a physical witness or personal service; these regulations preserve the traditional formality in those cases.

• Land laws are treated differently. Regulations 5(2) and 6(2) explicitly say that the exclusions in the regulations do not apply to laws relating to land. The practical effect is that land-related transactions may still benefit from the Act’s electronic regime. The “gotcha” is the inverse: for most documents the Act’s electronic facilitation may be excluded, but when the law concerns land the Act’s provisions remain available. Practitioners who deal with both land and non-land documentation must treat each document according to its governing statute, not by a blanket assumption about electronic applicability.

• The Government Printer’s classification may have operational consequences. Regulation 3A declares the Government Printer a government agency for the purposes of paragraph (g) of section 5(1) of the Act. That technical change may affect whether particular publications or communications qualify for any special treatment under the Act that attaches to government agencies. Those relying on the Government Printer’s status for any procedural or evidentiary purpose should check the exact effect of paragraph (g) in section 5(1) of the Act.

• Ministerial authorisation and the mySA GOV chokepoint. Regulation 7 makes the non-application of section 10(1)(c) contingent on use of a software application authorised by the Minister and known as mySA GOV. This creates an administrative requirement to access the specific regulatory consequence offered by non-application. If parties or agencies expect the non-application in circumstances where the document is not produced by mySA GOV, the expectation will be frustrated. The practical “gotcha” is that the regulatory benefit is tied both to ministerial authorisation and to use of a named platform.

• No standalone enforcement machinery in the regulations. Because the regulations do not create penalties, parties who rely on the regulations as their entire legal basis may discover that enforcement outcomes turn on the primary statutes. The operational “gotcha” is assuming that the regulations themselves create an enforceable private right or penalty; the regulations operate by preserving or removing the Act’s appliance to other statutes and do not create independent sanctions.

• Narrow drafting: terms like “must be served in the way specified in that Act” (reg 4(2)) and references to “sensitive material” (reg 4(3)) import definitions and obligations from other instruments. A failure to identify the relevant definitions and prescribed service methods in the underlying instruments could produce compliance risk.

Those practical traps flow from the regulations’ design: they are targeted carve-outs and exceptions rather than a comprehensive restatement of how electronic communications should operate across all statutes. Close attention to the specific statutory context of each document or proceeding is required.

Compliance with the Electronic Communications Regulations 2017 requires mapping the particular document or proceeding to the regulatory boundaries the instrument creates and then following the statutory or administrative pathway that applies. Concrete steps, each grounded in the text, are:

1. Identify whether the transaction or proceeding is a “prescribed legal proceeding” under regulation 4. If it is, do not assume Part 2 Division 2 of the Act alters statutory requirements. The list in regulation 4(1) includes proceedings under the Summary Procedure Act 1921 that relate to summary or indictable offences (reg 4(1)(a)); proceedings relating to sentence enforcement and fines and expiation fee recovery (reg 4(1)(b)); and proceedings relating to restrictive orders under the Summary Procedure Act 1921 or the Intervention Orders (Prevention of Abuse) Act 2009 (reg 4(1)(c)). For prescribed proceedings, follow the relevant Act’s modes and protections.

2. When serving court orders of the kind in regulation 4(1)(c), check the governing Act for any prescribed method of service. Regulation 4(2) requires that a court order which is required under the relevant Act to be served in a specified way must be served in that way. Practically, obtain and comply with the service provisions in the order and in the governing statute.

3. Assess whether the information to be delivered is “sensitive material” within the meaning of section 67H of the Evidence Act 1929. If it is, regulation 4(3) makes clear that the regulations do not require electronic delivery in relation to prescribed legal proceedings. Do not send sensitive material electronically simply because the Act might elsewhere permit electronic delivery.

4. Review whether the document or requirement falls within the exclusions in regulations 5 and 6. The exclusions are:

   • requirements that a document be witnessed, attested, verified or authenticated under the signature of a person other than the author (reg 5(1)(a) and reg 6(1)(a)(i));
   • requirements that delivery be effected by personal service only (reg 5(1)(b) and reg 6(1)(a)(ii));
   • section 13 of the Second-hand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Act 1996 (reg 5(1)(c) and reg 6(1)(a)(iii));
   • permissions under a law for a document to be witnessed by someone other than the author or for a document to be served by personal service only are likewise excluded from Part 2 Division 2 by reg 6(1)(b)(i)-(ii).

   If the document falls in these categories, do not assume the Act provides an electronic substitute.

5. If the transaction relates to land, note the specific carve-in for land laws. Regulation 5(2) and regulation 6(2) state the subregulation exclusions do not apply to laws relating to the disposition of land or the creation or disposition of interests in land. So, for land dealings, the Act’s section 7(1) and Part 2 Division 2 remain available for consideration. Confirm whether the Act’s provisions apply for the relevant land transaction and follow the Act where appropriate.

6. Use mySA GOV where the objective is to obtain the effect described in regulation 7. Regulation 7 provides that section 10(1)(c) of the Act does not apply if an electronic form of the document is produced using the Minister-authorised mySA GOV application. To obtain that specific regulatory effect, ensure that:

   • the document is produced by the mySA GOV application as authorised by the Minister; and
   • any procedural or authentication requirements of mySA GOV are followed. The regulation ties the effect directly to the authorised software and hence to the Minister’s authorisation.

7. Recognise the Government Printer’s agency status where relevant. Regulation 3A declares the Government Printer a government agency for paragraph (g) of the definition of government agency in section 5(1) of the Act. Where the Government Printer’s status affects whether a communication or publication is treated as government agency material under that paragraph, treat the Government Printer accordingly.

8. Determine enforcement consequences by reference to the underlying statute. Because the regulations do not create penalties, check the primary statute that governs the document or proceeding to identify civil, administrative or criminal consequences for non-compliance. For example, failure to serve an order in the specified way will raise the enforcement and remedy rules in the relevant order or statute.

9. Maintain record-keeping and audit trails where electronic communications are used outside the excluded categories. Even where the Act permits electronic communications, good practice and probative needs will often require retention of logs, authentication records and copies. The regulations preserve many traditional formalities; where electronic methods are available, ensure that records provide the equivalent evidentiary integrity.

10. Consult the referenced instruments for definitions and detail. The regulations import and cross-reference other statutes for definitions and exceptions. For example, determine whether material is “sensitive” using section 67H of the Evidence Act 1929. Check the operative text of the Summary Procedure Act 1921, the Intervention Orders Act 2009, the Second-hand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Act 1996 and the Electronic Communications Act 2000 for specific obligations.

Following these steps will ensure a practitioner treats each document and proceeding according to the applicable statutory frame, respects the carve-outs in the regulations, and uses mySA GOV where the regulation ties a specific effect to that platform. The focus of compliance is therefore contextual: identify the underlying statute, map the document to the regulation’s exclusions or inclusions, and adhere to the prescribed mode of service or formality where required.