The Act operates as a repeal-with-transition instrument. Its principal structural concepts are repeal, continuity, and conversion of specific instruments and processes from the repealed framework to the new framework. The Schedule 1 repeal is absolute in form , item 1 repeals the whole of the Export Market Development Grants Act 1974 , but item 2 limits the practical effect by specifying categories of persons and matters to which the repealed Act continues to apply (Schedule 1, item 2(1)(a)-(e)). The Act distinguishes what will be moved forward into the new Act and what will remain governed by the 1974 Act for limited purposes. The Act defines “new Act” in the transitional Part 3 as the Export Market Development Grants Act 1997 (s 4(1)). Section 4(2) sets the interpretive rule that expressions used both in Part 3 and in the new Act have the same meaning, unless a contrary intention appears.

Transitional conversion mechanics are explicit. Approvals as approved bodies, trading houses, joint ventures or consortia under the repealed Act are continued as approvals under specific provisions of the new Act, and are expressly amenable to variation and cancellation as if they were approvals under the new Act (s 5(1)-(3)). Guidelines made under sections of the repealed Act are continued, and may be varied or revoked as if they were guidelines under the new Act (s 6). Pending applications under the repealed Act are treated as applications made under particular sections of the new Act on 1 July 1997 (s 7). Specific administrative acts such as invitations for submissions or requests for information are also re-characterised as having been made on 1 July 1997 for the purposes of the new Act (ss 8, 12). Registrations made under the repealed Act for the 1996-97 grant year are taken to be registrations under the new Act, and Austrade is required to register applicants who had applied but had not been registered (s 10). Determinations and instruments under the repealed Act are preserved as if made under corresponding sections of the new Act (ss 9, 11).

Schedule 2 contains the consequential amendments to the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985, replacing multiple textual references to “1974” with “1997” and making drafting substitutions such as changing “a claim” to “an application” where that language better fits the new ACT’s terminology (Schedule 2, items 1-17). A particular saving is added: subsection 3(4) of the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985 is inserted to state that, unless the contrary intention appears, a reference in that Act to the new Act includes a reference to the 1974 Act to the extent it continues to apply under Schedule 1 of this repeal Act (Schedule 2, item 2).

The Act affects a defined and finite set of actors. Primary decision-maker and administrator: Austrade, defined in Schedule 1, item 2(4) as the Australian Trade Commission established by the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985, is the agency that must give effect to many transitional duties in the Act (for example s 10(2) requires Austrade to register certain applicants). Persons affected include:

• Claimants with pending grant claims under the 1974 Act at the time of repeal, who remain governed by the repealed Act until their claim is finalised (Schedule 1, item 2(1)(a) and (3)). The Act specifies when a claim is not finalised, including if Austrade has not made a determination under section 12 of the repealed Act or if such a determination may be subject to review or appeal (Schedule 1, item 2(3)).

• Persons who, but for the repeal, would have been permitted by Austrade to submit a claim under subsection 13(2B) of the repealed Act (Schedule 1, item 2(1)(b)).

• Persons to whom a grant was payable immediately before 1 July 1997 (Schedule 1, item 2(1)(c)).

• Persons indebted to Austrade under sections 39A or 40 of the repealed Act immediately before 1 July 1997 (Schedule 1, item 2(1)(d)).

• Persons liable to be prosecuted, or against whom a prosecution was pending, for an offence against the repealed Act immediately before 1 July 1997 (Schedule 1, item 2(1)(e)). The Act expressly preserves ongoing liability to prosecution.

• Entities approved under the repealed Act as approved bodies, trading houses, approved joint ventures or approved consortiums immediately before 1 July 1997. Their approvals continue, with specified durations and subject to variation and cancellation, but are carried forward as approvals under the new Act (s 5(1)-(3)).

• Applicants for approval as trading houses, joint ventures, consortia or approved bodies whose applications were pending at the time of repeal. Those applications are treated as having been made under the new Act on 1 July 1997 (s 7).

• Persons who undertook grants entry tests or were subject to determinations under specified parts of the repealed Act; the Act preserves the effect of those tests and determinations by treating them as if they had been taken or made under the corresponding sections of the new Act (ss 11-12).

• Third parties subject to guidelines made under the repealed Act, because such guidelines continue in force as if made under the new Act until varied or revoked (s 6; s 13).

The Act therefore affects both private actors with substantive economic interests (claimants, grantees, applicants, approved bodies, trading houses, joint ventures) and the administrative agency Austrade. It also preserves the jurisdictional roles of courts and the Administrative Appeals Tribunal in relation to matters that remain under the repealed Act by defining “court” to include the Administrative Appeals Tribunal for the purposes of Schedule 1 (Schedule 1, item 2(4)).

The Act creates a small set of affirmative duties and confers continuity rights by mapping existing approvals, applications and processes into the new legislative scheme. Key duties and rights that are explicit in the text include:

• Duty on Austrade to register certain applicants. Section 10(2) requires Austrade to register, as soon as practicable, any person who had applied under section 13I of the repealed Act to be registered for the grant year starting 1 July 1996 but had not been registered before 1 July 1997. Section 10(1) further provides that persons who were registered under section 13I for that grant year are taken to be registered under section 19 of the new Act.

• Right of approvals to continue subject to variation and cancellation. Section 5(1)-(3) continues approvals made under the repealed Act as approvals under specified sections of the new Act (treating approvals as approvals under section 89 of the new Act for approved bodies and trading houses, and as approvals under section 89 for joint ventures/consortia), and allows those approvals to be varied and cancelled as if they were approvals under the new Act. The continued approval period is limited in specified cases by time limits in s 5(1)(b) and s 5(2)(b)-(3)(b).

• Continuation of procedural instruments and guidelines. Section 6 continues guidelines made under the repealed Act (sections 41 or 42) and permits their variation or revocation as if made under paragraph 101(1)(c) of the new Act. Section 13 continues principles under section 19A of the repealed Act as if they were guidelines under paragraph 101(1)(d) of the new Act.

• Conversion of pending applications and associated inquiries. Section 7 takes pending applications for approval as trading houses, joint ventures, consortiums or approved bodies under the repealed Act and treats them as having been made under section 88 of the new Act on 1 July 1997. Section 7(2) treats questions asked and answers given by Austrade before 1 July 1997 as if asked and given on 1 July 1997 for the purposes of the application under the new Act.

• Treatment of invitations and submissions for cancellation processes. Section 8 converts invitations to make written submissions that straddle the commencement date into invitations under the new Act (paragraph 91(1)(b)) and treats submissions received before 1 July 1997 as submissions received on that date for the purposes of the new Act.

• Preservation of determinations and tests. Sections 9 and 11 preserve determinations under the repealed Act (section 40BH and section 13K respectively) as if they were made under corresponding sections of the new Act (sections 92 and 21 respectively). Section 12 treats grants entry tests that were taken but undecided before the commencement as having been taken under section 20 of the new Act and treats related information requests and responses under section 22.

• Continuation of the repealed Act for specified matters. Schedule 1, item 2 continues the repealed Act to apply to defined categories of persons and matters (claims not finalised, permitted claim submissions, persons owed grants, indebted persons, persons facing prosecutions) and limits the definition of grant year for those purposes to exclude the year commencing 1 July 1996 and subsequent years (Schedule 1, item 2(2)).

Rights preserved are therefore largely rights of continuity: approvals, pending applications, and claims in process do not fall away by reason of repeal; those matters are either carried forward into the new Act framework or left to be determined under the repealed Act where Schedule 1 permits. Obligations rest primarily on Austrade to treat the specified instruments as carried forward and to take required administrative steps such as registration.

The repeal Act itself does not create new criminal offences, penalty regimes, or novel enforcement powers. It preserves existing enforcement exposure and liabilities where appropriate. Important enforcement-related points in the text are:

• Preservation of prosecution exposure. Schedule 1, item 2(1)(e) explicitly preserves persons who were immediately before 1 July 1997 liable to be prosecuted, or against whom a prosecution was pending, for an offence against the repealed Act. That means outstanding criminal or quasi-criminal enforcement actions under the 1974 Act remain prosecutable despite repeal.

• Preservation of indebtedness and recovery. Schedule 1, item 2(1)(d) preserves persons who were indebted to Austrade under sections 39A or 40 of the repealed Act immediately before 1 July 1997. The Act does not extinguish debts; it preserves Austrade’s capacity to enforce or recover those sums under the repealed Act.

• Continuation of determinations and administrative review. Schedule 1, item 2(3) treats a claim as not finalised where Austrade has not made a determination under section 12 of the repealed Act or where such a determination may be subject to review or appeal. For this limited purpose, Schedule 1(4) defines “court” to include the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, thereby preserving the existing review routes that may affect enforcement and determinations under the repealed Act.

• Administrative powers to vary or cancel approvals. Sections 5(1)-(3) carry approvals forward as if under corresponding provisions of the new Act and allow them to be varied and cancelled. That allocation of administrative discretion to Austrade establishes the ongoing regulatory control over approved bodies, trading houses and joint ventures; any enforcement action that relies on cancelling approvals will proceed under the new Act’s procedures as applied via these transitional provisions.

• Procedural deadlines and treatment of submissions. Sections 8 and 12 ensure procedural acts such as invitations for submissions and requests for information that straddle the commencement date are treated as having been issued or received on 1 July 1997 for the purposes of the new Act. This affects how and when Austrade may exercise enforcement-related decision-making that depends on procedural timelines and may preserve or alter treatment of late submissions relative to the new Act’s framing.

There are no new monetary penalties, fines, or civil sanctions introduced by this repeal Act itself. Enforcement continuity is the key operational feature: existing liabilities, prosecutions, debts and review rights are expressly preserved and must be processed under the statutory mapping provided by the Act.

The Act operates mainly by interacting with two pieces of statutory architecture: the Export Market Development Grants Act 1997 (the new Act) and the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985. The Act defines “new Act” for transition purposes (s 4(1)) and then maps instruments from the repealed Act into sections of the new Act. For interactions:

• Direct mapping to the new Act. Multiple provisions in Part 3 take specific instruments or processes under the repealed Act and state that they continue to have effect and may be varied or revoked as if they were made under particular sections of the new Act. Examples: approvals under section 40B of the repealed Act continue as approvals under section 89 of the new Act (s 5(1)); guidelines under sections 41 or 42 of the repealed Act continue as guidelines under paragraph 101(1)(c) of the new Act (s 6); determinations under section 13K of the repealed Act continue as determinations under section 21 of the new Act (s 11); determinations under section 40BH continue as if under section 92 of the new Act (s 9). These mappings create a legal bridge so that instruments retain force but are administered under the procedural and substantive frame of the new Act.

• Saving of the repealed Act for specified matters. Schedule 1, item 2 saves the old statute for specified categories of persons and matters (claims not finalised; permitted claim submissions; persons owed grants; indebted persons; persons facing prosecutions). That means, despite the general repeal, the 1974 Act remains the operative law for those specified contexts, subject to the limitation that the definition of “grant year” is treated as not including the year commencing 1 July 1996 or subsequent years for the saved operation (Schedule 1, item 2(2)). The saving is therefore narrow and purpose-specific.

• Amendments to the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985. Schedule 2 updates the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985 to reflect the repeal and establishment of the new Act. It substitutes references to “1974” with “1997” across multiple sections (Schedule 2, items 1, 3, 4, 6, 9-14), edits textual references such as “a claim” to “an application” (Schedule 2, items 5, 7), and inserts a new subsection 3(4) that explicitly instructs that a reference in the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985 to the new Act includes a reference to the 1974 Act to the extent the 1974 Act continues to apply because of Schedule 1 (Schedule 2, item 2). This creates explicit cross-referencing so that other statutory functions of the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985 align with the transitional legal position.

• Interpretive alignment. Section 4(2) commands that, unless contrary intention appears, expressions in Part 3 that are also used in the new Act have the same meaning as in the new Act. This is an internal interpretive device to ensure consistent meaning and prevent semantic mismatch when migrating applications, approvals and tests into the new legislative regime.

• Administrative procedure alignment. The repeal Act converts invitations, submissions, questions and answers that were issued or provided to Austrade under the repealed Act into being treated as issued or provided on 1 July 1997 under the new Act (ss 7-8, 12). That procedural mapping interacts with the new Act’s timelines and decision-making powers; it binds IT and records processes in Austrade and determines the document trail that courts or tribunals might later examine.

The Act does not amend other federal statutes besides the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985. Its interaction with courts and tribunals is limited to preserving review and appeal rights by defining “court” to include the Administrative Appeals Tribunal in Schedule 1, item 2(4). No substantive interaction with state laws or other Commonwealth regulatory regimes is created by the text of this Act.

The Act itself is a single instrument that effects repeal and transitional arrangements; within the supplied text there are no prior amendments to this Act recited. The Act’s own operation is immediate: section 2 sets the commencement date at 1 July 1997. The Act’s Schedules implement the substantive changes:

• Schedule 1 repeals the Export Market Development Grants Act 1974 (item 1) and contains a saving provision (item 2) that keeps the repealed Act operative for specific categories of persons and matters and prescribes how to treat grant year for those saved applications (Schedule 1, item 2(2)). Schedule 1 also defines “Austrade”, “court” and “repealed Act” for the purposes of those savings (Schedule 1, item 2(4)).

• Part 3’s transitional provisions (ss 4-14) map approvals, guidelines, pending applications, determinations, grants entry tests, registration and principles from the repealed Act to the corresponding provisions of the new Act, with specified temporal limits on some carried-forward approvals (s 5). These are not amendments to other Acts per se, but they recharacterise previously existing instruments in terms of the new Act.

• Schedule 2 amends the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985 in multiple places to reflect the new statutory reference to the 1997 Act and to add the saving cross-reference that ties the continued operation of the 1974 Act (to the limited extent preserved) into the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985 (Schedule 2, item 2).

The Act does not record subsequent amendments or later legislative changes. The supplied text records only the initial instrument and the consequences it effects at commencement. No repeals of the repeal Act itself or later modifications appear in the source text supplied.

The supplied text contains no case law, judicial decisions or litigation citations concerning this Act. The Act preserves ongoing review and appeal pathways connected to matters constituted under the repealed Act. Schedule 1, item 2(3) sets out when a claim is taken not to be finalised, explicitly including the position where Austrade has not made a determination under section 12 of the repealed Act, or where such a determination may be, or is, subject to review or appeal to another court. Schedule 1, item 2(4) defines “court” for these purposes to include the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, thereby preserving tribunal review jurisdictions. Beyond that preservation, the Act contains no express statements about existing or future litigation, nor does it identify particular disputes or judicial interpretations. Users seeking case law involving the repeal or transitional operation must consult court and tribunal records outside the text of this Act because the Act itself provides no litigated examples or judicial gloss.

The Act contains several technical features and timing rules that can produce practical pitfalls for administrators and regulated parties if not carefully tracked.

• Repeal but partial preservation. Although Schedule 1, item 1 repeals the whole of the 1974 Act, Schedule 1, item 2 preserves the repealed Act for very specific categories of persons and circumstances. Parties might assume that repeal extinguishes all rights and obligations; the Act explicitly prevents that for claims not finalised, persons permitted to submit claims, grantees, debtors to Austrade, and persons facing prosecutions (Schedule 1, item 2(1)). Practitioners must identify whether a particular matter falls within the saved categories.

• Narrow temporal limitation on grant years for the saved provisions. For persons preserved by Schedule 1, item 2(1), the repealed Act applies as if the definition of “grant year” did not include the year commencing 1 July 1996 or subsequent years (Schedule 1, item 2(2)). That changes the temporal footprint of the repealed Act for saved matters. When assessing entitlements or obligations under the saved operation, check whether the disputed period is excluded by item 2(2).

• Approvals continued “as if” under new Act but with time caps. Section 5(1)(b) continues approvals of persons as approved bodies and specifies that such approvals continue until the third anniversary of the approval, or, if the third anniversary occurs or has occurred before the day 3 months after the commencement of this subparagraph, that earlier day. The layered temporal wording sets a cut-off that can be easily misread. Practitioners should compute the specific dates relevant to an approval to determine whether the approval persists beyond the commencement date and for how long. The same “continues until it would have ceased under the repealed Act” rule applies to trading house approvals (s 5(2)(b)) and joint ventures/consortia (s 5(3)(b)), which requires reconstructing the expiry terms that would have applied under the repealed Act.

• Procedural conversions fix dates to 1 July 1997. Several procedural acts that were pending immediately before commencement are treated as having been made or received on 1 July 1997 for the purposes of the new Act (see ss 7(1), 7(2), 8(1)-(2), 12(1)-(3)). This affects limitation periods, response deadlines and the timing of administrative discretions under the new Act. Parties should not assume that a submission or query provided to Austrade before commencement will be treated with its original timestamp; the Act re-dates many inputs to the commencement date.

• Registration obligation is “as soon as practicable.” Section 10(2) requires Austrade to register persons who applied under the repealed Act but had not been registered before 1 July 1997. The statutory standard of “as soon as practicable” is flexible and places the timing discretion on Austrade. Applicants relying on timely registration to access entitlements should follow up actively because the statutory duty does not prescribe a firm deadline.

• Amendments to other Acts change terminology. Schedule 2 replaces textual references to the 1974 Act with the 1997 Act in numerous places within the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985. It also replaces language such as “a claim” with “an application” (Schedule 2, items 5 and 7). Those drafting changes can affect cross-references and the interpretation of administrative procedure in relation to Austrade’s functions. Practitioners should read the Australian Trade Commission Act 1985 with the Schedule 2 substitutions in mind when assessing procedural interactions.

• Multiple instruments may be subject to variation and cancellation under the new Act. Approvals, guidelines and determinations carried forward are explicitly subject to variation and revocation as if under the new Act (ss 5, 6, 9, 11). That creates administrative uncertainty because the legal status of approvals or guidelines is preserved only until Austrade exercises its powers under the new Act. Stakeholders with ongoing approvals should anticipate review and possible amendment under the new regime.

• Definitions and interpretive alignment. Section 4(2) aligns expressions in Part 3 with meanings given in the new Act unless the contrary intention appears. That interpretive default requires users to consult the new Act’s definitions to determine the proper meaning of terms in the transition provisions. Failure to do so might lead to incorrect assumptions about who qualifies as a claimant, grantee, approved body, or trading house.

These features create several practical compliance and administrative traps if parties rely on surface-level readings that assume repeal extinguishes all obligations or that carried-forward approvals persist in perpetuity. The Act preserves many links between the old and new regimes but also relocates decision-making to the new Act and to Austrade’s exercise of powers under it.

Compliance under this repeal-and-transitional Act is predominantly administrative and record-focused. The practical compliance tasks for each affected actor are set out below with the relevant statutory hooks.

For Austrade

• Register pending applicants promptly. Section 10(2) requires Austrade to register persons who had applied under section 13I of the repealed Act for the grant year commencing 1 July 1996 but had not been registered before 1 July 1997, as soon as practicable. Austrade should have a prioritised workflow and an audit trail demonstrating the date of registration to evidence compliance with the statutory obligation.

• Treat approvals, guidelines and determinations according to the mapping. Where approvals, guidelines or determinations under the repealed Act continued by this Act are present, Austrade must treat those as if they were approvals, guidelines or determinations under the enumerated provisions of the new Act (see ss 5-6, 9-11). Administrative systems must flag transferred instruments, note their expiry dates where the Act specifies temporal limits (s 5), and schedule any variation or cancellation processes that Austrade may lawfully exercise.

• Re-date procedural documents where required. Sections 7, 8 and 12 require certain applications, questions, invitations and information to be treated as if made or received on 1 July 1997. Austrade should ensure record-keeping systems reflect this statutory re-dating so that timelines under the new Act can be correctly applied.

• Preserve and pursue debts and prosecutions. Schedule 1, item 2 preserves indebtedness to Austrade under the repealed Act and existing liabilities for prosecution. Austrade must ensure continuity of recovery and prosecution actions and keep records tying those actions back to the provisions of the repealed Act preserved by the Schedule.

For applicants, grantees, approved bodies, trading houses, joint ventures and claimants

• Confirm whether a matter is preserved by Schedule 1. Determine if an application, claim, indebtedness, grant entitlement or prosecution falls within Schedule 1, item 2(1)(a)-(e). If it does, the repealed Act may still govern that specific matter; otherwise, instruments generally map into the new Act per Part 3.

• Monitor approvals and dates. If operating under an approval that continued under section 5, calculate the relevant expiry date: approvals generally continue until the third anniversary of the original approval, subject to the temporal caveat in s 5(1)(b), or until the date the approval would have ceased under the repealed Act (s 5(2)(b), s 5(3)(b)). Keep records of the original approval date and check Austrade communications for any variation or cancellation actions under the new Act.

• Check registration status and follow up. If you applied for registration under the repealed Act but had not been registered before 1 July 1997, Austrade must register you as soon as practicable (s 10(2)). Follow up with Austrade if registration has not been recorded; retain copies of your application and evidence of delivery of any required materials.

• Preserve documentary evidence for procedural conversions. Because questions, answers, invitations to make submissions and information provided before commencement can be treated as made or received on 1 July 1997 for the purposes of the new Act (ss 7-8, 12), keep dated copies of all communications with Austrade, including copies of the original documents and any acknowledgements. These will be needed to demonstrate compliance or to challenge administrative actions if timestamps become material.

• Understand the limits on grant-year coverage. If seeking to compute eligible expenses for grants where you are applying in respect of the 1996-97 year and you were not a prior grantee, section 14 instructs that in working out eligible expenses you must exclude expenses incurred during the previous year that were in respect of eligible promotional activity for approved promotional purposes relating to eligible external services that were not eligible under the repealed Act. Practitioners should assemble their expense evidence with that exclusion in mind.

For legal advisers and auditors

• Map rights and obligations across both Acts. Section 4(2) requires using the new Act’s definitions for expressions used in Part 3, unless a contrary intention appears. Legal advisers should read the transitional provisions and the new Act together to advise clients on whether an approval, application, claim or debt is governed by the repealed Act or by the new Act.

• Check for reviewable decisions. Schedule 1, item 2(3) preserves claims that may be subject to review or appeal. Where a determination under the repealed Act may be subject to review, retain records of the administrative determination process, the relevant statutory grounds, and the timetable for review or appeal to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal which is explicitly included in the definition of “court” for these purposes (Schedule 1, item 2(4)).

Operational suggestions

• Maintain dual-track files. For matters that straddle the repeal date, keep files that show the original interaction with Austrade under the repealed Act and the mapping into the new Act. Note the statutory provisions invoked by the transitional Act when preparing submissions or litigating.

• Confirm Austrade’s administrative practice. Because several duties on Austrade are phrased as “may be varied and cancelled” or “as soon as practicable,” obtain Austrade’s published transitional practices or internal guidance if available. Use freedom of information or formal requests to get precise timeframes where statutory language is open-ended.

• Date computations. When computing any statutory timetables that depend on the “treated as” date of 1 July 1997, use that treated date rather than the original date of an action that was taken before commencement, unless the transitional provision explicitly preserves the earlier date.

Following these steps will align administrative and documentary practice with the conversion and saving rules in this repeal Act and with the duties imposed upon Austrade by the text.