Local Government Act 1960

Three broad classes of person are directly regulated.

First, local governments bear the heaviest burden. They must establish, maintain and staff pounds to statutory standards (ss. 449, 452–453, 456), give repeated forms of “local public notice”, maintain pound books, receive and apply sale proceeds according to the statutory waterfall (s. 479), vary fees only after notice (s. 464), and pay compensation for street alignment land (s. 364(7)). They are also deemed owners of public places for trespass purposes (s. 447) and may appoint rangers who can impound across district boundaries in defined cases (s. 458(2C)).

Second, landowners and occupiers of private land are both entitled to impound trespassing cattle and are subject to reciprocal obligations. They may seize and impound (s. 458(1), (3)), claim scheduled damages for trespass (s. 463), and, in the case of private impounding, must feed stock, give notice within 24 hours and may later transfer the animals to a public pound (s. 460). They are also the recipients of compensation when part of their land is taken for street widening (s. 364(7)) and must refrain from driving cattle from another person’s land without notice (s. 481).

Third, owners of cattle (including persons in charge where the owner cannot be found — s. 484(3)) face strict liability for straying or depasturing in public places (s. 484), must pay prescribed fees, sustenance and damage rates to secure release (s. 471), and may lose title to their animals through sale or destruction if they fail to claim them within the statutory windows. They are also protected by offences prohibiting unauthorised milking or working of impounded stock (s. 454) and by the requirement that poundkeepers are responsible for wilful neglect (s. 467(2)).

Poundkeepers themselves occupy a quasi-public office with statutory duties, record-keeping obligations, fee-charging rights and personal liability limited to wilful acts (s. 467(2)). Rangers, justices of the peace, the Registrar of Titles, and the CEO of the local government all have discrete roles. The legislation therefore casts a wide net across rural Western Australia, capturing councils, graziers, smallholders, pound operators and livestock owners alike.

Local government duties include constructing compliant pounds (s. 452(1)), ensuring segregation of diseased stock, twice-daily feeding, constant water and shelter (ss. 452–453), erecting and maintaining a conspicuous fee board (s. 456), supplying pound books (s. 455(1)), receiving monthly copies of entries (s. 455(2C)), and dealing with unclaimed money through a trust fund for two years before potential municipalisation (s. 457). When selling, only the poundkeeper or a person appointed by the local government may conduct the auction at the pound or a nominated place, and council members, the CEO and the poundkeeper are disqualified from purchasing (s. 474(6)).

Landowner rights comprise the ability to impound (s. 458), claim scheduled trespass damages (s. 463(1)), and, after notice, destroy goats, pigs, birds or poultry by non-poison means (s. 480). They enjoy a right to compensation for street alignment land depreciation (s. 364(7)) and may tender payment under protest to secure immediate release while preserving a cause of action for excess (s. 472).

Cattle owner rights are essentially procedural: the right to redeem stock on payment or tender of the claimed sum before actual impounding (s. 465), to receive personal notice where identity is known (s. 469(2)), to pay under protest (s. 472), and to receive any surplus sale proceeds (s. 479(d)(i)). They are protected by the offence provisions (ss. 454, 461, 482) and the poundkeeper’s limited liability (s. 467(2)).

Poundkeeper duties are onerous: legible entries in the Schedule 1 book (s. 455(2A)), posting of description notices (s. 468), giving of impounding notices (s. 469), release only on payment or statutory declaration waiver (s. 471), labelling sold animals under the Biosecurity and Agriculture Management Act 2007 (s. 474(7)), and correct application of proceeds (s. 479). Rights include charging the prescribed or varied fees and recovering shortfalls from owners or the local government (s. 477).

Evidentiary rights are noteworthy: local public notice of appointment is prima facie evidence (s. 450), possession within 48 hours is prima facie evidence of pound-breach (s. 482(2)), and averments as to ownership are taken as proved absent contrary evidence (s. 484(4)).

Penalties are modest by contemporary standards but were significant at enactment. The poundkeeper who fails to keep the pound clean, mixes diseased and healthy stock, starves impounded cattle or accepts stock beyond capacity faces a $40 penalty (s. 452(2)). Unauthorised milking or working of impounded stock carries a minimum $4 and maximum $80 plus compensation (s. 454). Knowingly giving a false or insufficient description in a notice attracts $40 (s. 469(6)). Unlawful impounding is an offence simpliciter (s. 461). Pound-breach, rescue, damage to pounds or interference with poundkeepers or rangers carries a maximum $400 plus expenses (s. 482). Driving cattle without notice or driving another’s cattle after notice is $800 (s. 481). Permitting cattle to stray in a public place is $200 (s. 484). Removing a fence to permit trespass is $400 (s. 483). The catch-all failure to comply with the Act (s. 670) applies where no specific penalty is provided.

Enforcement is primarily by prosecution in courts of summary jurisdiction (now magistrates courts). Many offences carry reverse onus or prima facie evidence rules that ease proof. Justices of the Peace exercise significant administrative jurisdiction to order destruction (ss. 459, 475, 478) or dispense with notice and advertising where value is low (s. 474(2A)–(3B)); these orders are final and not subject to appeal. Civil recovery of fees, damages or compensation is available in courts of competent jurisdiction (ss. 477, 485), with the statutory schedules providing liquidated measures of damage that do not preclude claims for additional loss.

Section 2 expressly provides that the Local Government Act 1995 applies as if the provisions of this Act were in it, but that pre-1995 meanings must be taken into account. Street alignment provisions cross-reference the Land Administration Act 1997 (revesting, acquisition under Part 9), the Transfer of Land Act 1893 and the Commercial Arbitration Act 2012 (s. 684). Pound operations intersect with the Biosecurity and Agriculture Management Act 2007 (labelling obligation — s. 474(7)). Notice requirements now utilise local government websites (amendments in the Local Government Legislation Amendment Act 2019 reflected in ss. 463(3) and 469).

The Act sits alongside the Criminal Procedure Act 2004 and Sentencing Act 1995 for prosecution. It preserves common-law actions for trespass (s. 485) and Crown rights (s. 682). Repealed building provisions once interacted with the Building Act 2011, but those Parts have been excised. The pound book and notice forms are prescribed by the Act itself, leaving little room for subordinate legislation except for fee variations and the rare regulation contemplated in s. 470.

The most recent substantive amendments appear in the Local Government Legislation Amendment Act 2019 (No. 16 of 2019). Sections 450, 451, 463, 464, 469 and 474 were altered to replace references to “newspaper” publication with “local public notice”, and s. 463(3) now requires a local government to publish a requested notice on its official website. These changes reflect the shift from print to digital communication, reducing costs and increasing accessibility.

Earlier amendments in the Standardisation of Formatting Act 2010 and the Building Act 2011 removed or relocated large tranches of building and subdivision regulation into newer statutes, explaining the multitude of deleted Parts. The Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Amendment Act 2007 inserted smoke alarm provisions that were later overtaken by the Building Act 2011. The overall trend since 1995 has been progressive pruning so that this statute now performs only the two narrow functions described above. No amendments have altered the core livestock trespass code since the decimal currency and metric conversion updates of the 1960s and 1970s, preserving its 1960s drafting style.

The Act itself contains no reported cases, and the compilation table and notes do not reference any specific litigation. Section 364(8) and s. 684 contemplate arbitration rather than court determination of compensation and clearing-date disputes; the arbitration route is expressed to be the only permitted forum. Orders made by justices under ss. 459, 474, 475 and 478 are declared final and not subject to appeal, limiting judicial review avenues.

The prima facie evidence and averment provisions (ss. 450, 482(2), 484(4)) would, if challenged, engage constitutional and statutory construction questions about reverse onus, but no such challenges are recorded in the source text. Controversies are therefore largely administrative: disputes about the adequacy of “local public notice”, the calculation of sustenance charges, or whether minor repairs fall within the s. 364(3C) exception. The retention of physical pound books and twice-daily feeding regimes in an era of intensive livestock management has attracted no legislative controversy on the face of the Act, but compliance officers will be aware of the practical tension between these 1960s requirements and modern biosecurity and animal welfare standards.

Most practitioners miss three critical features. First, the time limits are unforgiving and non-extendable on the face of the Act: a poundkeeper must give personal notice within 48 hours or post by the earliest post after 24 hours (s. 469(3)); failure can prevent recovery of fees (s. 477(2)) and expose the keeper to the offence in s. 469(6). Second, local governments that vary Schedule fees must do so by local public notice before the varied rates become chargeable (s. 464); retrospective variation is impossible. Third, the purchaser-protection rule in s. 476 is absolute — a buyer at a statutory sale need not prove regularity — but the disqualification of councillors, CEOs and poundkeepers from purchasing (s. 474(6)) is strict; breach would likely render the sale voidable.

Another trap is s. 460(5)–(6): an unbranded entire male horse, ass or bull over one year found trespassing without a keeper may be castrated by the landowner if the owner is unknown, with no compensation payable. This archaic self-help remedy survives and could trigger modern animal welfare complaints. The “suckling animal” exemption from all fees and damages (repeated in Schedules 2–4) is often overlooked, as is the fact that ranger fees are claimable per owner, not per animal, when multiple beasts are impounded together (s. 458(2B)).

Finally, the interaction between scheduled trespass damages and full common-law compensation (s. 485) means a landowner can elect to sue outside the Act for consequential loss (e.g. contamination of a water source or escape of valuable stud stock), yet many settlement agreements inadvertently limit recovery to Schedule 4 rates.

Local governments should maintain a current register of pounds, publish an up-to-date fee board and website schedule, ensure every pound meets the physical standards in ss. 452–453, and train poundkeepers on the exact sequence of notice, pound-book entries and monthly reporting. A written impounding protocol should mirror the particulars required by s. 466. When varying fees, the local public notice must precede the first charge at the new rate. CEOs must hold unclaimed sale proceeds in the trust fund for two years (s. 457) and record revesting notices under s. 364(9).

Landowners wishing to impound should photograph the trespass, calculate damage strictly by reference to Schedule 4 (or prove greater loss in court), give the exact notice required by s. 460(2) within 24 hours, and feed to the public-pound sustenance rate. If selling privately impounded stock, the local government must be engaged to conduct the sale under s. 460(3AA)–(3a). Notice under s. 480 must be given before destroying goats, pigs or poultry.

Poundkeepers must keep the Schedule 1 book in legible handwriting, never erase entries, post the description notice immediately (s. 468), and refuse release outside sunrise-to-sunset hours or without payment or statutory declaration (s. 471). When selling, they must label under the Biosecurity and Agriculture Management Act 2007 and apply proceeds in the exact statutory order.

Cattle owners should respond to any notice within the shortest applicable period (three days after personal service), pay under protest if disputing quantum (s. 472), and maintain fences to avoid the strict liability offence in s. 484. Records of brands, ear tags and movement should be kept to rebut averments of ownership.

All parties should keep file copies of every notice, statutory declaration, JP order and pound-book extract. Because many provisions cross-reference the Local Government Act 1995 and other statutes, compliance checklists should be updated whenever those parent Acts are amended. Regular auditing of pound records against the monthly CEO copies is the single most effective safeguard against the offence provisions in s. 455(6) and the fee-recovery defence in s. 477(2).

By treating the surviving provisions as a complete code rather than an historical curiosity, councils and landowners can avoid the procedural pitfalls that have been preserved for more than six decades.