Notaries Public Act 1990

The statute organises the notary function around a handful of statutory concepts with operational consequences.

• The Court. The Act designates the Supreme Court of Tasmania as the Court with the power to appoint notaries, hear objections, exercise disciplinary powers and make rules (see s 3 definition of the Court; appointment power in s 5; objections in s 6; discipline in s 10; rule-making in s 12). Where the Act speaks of Court actions it means actions by the Supreme Court acting under its statutory role here.

• The Registrar and the Roll. The Registrar of the Supreme Court must establish and maintain a Roll of notaries public and enter prescribed particulars for each notary (s 7(1)-(2)). The Roll is the statutory record determining who may lawfully perform notarial acts in Tasmania (s 11(1)). The Registrar issues a certificate of appointment under the Court’s seal on application (s 8(1)) and may issue duplicates (s 8(2)). The Roll can be adjusted by the Court at a notary’s request (s 7(3)) and may have names removed where the notary’s name is removed from local legal rolls (s 7(4)).

• Appointment eligibility and need. The Act makes eligibility conditional on professional status and other qualities: being an Australian legal practitioner of at least five years’ standing, of good fame and character and competent to act (s 5(1)(a)-(c)). The rules may prescribe additional qualifications such as specified courses or examinations (s 12(a)). The Court will only appoint where it is satisfied there is a need for a notary public in the applicant’s district (s 5(1)).

• Conditions and discipline. The Court can impose conditions on appointments (s 5(2)) and can discipline a notary by reprimand, suspension or removal from the Roll on its own motion or on application by any person (s 10(1)). Where it reprimands or suspends it may impose compliance conditions (s 10(2)).

• Exclusive entitlement to act in Tasmania. The Act makes it an offence for any person to do notarial acts in Tasmania unless their name is on the Roll (s 11(1)). It also prohibits suspended notaries and suspended Australian legal practitioners from performing notarial acts while suspended (s 11(2)).

• Rule-making and administrative detail. The Act leaves procedural and many substantive qualification details to rules made by the judges of the Supreme Court (s 12), including advertising and fees for applications (s 5(1) refers to advertisement and fee “as prescribed by the rules”), forms, particulars, oaths and conduct regulation.

• Recognition of extraterritorial acts and repeal of old UK law. The Act affirms that a notary appointed under it can exercise UK notary powers in Tasmania (s 9(a)) and preserves the validity of notarial acts done outside Tasmania (s 9(b)). It also expressly ceases the operation of a 41 Geo III UK Act in Tasmania (s 13).

These concepts work together: statutory eligibility and Court discretion control supply of notaries, the Roll operates as the exclusive gateway to notarial practice in Tasmania, and the rule-making power sets the administrative scaffolding.

This Act affects a circumscribed set of actors and, through them, the public who use notarial services. The principal affected parties and the statutory mechanisms that affect them are as follows.

• Existing notaries who immediately before commencement held office and practised in Tasmania under appointment or purported appointment by the Court of Faculties of the Archbishop of Canterbury. The Act deems those persons to have been appointed under this Act on the commencement day (s 4(1)) and validates their prior acts in Tasmania as if the Act had then been in force (s 4(2)). That deeming moves pre-existing practitioners into the new statutory regime without reapplication.

• Prospective notaries, specifically Australian legal practitioners. The Act limits eligibility to persons who are Australian legal practitioners of not less than five years’ standing and who meet character, competence and any rule-prescribed qualifications (s 5(1)(a)-(d)). Those prospective applicants face procedural requirements: an application to the Court, advertisement and payment of a fee prescribed by the rules (s 5(1)).

• The Supreme Court and its judges. The Court decides applications, prescribes or approves conditions on appointments (s 5(2)), hears and determines objections (s 6), exercises discipline (s 10) and the judges may make rules for the purposes outlined in s 12. The Court therefore occupies both adjudicative and regulatory roles under the Act.

• The Registrar of the Supreme Court. The Registrar is charged with establishing and maintaining the Roll, entering prescribed particulars, making the Roll available for public inspection as prescribed by rules, issuing certificates and duplicates (s 7(1)-(2); s 8(1)-(2)). The Registrar also acts on requests to remove names from the Roll and must remove names in the circumstances set out in s 7(4).

• Persons who might otherwise perform notarial acts. The Act criminalises doing notarial acts in Tasmania unless the person’s name is on the Roll (s 11(1)). That creates a legal bar for non-registrants and a potential criminal exposure for those who ignore it.

• Suspended notaries and suspended Australian legal practitioners. Section 11(2) prohibits a notary suspended under s 10(1) from performing notarial acts. It also prohibits a person suspended from practice as an Australian legal practitioner from performing notarial acts (s 11(2)(b)), so disciplinary or licensing actions in the broader legal profession regime directly affect notarial practice.

• The public and users of notarial services. Because the Roll is the statutory record of who may act (s 7) and the Registrar must make the Roll publicly available as prescribed by rules (s 7(2)), clients and institutions rely on the Roll and certificates (s 8) to confirm authority. The Act therefore shapes who the public may validly use for notarial services.

• Other regulatory regimes. The Act references other rolls under the Legal Profession Act 2007 and the barristers’ roll (s 7(4)), meaning changes in those regimes feed into the notary Roll. The Act also uses the term “Australian legal practitioner” without defining it in the text provided (s 5(1)(a)), so the definition and disciplinary mechanisms of the broader legal profession framework will interact with this Act when determining eligibility and suspension consequences.

In sum, the effects are concentrated on the legal profession (existing and prospective notaries, the Court and Registrar) while producing a general legal effect for anyone seeking or relying on notarial acts in Tasmania through the Roll and criminal prohibition.

The Act establishes explicit duties for public officers, applicants and notaries, and confers rights and entitlements that determine who may lawfully perform notarial acts in Tasmania.

Duties imposed by the Act

• Registrar’s duties. The Registrar must establish and maintain the Roll of notaries public and enter names and prescribed particulars (s 7(1)). The Registrar must make the Roll available for public inspection at times and in the manner prescribed by rules (s 7(2)). On application by a person whose name is on the Roll, the Registrar must issue a certificate of appointment under the Registrar’s hand and the Court’s seal (s 8(1)), and may issue duplicates where satisfied of loss, destruction or other reason (s 8(2)). The Registrar must remove a notary’s name from the Roll where the notary’s name is removed from the roll of local lawyers under the Legal Profession Act 2007 or from the barristers’ roll and the notary is not then entered on the other of those rolls (s 7(4)).

• Applicants’ duties. Applicants must follow the application procedure prescribed by the rules, including advertising their application as prescribed and paying the prescribed fee (s 5(1)).

• Notaries’ duties. A person must not perform notarial acts in Tasmania unless their name is on the Roll (s 11(1)). A notary suspended from practice under s 10(1) must not perform notarial acts while suspended (s 11(2)(a)). A person suspended from practice as an Australian legal practitioner must not perform notarial acts while that suspension applies (s 11(2)(b)). Notaries must also comply with any conditions the Court imposes on their appointment (s 5(2)) and with conditions ordered by the Court when reprimanding or suspending (s 10(2)).

Rights and entitlements

• Right to be appointed and to act. Where the Court appoints a person as a notary public, the notary is entitled to exercise throughout Tasmania all powers and authorities lawfully exercised by a notary public in the United Kingdom (s 9(a)). The Act also preserves the validity within Tasmania of notarial acts done outside Tasmania (s 9(b)), which supports reliance on foreign notarial acts.

• Procedural rights. A person who files and serves an objection in the form prescribed by the rules may appear in person or by counsel and be heard in opposition to an application for appointment (s 6). This gives third parties an opportunity to challenge an appointment before the Court.

• Administrative rights. A notary whose name appears on the Roll may obtain a certificate of appointment from the Registrar and a duplicate if required (s 8(1)-(2)). A notary may request the Court to cause their name to be removed from the Roll (s 7(3)).

Court powers and regulatory instrument

• The Court has broad powers to appoint subject to conditions (s 5(2)), to discipline a notary by reprimand, suspension or removal (s 10(1)), and when reprimanding or suspending, to order compliance with conditions (s 10(2)). The judges may make detailed rules governing qualifications, oaths, Roll particulars, certificate forms, and regulation of professional practice, conduct and discipline (s 12(a)-(e)). These rules will shape many procedural rights and duties through delegated regulation.

Enforcement mechanism

• Criminal enforcement for unauthorised practice is a summary offence carrying a maximum penalty of 20 penalty units (s 11(3)). Discipline under s 10 operates in parallel and can be triggered on the Court’s own motion or by application from any person (s 10(1)).

These duties and rights create a gatekeeper record (the Roll) and procedural scaffolding for appointments and discipline, while subjecting notarial work to both criminal sanction and Court-based disciplinary supervision. The rule-making power in s 12 is the principal vehicle for converting statutory standards into granular administrative obligations.

The Act supplies both civil-adjacent disciplinary mechanisms and criminal sanctions; jurisdiction and modes of enforcement are allocated mainly to the Court and to summary criminal process.

Criminal sanction

• The principal statutory criminal offence is set out in s 11. It is an offence for a person, on or after the commencement day, to do or perform in Tasmania any act, matter or thing appertaining to the office, function or practice of a notary public unless the person’s name is on the Roll (s 11(1)). The Act also criminalises a notary from performing such acts while suspended from practice under s 10(1) (s 11(2)(a)) and criminalises anyone suspended from practice as an Australian legal practitioner from performing notarial acts while suspended (s 11(2)(b)). The penal maximum is a fine not exceeding 20 penalty units on summary conviction (s 11(3)). The Act does not itself specify imprisonment or comparable penalties; the declared sanction is a monetary fine on summary conviction only.

Disciplinary enforcement by the Court

• The Court’s disciplinary powers are elective: the Court may act on its own motion or on cause shown on application by any person (s 10(1)). Available measures are reprimand, suspension for a specified period, and removal from the Roll (s 10(1)(a)-(c)). The Court may dismiss an application for discipline (s 10(1)), indicating a contested-process model. Where the Court reprimands or suspends, it may order compliance with conditions it thinks fit (s 10(2)). These are administrative/supra-professional sanctions, not criminal penalties, but they immediately affect the notary’s right to act.

Interplay between criminal and disciplinary enforcement

• The two regimes operate in parallel. For example, a person who continues to perform notarial acts after removal from the Roll or while suspended both violates the criminal prohibition (s 11) and gives the Court cause to exercise disciplinary powers (s 10) where it has not already done so. The Act does not specify which remedies must be pursued first; the Court’s power to act on its own motion means it can initiate discipline without waiting for criminal process.

Procedural regulation and rules

• The rules made by the judges under s 12 may regulate professional practice, conduct and discipline (s 12(e)), and they also prescribe procedural aspects of applications and objections (s 5(1) refers to advertisement and fee “as prescribed by the rules”; s 6 contemplates rules-prescribed forms and service). Therefore, detailed enforcement processes and timing will largely be shaped by rules the Court makes.

Administrative record and public inspection

• The Registrar must make the Roll available for public inspection at times and in the manner prescribed by rules (s 7(2)). Certificates of appointment (s 8) are the administrative instruments that substantiate a notary’s legal authority; absence of a certificate or Roll entry is actionable under s 11. The Registrar’s statutory duties to maintain and publish the Roll are therefore a key compliance and enforcement mechanism for the public and agencies relying on notarial acts.

Who enforces

• Criminal enforcement will run through the ordinary summary criminal process. The Court is the primary regulatory body for discipline and appointment decisions. The Registrar enforces the record-keeping and certification obligations that undergird the criminal provision.

In sum, enforcement combines: (1) a public-record-based exclusion (the Roll) backed by a summary criminal offence with a maximum monetary penalty (s 11); (2) Court-led discipline that can remove or suspend notarial authority and impose conditions (s 10); and (3) rule-made procedural details that will determine how objections, qualifications and disciplinary processes operate in practice (s 12).

The Act explicitly and implicitly connects to other statutory and regulatory frameworks. The text provides several points of interaction that practitioners must note.

Explicit interaction with historical United Kingdom law

• Section 13 expressly ceases the operation in Tasmania of the Act passed in England in the 41st year of the reign of King George III entitled "An Act for the better Regulation of Publick Notaries in England". That repeal removes the old UK statutory basis that previously operated in Tasmania and replaces it with this domestic statutory regime.

Interaction with the legal profession framework

• The Act uses the term “Australian legal practitioner” as an eligibility threshold (s 5(1)(a)). The Act does not define that term within the text provided. Consequently, the meaning and requirements that attach to “Australian legal practitioner” will derive from the broader legal framework that defines and regulates legal practitioners. The provision therefore links eligibility for notarial appointment to the substantive standards, admission and continuing practice rules of the legal profession.

• Section 7(4) creates a direct statutory linkage between the Roll of notaries and the local lawyers’ roll kept under the Legal Profession Act 2007 and the barristers’ roll: where a notary’s name is removed from those rolls and the notary is not then entered on the other of those rolls, the Registrar must remove the notary’s name from the Roll of notaries public (s 7(4)). That makes the notary entitlement contingent on continued standing in the local legal regulatory rolls; a suspension or removal in the legal profession regime can cascade into loss of notarial authority via the Registrar’s duty.

Delegation to Court rules and interaction with judicial administration

• The judges of the Supreme Court may make rules for a broad range of matters (s 12). Those rules will interact with court procedural regimes and administrative practice, because they may prescribe forms, fees, advertising, qualification standards (including courses and exams), oaths, particulars, and professional conduct regulation. The Act therefore imports into its operation the Court’s rule-making machinery and any relevant limits or conventions that govern judicially-made practice rules.

Recognition of extraterritorial notarial acts

• Section 9(b) declares that nothing in the Act affects the validity or operation within Tasmania of a notarial act duly done outside Tasmania. This provision means Tasmanian law will continue to accept notarial acts performed abroad, subject to other applicable law. It creates a bridge between local notarial authority and foreign notarial acts, potentially affecting cross-border documentary practice.

Dependence on penalty unit regime and summary offence procedures

• The Act fixes the maximum criminal penalty at 20 penalty units on summary conviction (s 11(3)). The practical effect of any fine therefore depends on the definition and current value of a penalty unit under the relevant Tasmanian penalties legislation. The Act therefore operates in conjunction with the general penalty-unit scheme and summary criminal procedure statutes.

Practical consequence: regulatory overlaps

• Disciplinary measures in the legal profession (suspension from practice as an Australian legal practitioner) interact directly with the notary offence provision (s 11(2)(b)). The Act thereby aligns notarial status with broader professional discipline and creates automatic operational consequences flowing from actions in other regulatory settings.

In short, the Act is not a freestanding, self-contained code. It relies on and links to the legal profession’s definitions and disciplinary systems, the Court’s rule-making powers, the penalty units and criminal procedure regimes, and it replaces a historical UK statutory foundation. The precise operational details of many interactions will be determined by Court rules and by the external regimes the Act references.

The text provided includes built-in amendment annotations for several provisions. The Act as presented shows amendment notes embedded in the text for particular subsections. The material facts visible in the supplied text are these.

• Section 5(1) contains editorial amendment notes indicating it was amended by No. 66 of 2007, Schedule 1, and that amendment was applied on 31 December 2008. The bracketed note appears twice in the text adjoining the provision for s 5(1) and the identified qualification subparagraph (a). The operative wording in s 5(1) now requires an applicant to be “an Australian legal practitioner of not less than 5 years’ standing” (s 5(1)(a)).

• Section 7(4) contains an amendment notation that it was amended by No. 66 of 2007, Schedule 1 (applied 31 December 2008), and also contains a further editorial reference to an earlier amendment by No. 68 of 1994 (s 3 and Schedule 1). The current text of s 7(4) ties removal from the Roll of notaries public to removal from the roll of local lawyers kept under the Legal Profession Act 2007 or the barristers’ roll.

• Section 11(2) includes an amendment note indicating that paragraph (b) was amended by No. 66 of 2007, Schedule 1, applied 31 December 2008. The current text of s 11(2)(b) contains the prohibition against performing notarial acts while suspended from practice as an Australian legal practitioner.

• No other amendment annotations are shown in the text provided. Section 12, 13 and other provisions do not carry inline amendment notes in the supplied text.

• Section 2 (commencement) indicates commencement is by proclamation; the text provided does not include a proclamation date for commencement.

Because the supplied statute text contains explicit bracketed amendment annotations, those are the only visible amendment history items that can be reported from this source. The Act therefore, as presented, shows at least two discrete amendment events affecting sections 5(1), 7(4) and 11(2), the details of which are flagged within the body of the text. No case law or judicial interpretive history appears in the supplied material.

If a reader requires the precise legislative instruments, dates, or amendment texts beyond the notes embedded here they will need to consult the Tasmanian statute revision or legislative history records; the embedded notes identify the amending instruments by number but do not contain the full amending text or parliamentary explanatory materials.

The text of the Act supplied contains no citations to cases, no recorded judicial decisions construing its provisions, and no statutory notes of litigation outcomes. Accordingly, there is no litigation history recorded within the text to summarise.

Practical implications of the absence of recorded litigation in the source

• Interpretive gaps. Where the Act leaves significant matters to Court rules (eg advertising requirements and fees under s 5(1); qualifications under s 12(a); particulars to be entered on the Roll under s 12(c)), those questions may be shaped either by administrative practice or, if contested, by judicial interpretation. Because the Act is silent on the content of rules, initial disputes about the scope of applicants’ rights, the Court’s discretion to determine “need for appointment in the district” (s 5(1)), or the procedural fairness applicable to objections under s 6 are likely to be resolved through the Court’s rule-making and, if necessary, judicial determination. The supplied text records no case law on those issues.

• Enforcement and dispute paths. The Act vests disciplinary power in the Court (s 10). Because the Court itself is the statutory disciplinarian, any contested disciplinary matter could, in principle, generate a record of judicial decisions interpreting the Act’s scope. Those decisions are not present in the provided text.

• Reliance on administrative practice. In the absence of litigation precedents in the source, practitioners must rely on the express statutory text (s 5 to s 12) and the rules the judges make under s 12. Rules will be the immediate source of procedural detail and are likely to pre-empt many triable disputes that otherwise would be litigated. The Act anticipates that rules will regulate professional practice, conduct and discipline (s 12(e)).

• No recorded cases cited. The instruction accompanying this task prohibits naming cases not contained in the source. There are none in the supplied Act text to name; therefore this section must record that no litigation history appears in the source and explain the consequence that interpretive questions will be answered through rule-making and, if necessary, subsequent adjudication by the Court.

To locate any judicial decisions construing this Act, or to identify disputes that have arisen under it in practice, one must examine Tasmanian Supreme Court records and reported decisions. The statute text as provided does not itself supply that litigation history.

The Act contains several provisions and structural features that create legal and operational risks or traps for applicants, practitioners and users of notarial services. These are practical, statute-derived pitfalls to watch for.

• Commencement by proclamation creates timing uncertainty. The Act does not commence on enactment; it commences on a day fixed by proclamation (s 2). Until proclamation occurs, the deemed appointments in s 4 and the Roll and application processes under s 5-s 8 are not in legal force. Parties should not assume the Act applies until the proclamation day is published and effective.

• Deemed appointments require verification on the Roll. Section 4(1) deems certain pre-commencement notaries to be appointed under this Act, and s 4(2) validates their past acts. However, s 7(1) still requires the Registrar to enter those names and particulars on the Roll. The practical risk is reliance on the deemed status without confirming Roll entries or certificates. For legal certainty, users should verify the Registrar’s Roll or request a certificate under s 8.

• Narrow eligibility concentrates supply. The eligibility requirement that an applicant be an Australian legal practitioner of not less than five years’ standing (s 5(1)(a)) restricts the candidate pool. That restriction can have measurable effects on access and price of notarial services in some districts, because the Court must also be satisfied there is a need for a notary in the applicant’s district (s 5(1)). Where the Court judges there is no need, an otherwise qualified practitioner may be refused.

• “Need for appointment in the district” is discretionary and potentially subjective. The Court must be satisfied of need in the applicant’s practising district (s 5(1)), but the Act supplies no criterion for assessing need. This introduces discretionary decision-making by the Court, with attendant uncertainty for applicants and the risk of inconsistent or uneven availability across districts.

• Extensive delegation to Court rules means many details are unknown until rules are promulgated. The Act repeatedly defers to rules for advertisement, fee, prescribed qualifications, form of oath, particulars on the Roll, certificate form and regulation of practice and discipline (s 5(1); s 12). Until rules are in force, applicants and notaries lack statutory detail on procedure, fees, qualification tests, and inspection logistics.

• Removal from the Roll is tied to other profession rolls. Section 7(4) makes a notary’s inclusion on the Roll contingent on their appearance on local lawyer rolls or the barristers’ roll under the Legal Profession Act 2007. Removal from those external rolls triggers a duty on the Registrar to remove the notary’s name. Practitioners facing discipline in the broader legal profession can therefore lose notarial authority as a statutory corollary, possibly with immediate operational consequences for clients.

• Suspension as an Australian legal practitioner bars notarial acts. Section 11(2)(b) makes it an offence to perform notarial acts while suspended from practice as an Australian legal practitioner. That operates even if the suspension does not specifically mention notarial functions. The practical exposure is that a suspension in the general profession regime can criminalise continuing to perform notarial acts.

• Strict record-based offence. Section 11(1) provides that doing notarial acts in Tasmania when not on the Roll is a criminal offence. That creates a strict dependency on the Roll and certificates. A notary who believes they are lawfully appointed but lacks a current Roll entry or certificate risks criminal sanction.

• Certificates and duplicates hinge on Registrar satisfaction. The Registrar issues certificates on application and may issue duplicates where satisfied of loss, destruction or other reason (s 8(1)-(2)). If the Registrar is not satisfied, the applicant may be unable to obtain documentary proof of authority until the issue is resolved.

• Public inspection particulars are rule-determined. The Registrar must make particulars available for public inspection as prescribed by rules (s 7(2)). The type and extent of particulars to be published could raise confidentiality or privacy issues for notaries; the statute itself permits publication of “prescribed particulars”.

• Cross-border recognition preserved but not defined. Section 9(b) preserves the validity of notarial acts done outside Tasmania, but it does not define what foreign acts qualify or the conditions for recognition. Users should not assume universal equivalence; particular document authentication requirements (eg consularisation, apostille) are not addressed in this Act.

• Penalty expressed as penalty units. The fine maximum is 20 penalty units on summary conviction (s 11(3)). The monetary exposure therefore depends on the current statutory value of a penalty unit. Practitioners must consult the Tasmanian penalties schedule to convert that into currency.

These “gotchas” all flow directly from the statutory text. They largely derive from the Act’s delegations to rules or its linkages to other professional regulatory frameworks, and from strict record-based criminalisation of notarial practice without an up-to-date Roll entry.

To comply with this Act, applicants, practising notaries and institutions that use notarial services should adopt explicit administrative and operational steps matched to the statutory requirements. The following is a practical checklist grounded in the Act’s text.

For prospective applicants (seeking appointment as a notary public)

1. Check eligibility. Confirm you are an Australian legal practitioner with at least five years’ standing, and be ready to evidence good fame and character and competence to act as a notary (s 5(1)(a)-(c)). Identify any additional qualifications that may be prescribed by the Court’s rules (s 5(1)(d); s 12(a)).

2. Prepare the application. Make an application to the Supreme Court (the Court) in the form and manner the rules prescribe. The application must be advertised and accompanied by the fee prescribed by the rules (s 5(1)). Because the Act defers to rules for advertising, fee and forms, obtain the current rules from the Court before lodging an application.

3. Anticipate objections. The Act allows prescribed-form objections to be filed and served, and those objectors may appear in person or by counsel to oppose the application (s 6). Be ready to respond to objections and to appear before the Court.

4. Expect the Court to consider district need. Prepare evidence demonstrating that there is a need for the appointment of a notary public in your practising district to satisfy the Court’s statutory requirement (s 5(1)). Compile local practice data or client need evidence as appropriate.

5. Be aware of possible conditions. The Court may impose conditions on an appointment (s 5(2)). If a conditional appointment is offered, obtain the conditions in writing and ensure compliance planning is in place.

For existing notaries and practising Australian legal practitioners

1. Maintain standing on professional rolls. Keep your name on the roll of local lawyers or the barristers’ roll. If removed from those rolls and not entered on the other, the Registrar must remove your name from the Roll of notaries public (s 7(4)). Understand that disciplinary action in the legal profession can have immediate effects on your notarial authority.

2. Verify Roll entry and obtain a certificate. Confirm that your name and particulars are correctly entered on the Roll (s 7(1)-(2)). Apply for and retain the certificate of appointment issued under the Registrar’s hand and the Court’s seal (s 8(1)). If the certificate is lost or destroyed, apply for a duplicate and be prepared to satisfy the Registrar as to the circumstances (s 8(2)).

3. Do not act unless on the Roll. Ensure you do not perform notarial acts in Tasmania unless your name is on the Roll (s 11(1)). Failure to check or maintain your Roll entry exposes you to a summary offence (s 11(3)).

4. Avoid performing notarial acts while suspended. If suspended from practice as a notary under s 10 or suspended as an Australian legal practitioner, do not perform notarial acts while suspended (s 11(2)(a)-(b)). The prohibition is statutory and carries a criminal sanction.

5. Comply with conditions and practice rules. If the Court imposes conditions on your appointment or as part of discipline, comply with them (s 5(2); s 10(2)). Monitor and follow any rules made under s 12 that regulate professional practice, conduct and discipline.

For institutions and users of notarial services

1. Verify authority. Before relying on a notarial act, confirm the notary’s name appears on the Registrar’s Roll and, where appropriate, request sight of the certificate of appointment (s 7(1)-(2); s 8(1)). Because performing notarial acts without Roll authority is an offence (s 11(1)), institutional reliance on Roll verification reduces legal risk.

2. Be cautious with out-of-State/overseas notarial acts. Section 9(b) preserves the validity of notarial acts done outside Tasmania, but it does not automatically define equivalence for all documents. Confirm the specific form of authentication required for the document’s intended use.

Administrative and compliance monitoring

1. Track Court rules. The judges of the Supreme Court will make rules under s 12 dealing with advertising, fees, qualifications (including completion of specified courses or passing examinations), oaths, particulars on the Roll and regulation of practice. Subscribe to Court rule updates and ensure internal compliance procedures reflect those rules.

2. Maintain records and client notifications. Keep contemporaneous records demonstrating that you were on the Roll at the time of any notarial act, and preserve your certificate. If circumstances change (eg suspension, removal from local roll), promptly notify clients and institutions holding documents notarised by you.

3. Seek prompt legal advice on uncertain questions. Where the rules are silent or a doubt arises about the scope of “need for appointment in the district” or about cross-border validity for a particular instrument, obtain legal advice or approach the Court for guidance. Objections and discipline can be litigated before the Court (s 6, s 10), and proactive clarification reduces downstream risk.

4. Implement internal checks for multi-jurisdictional practice. If a practitioner is performing notarial acts for documents used overseas or in other States, verify that the notarial act meets receiving jurisdictions’ formalities and preserve evidence of compliance with Tasmanian Roll requirements.

Following these steps aligns operational practice with the statutory duties and rights created by the Act and minimises exposure to the criminal offence in s 11 and to Court-based disciplinary action under s 10. Where the statute defers to Court-made rules, compliance requires active monitoring of those rules and administrative adaptation as the rules are promulgated.