Part A – Effective Date 1 September 2007

Amendments to the Standard for the Uniform Scheduling of Drugs and Poisons

The National Drugs and Poisons Schedule Committee directs that the amendments below be applied to the Standard for the Uniform Scheduling of Drugs and Poisons No.22 and recommends that these amendments be adopted by the States and Territories with effect from 1 September 2007 unless otherwise stated. The amendments arise from decisions made by the Committee at its February 2007 meeting and confirmed at the June 2007 meeting except where separately specified.

Principles of Scheduling

READING THE SCHEDULES – Amend section to read:

Schedule entries have been designed to be as simple as possible while retaining readability, legal integrity and as much freedom from ambiguity and contradiction as possible. As a result they are expressed in a number of ways, though this number has been kept to a minimum. It is necessary to keep this variety of expression in mind when searching or interpreting Schedule entries.

Firstly, poisons are now scheduled individually using their approved names wherever practicable although exceptions are necessary in some cases. Some of those are mentioned overleaf. Older group entries are being revised and replaced by individual entries as time permits although in some of these cases a group term has also been retained to deal with any members of the group or class that may have escaped attention but should be scheduled.

Secondly, schedule entries have been expressed in either positive or negative terms and care must be taken to distinguish between the two different forms of expression. Thus, selenium is in Schedule 6 only when one of the clauses in this schedule entry applies, while fluorides are in Schedule 6 unless one of the exempting clauses applies.

Where exceptions are included in an entry these have been emphasised by printing the word “except” in bold type.

Where the schedule entries for a poison make a specific exclusion or exemption, the requirements of this Standard do not apply to that poison within the constraints of that exclusion or exemption although controls under other legislation such as pesticide registration may apply.

Where a poison has been included in more than one Schedule the principal entry, where practicable, has been included in the most restrictive Schedule with references to the other Schedule(s) involved.

It is important to remember that a Schedule entry includes preparations containing the poison in any concentration and all salts and derivatives of the poison unless it specifically states otherwise. (See Interpretation PART 1 [paragraph 1(2)]).

It is important to note that a substance is not classed as a derivative on the basis of a single, prescriptive set of criteria. Classification of a substance as a derivative of a Scheduled poison relies on a balanced consideration of factors to decide if a substance