Social Security (Administration) (Exempt Welfare Payment Recipient – Principal Carer of a Child) (Activities) Instrument 2026

This instrument, titled the Social Security (Administration) (Exempt Welfare Payment Recipient - Principal Carer of a Child) (Activities) Instrument 2026, sets out the activities that count for specified subparagraphs of the Social Security (Administration) Act 1999 (the Act). Mechanically, it does four things.

• It brings the instrument into operation the day after registration (s 2, commencement table). The instrument notes that the displayed commencement table is only for the original instrument (s 2(2)).
• It records the statutory authority under which it is made: subsections 123UGD(2) and (3) of the Act (s 3).
• It supplies a set of definitions used by the instrument, including cross‑references to terms defined in the Family Assistance Administration Act, the Social Security Act 1991 and to an external Northern Territory Government record for health and immunisation schedules (s 5).
• It prescribes the kinds and, in some cases, the number of activities that are to be treated as the specified activities for the purposes of particular parts of the Act (ss 6 and 7). Section 6 prescribes the specified activity for a school age child with a terminal condition. Section 7 prescribes specified numbers and kinds of activities for children who are not school age children, with detailed age bands, distinctions for terminal conditions, and separate lists of health related activities and engagement related activities.

The instrument does not itself create or amend parental or carer payments, does not set eligibility for any social security payment, and does not prescribe sanctions or enforcement mechanisms. Rather, it operates as a statutory specification of what counts as a "specified activity" for the Act’s listed subparagraphs. Its legal effect is therefore to narrow or define the factual triggers that an authorised decision‑maker must apply under the Act by reference to the activities and definitions in this instrument (see ss 3, 6 and 7).

The instrument contains no in‑text policy statement or explanatory memorandum. Its authority clause (s 3) and the cross‑references in the definitions (s 5) make clear that the instrument is intended to be read with the Act and with the Family Assistance and Social Security Acts cited. The operational consequence is that decisions under the Act that depend on whether a carer or a child is engaged in a specified activity must rely on the specific activity kinds and counts listed here (ss 6-7), and on the external definitional and evidentiary anchors cited in s 5 (for example the NT Personal Health and Immunisation Record and the statutory definitions in the other Acts).

Instruments of this kind change administrative thresholds and evidentiary points rather than primary entitlements. The principal mechanical effect is to constrain the set of activities that can be counted toward the relevant statutory reference in the Act and to require decision‑makers and claimants to rely on the external documents and statutory definitions that the instrument explicitly incorporates (s 5).

The instrument revolves around a compact set of concepts and cross‑references. Understanding these concepts is necessary to apply the activity specifications in ss 6-7.

• Definitions and cross‑referencing (s 5). The instrument defines terms used in the rest of the text and anchors several definitions to other Commonwealth Acts or to an external Northern Territory record. Key definitional points are:

  • "Act" means the Social Security (Administration) Act 1999 (s 5).
  • "approved child care service" is given the same meaning as subsection 3(1) of the Family Assistance Administration Act (s 5).
  • "Family Assistance Act" and "Family Assistance Administration Act" are defined by name for cross‑reference to the A New Tax System (Family Assistance) legislative scheme (s 5).
  • "program of regular health and development assessments" is explicitly defined to mean assessments provided by treating health professionals and in accordance with the schedule published by the Northern Territory Government known as the Personal Health and Immunisation Record (s 5).
  • "treating health professional" is given the same meaning as subsection 197(1) of the Social Security Act (s 5).
  • "severe disability or severe medical condition" and "terminal condition" adopt the meanings in Part 2.5 of the Social Security Act (s 5).
  • "pre‑school includes kindergarten" (s 5), and "treatment includes care" (s 5).

• Specified activities for school age children with terminal condition (s 6). For the statutory reference in subparagraph 123UGD(1)(b)(iii) of the Act, the instrument specifies a "program of treatment for the terminal condition, provided by one or more treating health professionals" as the specified activity (s 6). That phrase links back to the treating health professional definition in s 5.

• Specified numbers and kinds for non‑school age children (s 7). Section 7 is the substantive schedule for children who are not school age children. It sets a matrix:

  • If a child (other than a school age child) has a terminal condition the specified number is one activity of a kind in subsection (4) (s 7(1)).
  • For children without terminal conditions, the specified number varies by age band and by whether the child is unable to participate in engagement related activities (s 7(2)-(3)), with different outcomes for under‑3s, children aged 3-4, and children aged 4 and over depending on preschool attendance (s 7(2)(a)-(c)).

The instrument operates by specifying the activities that count for particular references within the Social Security (Administration) Act 1999. The text itself names no classes of recipients or statutory payments, but its title and the items it modifies indicate the intended administrative target. From the instrument’s content the following affected parties are identifiable.

• Principal carers of children who are the subject of social security administration decisions under the Act. The instrument is captioned as applying to an "Exempt Welfare Payment Recipient - Principal Carer of a Child", and its substantive provisions (ss 6-7) specify activities relating to children and their treatment, health checks, immunisation and attendance at early‑childhood or school settings. The instrument therefore affects administrative assessments of activity‑based exemptions or qualifications that involve principal carers of children. The instrument does not itself name or establish a payment; it supplies activity specifications for application under the Act (s 3).

• Children whose age and medical status are determinative under the instrument. The instrument distinguishes "school age child" and "child (other than a school age child)" (s 5, s 7). The number and kinds of activities that count depends on the child’s age band (for example under 3, aged 3-4, aged 4 or over and attending pre‑school, or aged 4 or over and not attending pre‑school) (s 7(2)(a)-(c)). It also depends on whether the child has a terminal condition or severe disability/medical condition as those terms are defined in the Social Security Act (s 5, s 7(1)-(3)).

• Treating health professionals. The instrument explicitly relies on treating health professionals to provide programs of treatment and regular health and development assessments (s 5; s 6; s 7(4)(b)-(c)). The definition of "treating health professional" is adopted from subsection 197(1) of the Social Security Act (s 5). When a specified activity is a program of treatment or assessment, the involvement of one or more treating health professionals is a legal predicate for the activity to qualify (s 6; s 7(4)).

• Administrative decision‑makers within the social security system. The instrument is designed to be applied by decision‑makers charged with interpreting and applying the Act. These officers must apply the numerical and categorical tests in s 7 and the program/treatment test in s 6. They must also rely on external definitions and documents referenced in s 5 when assessing whether an activity qualifies. The instrument therefore affects the way those officers exercise administrative discretion in assessing compliance with the Act’s relevant provisions.

This instrument primarily imposes definitional obligations on administrators and evidentiary expectations on carers; it does not itself create explicit positive legal duties or rights outside the Act. The following are the operative duties and rights derived from the instrument’s mechanics and text.

• Duty to apply the specified activities when construing the Act. Decision‑makers administering the Act must treat the activities specified in ss 6 and 7 as the activities relevant to the referenced subparagraphs of the Act (s 3, ss 6-7). That is, where the Act calls for a "specified activity" (for example in subparagraph 123UGD(1)(b)(iii) or paragraph 123UGD(1)(c)), the instrument prescribes what is to be taken as the specified activity.

• Duty to use cross‑referenced definitions and external documents. The instrument requires administrators to apply definitions in other statutes and to treat an external Northern Territory Government record as authoritative for the schedule of health and development assessments. For example, "approved child care service" is to be given the same meaning as subsection 3(1) of the Family Assistance Administration Act, and "program of regular health and development assessments" must be provided in accordance with the Personal Health and Immunisation Record published by the Northern Territory Government (s 5; s 7(4)(b)). Administrators must therefore consult those sources when making decisions.

• Duty to accept treating health professionals as the providers of qualifying programs. The instrument ties qualifying treatment and assessment programs to "one or more treating health professionals" as defined in the Social Security Act (s 6; s 7(4)(b)-(c)). This embeds a gatekeeping role for health professionals: their status as treating health professionals is part of whether a program qualifies.

• Right of a principal carer to rely on specified activities as qualifying evidence. Under the instrument a principal carer may present compliance with any of the listed activities to meet the Act’s referenced activity test. The instrument creates objectively ascertainable categories , immunisation requirements, regular assessments per the NT record, treatment programs by treating health professionals, attendance at approved services for at least eight hours per week, and a list of other engagement activities , which a carer can use to establish compliance with the relevant Act provisions (s 7(4)-(5)).

• Procedural implication tied to the child’s medical status. Where children have a terminal condition the instrument reduces the required number of activities for certain bands (for a non‑school age child with terminal condition the specified number is one activity of a kind mentioned in subsection (4)) (s 7(1)). Where a child has a severe disability or severe medical condition, subsection (3) requires decision‑makers to consider whether the child is "unable to participate" in engagement related activities before applying the default activity counts (s 7(3)). This places on administrators an evaluative task to determine inability based on the Social Security Act’s definitions.

The instrument contains no penalty provisions, no criminal offences, and no administrative sanctions. It does not create new enforcement mechanisms. The text is purely definitional and prescriptive concerning which activities count as specified activities for the purposes of the Act. The consequences for non‑compliance with the Act’s substantive requirements therefore flow from the Act itself rather than from this instrument.

• Absence of penalty clauses. Review of the instrument shows no provisions imposing fines, imprisonment, civil penalties, administrative sanctions, or compliance notices. The instrument neither prescribes enforcement mechanisms nor alters enforcement powers that exist under the Act. Any penalty or enforcement action in relation to a principal carer’s status or obligations remains governed by the Act and any other relevant legislation.

• Enforcement by omission: practical effect. Although the instrument contains no express enforcement provisions, its specification of qualifying activities has enforcement implications in practice. Decision‑makers can treat a principal carer as not meeting the relevant statutory activity requirement if the carer or child does not undertake the specified activities in the required number and kinds (ss 6-7). That administrative finding will typically trigger whatever consequences the Act attaches to failure to meet the relevant activity requirements. The instrument therefore shapes enforcement outcomes indirectly by defining the factual tests that determine compliance.

• Evidence and administrative adjudication. Because the instrument ties qualifying activities to documented events and to specified classes of providers and professionals, it creates a predictable evidentiary framework for administrators to determine compliance. For example, an attendance record showing at least eight hours per week at an "approved child care service" (as defined in the Family Assistance Administration Act) will tend to be accepted as evidence of the engagement related activity in s 7(5)(a), subject to the Act’s procedural rules and any evidentiary standards that decision‑makers apply.

• Reliance on other enforcement powers under the Act. Any decision to apply sanctions, recover payments, or refuse exemptions will be made under the Act’s own enforcement and appeal provisions, not under this instrument. The instrument therefore should be read as changing the inputs to those enforcement decisions rather than the available enforcement outputs.

The instrument operates through explicit cross‑references to the Social Security (Administration) Act 1999, the Social Security Act 1991 and the Family Assistance legislative scheme, and through reference to a Northern Territory Government record. Those cross‑references create direct legal interactions.

• Authority: the instrument is made under subsections 123UGD(2) and (3) of the Social Security (Administration) Act 1999 (s 3). Its legal operation is therefore subordinate to and dependent on the Act. The instrument’s role is to supply content to the Act’s unspecified or delegable elements. Any inconsistency between the instrument and the Act would be resolved under the ordinary rules of statutory interpretation and the limits of delegated legislative power.

• Definitions drawn from other Commonwealth Acts. The instrument adopts or mirrors definitions from other Acts:

  • "approved child care service" is to have the same meaning as in subsection 3(1) of the Family Assistance Administration Act (s 5);
  • "treating health professional" has the same meaning as in subsection 197(1) of the Social Security Act (s 5);
  • "severe disability or severe medical condition" and "terminal condition" are defined by reference to Part 2.5 of the Social Security Act (s 5). These cross‑references make interpretation of the instrument dependent on the text and judicial construction of those other statutes. Administrators must consult those Acts to determine whether a particular service or professional falls within the adopted meanings.

• Interaction with the Family Assistance Act immunisation requirements. The instrument makes meeting "the immunisation requirements (within the meaning of the Family Assistance Act)" a health related activity (s 7(4)(a)). That ties an activity used for family assistance purposes to social security administration by using the Family Assistance Act’s immunisation standard as the benchmark. Consequently, a change to the Family Assistance Act’s immunisation requirements would affect what counts under this instrument without this instrument being amended.

• Reliance on an external Northern Territory schedule. The "program of regular health and development assessments" must be "in accordance with the schedule of health and development assessments for a child of that age, as set out in the record published by the Northern Territory Government and known as the Personal Health and Immunisation Record" (s 5). That incorporates an external government document into the Commonwealth instrument. The cross‑jurisdictional reference means that administrators applying the instrument must accept the NT record as the standard for schedules, at least for the purpose of identifying the content and timing of assessments that qualify.

The instrument’s amendment history within the text is minimal and self‑contained.

• Commencement and original register. Section 2 contains a commencement table specifying that "The whole of this instrument" commences "the day after this instrument is registered." The instrument also includes a note that the table reflects the instrument as originally made and will not be amended in the table to reflect later amendments (s 2). This indicates that, at least as presented, the instrument took effect the day after registration and that any subsequent amendments will not be tracked in the table appearing in the instrument’s published copy.

• Authority for future modification. Section 4 provides that each instrument specified in a Schedule to this instrument is amended or repealed as set out in the applicable items in the Schedule, and that any other item in a Schedule has effect according to its terms. The instrument as provided contains no substantive Schedules; s 4 therefore anticipates that Schedules might be used to make consequential amendments to other instruments if included. The current text contains no such Schedule items.

• No recorded amendments within the supplied text. The instrument as supplied contains no entries indicating later amendments, no repeal clauses, and no historical notes about variations. There is no schedule of amendments, no transitional provisions other than the commencement instruction in s 2, and no savings clauses. The instrument therefore appears to be a standalone specification instrument enacted by reference to the Act without subsequent amending history shown in the text.

• Note about published versions. Section 2(2) notes that column 3 of the table may contain information in published versions and that such information is not part of the instrument. That is a publication caveat and not an amendment history entry.

Users should therefore treat the instrument as having the single recorded commencement date and the text as the operative specification unless later amending instruments are published separately. Any subsequent amendment, repeal or replacement would need to be located in the consolidated legislative database or in later instruments expressly amending this instrument; the text supplied contains no such material.

The instrument itself contains no litigation history. The text does not record any court decisions, references to judicial interpretations, or ongoing litigation. No cases are named in the instrument and there are no footnotes or references to judicial authority. Therefore, based on the instrument’s text, there is no recorded litigation to summarise.

Practical implications of that absence are as follows.

• No reported judicial construction. Because there is no litigation history recorded in the instrument, there is no authoritative judicial construction of the definitional phrases in ss 5-7 within the instrument’s text. Administrative decision‑makers and advisers must therefore apply the instrument’s language directly and will need to look to decisions under the Act, the Family Assistance Act, or the Social Security Act for jurisprudential guidance where relevant. The instrument’s reliance on definitions in those other Acts means that some litigation under those Acts could be relevant to interpretation even if not recorded here.

• Potential for future litigation. The instrument establishes categories and an evaluative determination (for example, whether a child is "unable to participate" in engagement related activities under s 7(3), or whether an activity qualifies under the residual "any other age appropriate activity" in s 7(5)(f)). These features create potential interpretive questions that could be the subject of administrative review or judicial review in future litigation. The instrument, however, contains no record that such disputes have been litigated to date.

• Evidence base for challenges. If litigation arises, the instrument’s explicit cross‑references to other Acts and to the NT Personal Health and Immunisation Record will shape evidentiary and interpretive disputes. Litigants may, for example, challenge whether a particular program is "in accordance with" the NT record, or whether a professional qualifies as a "treating health professional" under the Social Security Act. The instrument’s text provides the legal hooks for those lines of argument, but the instrument itself provides no case law.

In short, there is no litigation history recorded in the instrument. Practitioners should therefore treat interpretation as an administrative matter until case law develops, looking to the Social Security and Family Assistance statutory contexts for established principles.

The instrument’s concise drafting hides several practical traps and sources of administrative uncertainty. These are not normative claims but are direct consequences of how the instrument is drafted and the external materials it imports.

• External documents become binding benchmarks. The instrument requires that "program of regular health and development assessments" be provided in accordance with the schedule set out in the Northern Territory Government’s Personal Health and Immunisation Record (s 5; s 7(4)(b)). That external, jurisdictional document is incorporated as the benchmark for qualifying assessments. If a child’s health assessments follow a different state or territory schedule, a decision‑maker must determine whether the NT record’s schedule has been met. This creates a cross‑jurisdictional evidentiary complication for carers resident outside the Northern Territory.

• Definitions anchored to other statutes mean changing law changes outcomes. The instrument uses statutory definitions from the Family Assistance Administration Act and the Social Security Act (s 5). Any future amendments to those Acts, or judicial interpretations of their definitions, will alter how the instrument operates without this instrument being amended. Practitioners should therefore track changes in those linked statutes.

• Minimum hours requirement for childcare attendance. The instrument specifies that attendance at an approved child care service must be "for at least 8 hours per week" to count as an engagement related activity (s 7(5)(a)). Attendance below that threshold will not qualify under that subparagraph, which may be a decisive detail for carers relying on part‑time childcare arrangements.

• Open‑ended residual category. Subsection 7(5)(f) includes a wide residual category: "any other age appropriate activity that is designed to promote the child’s social, emotional, mental or physical development." That phrase is broad and evaluative. Decision‑makers will exercise judgment in determining what activities meet that description, which creates potential inconsistency and administrative discretion. Carers and service providers may face uncertainty as to whether bespoke programs qualify.

• Medical status triggers and evidentiary complexity. Subsection 7(3) makes the alternative activity counts contingent on a determination that the child "has a severe disability or severe medical condition" as defined in Part 2.5 of the Social Security Act and that, because of that condition, the child "is not able to participate in any of the kinds of activities mentioned in subsection (5)" (s 7(3)). This two‑stage test requires both a legal medical classification and an operational determination of inability to participate. Practically this will require medical documentation and likely professional assessment, which may be administratively burdensome and time‑sensitive.

Compliance under this instrument is about producing the right kinds of evidence and ensuring activities meet the specified categories and counts set out in ss 6-7. The instrument does not provide procedural rules or forms, so compliance focuses on aligning behaviour and documentation with the instrument’s text and the external materials it imports.

• Map the child to the correct category and age band. Determine whether the child is a "school age child" as that term is defined in section 123TC of the Act (the instrument references that term in s 5), or whether the child is "other than a school age child" for the purposes of s 7. For a child who is not a school age child, identify the correct age band: under 3; aged 3 or over but under 4; aged 4 or over and attending pre‑school; or aged 4 or over and not attending pre‑school (s 7(2)).

• Establish medical status where relevant. If the child may be classified as having a terminal condition or a severe disability/severe medical condition, obtain appropriate documentation from treating health professionals. The instrument ties the medical terms to Part 2.5 of the Social Security Act (s 5). For the "unable to participate" test in s 7(3), you will need documentation establishing both the legal classification in Part 2.5 and that the child cannot participate in the engagement related activities listed in s 7(5).

• Use treating health professionals for qualifying programs. Where a qualifying activity is a "program of treatment" or a "program of regular health and development assessments," ensure those programs are provided by one or more treating health professionals, as defined in subsection 197(1) of the Social Security Act (s 5; s 6; s 7(4)(b)-(c)). Documentation from the treating health professional describing the nature, frequency and purpose of the treatment or assessment will be the primary evidence.

• For health related activities, collect the right documentary evidence.

  • Immunisation: satisfy the immunisation requirements "within the meaning of the Family Assistance Act" and retain records showing immunisation status consistent with the Family Assistance Act’s standards (s 7(4)(a)).
  • Regular assessments: ensure any health and development assessments are delivered in accordance with the NT Personal Health and Immunisation Record schedule and retain documentation showing dates and scope of assessments (s 5; s 7(4)(b)).
  • Treatment programs: retain clinical notes, referral letters or statements from treating health professionals confirming participation in the treatment program (s 6; s 7(4)(c)).