National Licensing for Property Occupations Consultation Regulation Impact Statement

Notification

Prior to the commencement of national licensing for property occupations, licensees will be advised by letter of the national licence they will hold following commencement. Licensees will have the opportunity to discuss any concerns they may have with their proposed national licence. It should be noted that current state and territory licences will be considered national licences when licensing commences for that occupation.

1. Issuing of new national licence documentation

Under the option for national licensing, it is proposed that national licences will be provided to licensees at the time of renewal (rather than on commencement of national licensing). However, some jurisdictions may have the capacity to issue new licence documentation to all licensees on the commencement date of national licensing. Licensees will be advised by their jurisdictional regulator as to when a national licence document will be made available.

Most licence holders will retain their existing licence document until its expiry date. On renewal, a national licence document would then be issued.. It is proposed that licensees who have had changes to their licence category will be written to prior to the commencement of national licensing to confirm their licence category. Licensees would be issued with a national licence document at the commencement of national licensing. It is anticipated that licensees who wish to obtain a national licence before the renewal date should be able to do so; however, this may be subject to the capacity of each jurisdiction to provide this service.

A new national licence numbering scheme is proposed where a unique national licence number would be assigned to each licensee that transitions to national licensing and to each new licensee after the system commences. The national system would identify each entity once only in the licensing database. It is also proposed that an individual, partnership or company should be able to hold multiple occupational licence categories under this single national licence number.

The proposed national licensing register would have the capacity to search for a licensee’s new national licence number and all previously generated licence numbers.

There will be a five-year transitional period to national licensing, by which time all licensees would be required to use their national licence number for advertising, marketing and identification purposes, and a licensee’s previous state or territory licence number, cards and certificates could no longer be used.

1. Format of licence documentation

A combination of cards and certificates are currently issued by the jurisdictions. It was observed that the quality of cards and certificates varies greatly between jurisdictions. Commonly for property licensees only a certificate is produced. Cards for the other occupations vary greatly, ranging from laminated cardboard to high-quality cards produced to a similar standard to a driver’s licence with photo identification.

The National Law allows for an approved form of a national licence. One option proposed that the licensing authority or its delegates (existing jurisdictional regulators) would issue:

a licence card (similar to a driver’s licence in size and content) for identification purposes when engaging with members of the public, employers or regulators

a licence certificate to corporate entities.

Currently most jurisdictions, for some of the occupations, can issue a licence card with a photo. For example, Victoria, Queensland and the Northern Territory issue licence cards with photos for the plumbing occupations only. South Australia and Tasmania issue them to all the trade occupations. However, under national licensing the licensing authority would set the minimum requirements for standard national licence documents and jurisdictions would be required to issue national licences that comply with the requirements.

Note that the inclusion of photo identification on an individual’s licence card would most probably increase the cost of a licence where it is not currently provided by state-based regulators. It is possible that the cost of a photo licence could be minimised with the economy of scale of all participating jurisdictions.

Communication strategy for national licensing

Consultation about national licensing has been ongoing with a range of stakeholders including state and territory governments, industry, employer and employee representatives and internal working groups.

As with any change to regulations, a communication awareness campaign will need to be undertaken to ensure licensees, consumers and other stakeholder are informed of changes that may affect them once the new system is implemented.

There should be two levels of an awareness campaign for national licensing; one at a jurisdictional level and one at a national level.

A jurisdictional campaign could include the following activities:

direct communications (letters/emails)

metropolitan and regional meetings with licensees

website content and social media

temporary call centre staffing

public information campaign

industry and public campaign management.

An estimate drawing on a Victorian campaign of a similar scale to that suggested above is approximately $300,000 to $350,000, and is based on approximately 22,000 licensees. The impact analysis contained in this Consultation Regulation Impact Statement includes a qualitative estimate of the communication costs for governments during the transition period.

At a national level, the licensing authority would assist with the communication process by ensuring consistency of messaging through its website (www.nola.gov.au), media releases and other media and social avenues. The licensing authority’s chair and board could be expected to consult with:

ministers and governments

business and industries

peak bodies, which would include employee and employer associations.