The Assistant Treasurer, Senator Rod Kemp today announced that the Productivity Commission has been asked to undertake a review of the prices oversight arrangements at airports and report within twelve months.
In 1997 the Government sold the first tranche of Federal airports and announced that the prices oversight arrangements being put in place would only operate for the first five years of private ownership. It was also announced that the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) would undertake a public review, before the end of the first five years, to determine the appropriate form of subsequent prices oversight arrangements. Terms of reference for the ACCC's review were contained in the Pricing Policy Paper issued in 1996 by the Department of Transport and Regional Development.
The Government has subsequently decided that the five year review of prices oversight arrangements at airports will be undertaken by the Productivity Commission rather than the ACCC. There are strong synergies between this review and the Productivity Commission's current review of the Prices Surveillance Act 1983, which provides the framework within which airport prices are regulated. There are also synergies with its current reviews of telecommunications specific competition regulation and access arrangements under Part IIIA of the Trade Practices Act 1974.
The attached terms of reference for the Productivity Commission review draw on the arrangements foreshadowed in the 1996 Pricing Oversight Guidelines. In particular, the terms of reference for the ACCC review have been incorporated, with only minor enhancements and necessary changes, into the terms of reference for the Productivity Commission review.
The Commission will shortly release an issues paper and invite expressions of interest from anyone wanting to participate in the review. All interested parties are encouraged to make submissions to the Commission and attend its public hearings.
MELBOURNE
21 December 2000
Media contacts:
Richard Allsop
Assistant Treasurer’s Office
(03) 9650 7274
Malcolm Greening
Treasury
(02) 6263 2711
Robert Kerr
Productivity Commission
(03) 9653 2293