Mining Act 1992

The Secretary may assess the amount of the security deposit that may be required by a security deposit condition for a particular authorisation or, in the case of a group security deposit, for a particular group of authorisations.

The amount of the security deposit as assessed by the Secretary is the assessed deposit for the authorisation or authorisations concerned.

The Secretary must make an assessment if the regulations require an assessment to be made.

The Secretary may make an assessment at any other time—

at the request of the decision-maker, or

on the Secretary’s own initiative.

An assessment, and a decision to make or request an assessment, may be made without prior notice to, or consultation with, the holder of an affected authorisation.

The Secretary must make an assessment under this section having regard to the following—

the estimated cost of fulfilling any obligations under the authorisation or authorisations concerned, including obligations under the authorisation that may arise in the future,

other matters, if any, prescribed by the regulations.

An assessed deposit must not be less than—

for a group security deposit—the amount prescribed by or calculated in accordance with the regulations,

for another security deposit—the minimum deposit for the authorisation.

After an assessment is made, the Secretary must give written notice of the assessment—

to the holder of an affected authorisation, and

to the decision-maker (if not the Secretary).

The notice given to the holder of an affected authorisation must—

set out the reasons for the Secretary’s assessment, and

advise the holder of the holder’s entitlement to apply for a review of the assessment under this Part.

The Secretary is to exercise his or her functions under this section having regard to any guidelines approved by the Minister.

An assessment by the Secretary under this section does not affect—

the validity of any security deposit condition imposed or varied before the assessment was made, or

liability for an administrative levy that arose before the assessment was made.

The Secretary may revise his or her assessment under this section. For that purpose, the Secretary may amend, revoke or replace a previous assessment.

This section applies in respect of the revision of an assessment in the same way as it applies in respect of an assessment.

An assessment may be made in relation to a security deposit condition proposed to be imposed on the grant of an authorisation and, for that purpose, a reference in this section, and in sections 261BD and 261BE, to a holder of an authorisation is taken to include a reference to a person who, on grant, will be a holder of an authorisation.