Gas Supply Act 2003

The distributor is not obliged to provide the customer connection services to a person’s premises in any of the following circumstances—

providing the services—

contravenes a provision of the Petroleum and Gas (Production and Safety) Act or another relevant Act about safety; or

contravenes a provision of the Petroleum and Gas (Production and Safety) Act or another relevant Act about gas measurement or quality; or

would unreasonably interfere with the connection, transport or sale of a covered gas to other customers; or

is denied or limited under an insufficiency of supply direction;

the distributor has asked the person to do any of the following and the person has not complied with the request within a reasonable period—

perform work, or changes to the person’s installation for a covered gas, necessary to allow connection of the distributor’s meter to measure consumption of the covered gas;

provide or maintain access, equipment, facilities, space or anything else reasonably needed for the provision of the services;

the distributor is entitled, under its connection contract or under a regulation, to disconnect customer connection services to the premises;

a circumstance beyond the distributor’s control prevents the distributor from providing the customer connection services.

The obligation ceases during any period in which the provision of the services is disconnected under a connection contract or under a dangerous situation direction under the Petroleum and Gas (Production and Safety) Act.

Also, the obligation does not apply if a regulation states the obligation does not apply.

The obligation is subject to—

any relevant insufficiency of supply declaration or insufficiency of supply direction; and

the retailer of last resort scheme; and

the conditions of the distributor’s relevant distribution authority; and

any relevant provision of a distribution network code about cooling-off periods for the provision of customer connection services.

This section does not prevent the distributor from lawfully providing the customer connection services even though it is not obliged to do so.