Second draft at Local Laws by the Council that brought you the Lemon Laws

Council have brought the second draft of their local laws document to the December Council meeting and there have been a few notable changes made to the original draft.

Nature strips can be mowed without needing a permit

Council have removed the reference to needing a permit to destroy, damage or remove any VEGETATION so mowing the nature strip will no longer require a permit from Council.

Farmers can be fined for having weeds (new addition)

Council did add in the word noxious weeds meaning that farmers might be issued an infringement notice if someone sees a ragwort on their property and thinks the beast is unsightly.

Bike riding is again permitted

Council removed the bicycle reference to clause 23 about toys being used, placed, or left on a road or in a municipal place. So riding your bike is now allowed again on roads and in municipal places.

Can now sell from home again without needing a permit.

Council removed the clause that stated people were not allowed to sell or offer goods for sale from their private property if the property was adjacent to a road.

So garage sales, selling on ebay, selling at the local market all allowed again without a permit required.

Lemons still not able to be given away to neighbours door to door.

The rule is unchanged as follows:

Without a permit, a person must not:…… (b) distribute any products, services, handbills, flyers or other printed material, on or from any road or municipal place, or from premises to premises, or cause or authorise another person to do so.

So people are still not going to be allowed to hand out leaflets, flyers or bibles to neighbours or door to door deliveries of lemons from your abundant lemon tree.

Grass still must be 300mm but farms are exempt if the grass is for fodder.

Dilapidated buildings wording changed to dangerous buildings

34. (1) An owner or an occupier of private property which is dangerous to the extent that it threatens a person’s or an animal’s life or health, any property or the natural environment must:

This was changed from any building in a dilapidated state that might have not been a danger to anyone.

Keeping of animals

Restrictions on the keeping of animals s40 which applied to some farmland zones has been reworded so the farm zones are exempt as follows:

S40. (3) Sub-clause (1) does not apply to private property located in a Rural Conservation or Rural Living Zone (as defined in the Planning Scheme) if the private property is farm land.

Animal waste

Farmland has been generally made exempt from the animal housing restrictions around waste as follows:

The following clauses no longer apply to farm land.

(ii) all animal food for consumption kept or stored on the private property is kept or stored in a vermin and fly-proof receptacle;
(iii) animal waste is not offensive and does not cause a nuisance to any other person; and
(iv) any animal odour emanated from the private property does not interfere with the immediate amenity of the area.

Droving

Council have reworded this section or maybe it would be more correct to say they swapped clause 1 and 2 over but the effect is the same.

The original draft version said:
Livestock – grazing, droving and movement on a road or municipal place
(1) Without a permit, a person must not cause, allow or undertake the grazing or droving of livestock on a road or on or in a municipal place.
(2) Sub-clause (1) does not apply when the person complies wholly with the Manual for Traffic Control at Stock Crossings (Vic Roads, June 2015), including obtaining all necessary permissions from the relevant road authority

The latest draft version says:
Livestock – grazing, droving and movement on a road or municipal place
(1) A person who causes, allows or undertakes the grazing or droving of livestock on a road or on in a municipal place must comply wholly with the Manual for Traffic Control at Stock Crossings (VicRoads, June 2015), including obtaining all necessary permissions from the relevant road authority.
(2) A person who does not comply or is incapable of complying with sub-clause (1) must not, without a permit cause, allow or undertake the grazing or droving of livestock on a road or on or in a municipal place

It can be clearly seen that clause (1) and (2) have merely been swapped around and reworded but say exactly the same thing.

We therefore decided to look up the manual for stock crossing on Vicroads site ourselves.

On the website it says in big text the following:

This Manual is to be used by farmers, drovers and other people who have a stock crossing permit from a coordinating road authority (VicRoads or municipal Council) – or who are exempted by a local law from the need to have a permit – to have stock on roads or road reserves in Victoria.
So the manual is saying that the manual applies to people with a permit from Council so without a permit, none can comply so everyone must get a permit.

The local law draft then says:
“This clause has been reworded to make it clearer that a permit to graze or drove livestock on a road or in a municipal place is only required if a person is unable to adhere to the conditions in the Manual for Traffic Control at Stock Crossings, including necessary permissions.”

So if the farmer is merely stock crossing the road he must comply with the requirements in the manual for stock crossings BUT he will still need a permit! If he wants to take his stock down the road and into another property he owns he will also need a permit since the manual says droving must comply with Council requirements.

The manual says the following:
“All relevant local law permits must be obtained prior to droving of stock.”

Domestic Bins

The clause stating that bins could not be out for more than 1 day before or after bin collection has been removed and put in the bin.

The Council have put the whole thing out for a further one month over the Xmas/New Year period for the community to have another go. Council might be hoping people get fed up of having to do this again and again only to spot obvious issues that should never have been included in the first or in this case, the second go at drafting these laws.