Extending the Legal Deposit Regime to Digital Material – Regulation Impact Statement – The Attorney General’s Department

25 May 2015

On 29 October 2014 the Government introduced the Civil Law and Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2014. A part of this Bill changes the legal deposit requirements. Legal deposit is a requirement under section 201 of the Copyright Act 1968 that publishers deposit a copy of library material to the National Library of Australia (NLA). This requirement currently applies to material that is in print form, published in Australia, and in which copyright subsists. The proposal will enable the NLA to meet its statutory function of providing a comprehensive collection of publications relating to Australia and the Australian people. Currently if a publisher publishes relevant documents in digital-only form they do not need to deposit that material with the NLA. Given the increase in digital-only publications over recent years there is concern that the record of Australia’s cultural heritage held by the NLA is being eroded. There are two main parts to the changes. Digital-only material needs to be provided to the NLA subject to other carve-outs and hard-copy material can be provided in soft-copy format. The need to provide digital only material will increase costs to industry, while the ability to substitute soft-copy for hard-copy material will reduce costs to industry. It is estimated that regulatory costs will be reduced by $125,000 per annum. A Regulation Impact Statement (RIS) was prepared by the Attorney General’s Department and assessed as compliant and consistent with best practice by the Office of Best Practice Regulation (OBPR).