Treasury Laws Amendment (Energy Price Relief Plan) 2022

✦ Plain-English Summary

# Treasury Laws Amendment (Energy Price Relief Plan) 2022

## What it does
The government is giving itself new powers to regulate Australia's gas market and control gas prices when they spike too high. It creates new rules (a "gas market code") that gas companies must follow, plus emergency powers to impose price orders if the market gets out of control.

## Why it matters
Gas prices had shot up dramatically, hitting household bills and businesses hard. This law is designed to stop that happening again by letting the government step in directly if prices climb too steeply.

## Key details
- **The gas market code**: The government will write detailed regulations that gas companies have to obey. Breaking these rules can result in civil penalties (fines).
- **Emergency price orders**: If prices spike dangerously, the government can issue emergency orders to cap or control them without waiting for normal parliamentary processes.
- **When it starts**: The law came into effect the day after it received Royal Assent (basically immediately). It also includes separate bills providing temporary energy bill relief payments to households and businesses.

Official Description

Amends the: Competition and Consumer Act 2010 to: establish regulation-making powers in relation to dealings between persons who supply or acquire a gas commodity, dealing with and resolving disputes or complaints between persons who supply or acquire a gas commodity, and gas market emergency price orders; enable the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission to order the production of certain information and documents, investigate suspected non-compliance and utilise a range of sanctions for non-compliance; provide for civil penalty provisions of gas market instruments; and prohibit schemes designed to avoid the application of a civil penalty provision of a gas market instrument; and Federal Financial Relations Act 2009 to introduce a payment to states and territories to support temporary energy bill relief for households and small businesses.

Committee Referrals

Senate Standing Committee for the Scrutiny of Bills

Full bill PDF →APH page →

Audit History

Introduced

15 Dec 2022

Last updated on APH

10 Apr 2026

Outcome date

16 Dec 2022

Last checked by Crossbench

yesterday

Full text indexed

yesterday

🗳️

No formal division recorded

This bill passed by voice vote — parliament agreed without calling a formal count. A division is only recorded when a member explicitly requests one.

Constituent votes

Voting is closed — this bill has been decided by parliament.

No votes yet.

No votes were recorded for this bill.

🔒 Voting closed — this bill has been decided by parliament