Links to sources for Legislative Instruments (including regulations and court rules), with scope notes and search tips. See also which version of the legislation do I need?
Note on historical terminology:
Statutory Rules [SR] 1904-2004
“Statutory rules or SRs included all Regulations made under an Act of Parliament, rules of court and certain other instruments required to be printed under the Statutory Rules Publication Act 1903. The Act, and therefore the Statutory Rules series, ceased on 1 January 2005. In 2005, instruments that would have been included in the Statutory Rules series were numbered in the Select Legislative Instrument (SL) series. This SL series was discontinued at the end of 2015.” (Source: Federal Legislation Register glossary)
Select Legislative Instruments [SLIs] 2005-2015
“The Select Legislative Instrument Series was a numbering series applied to instruments made by the Governor-General that consisted mostly of Regulations and Rules of Court. This series started after the repeal of the Statutory Rules Publication Act 1903 on 1 January 2005. SLIs [are] available on the Legislation Register up to the end of 2015 after which time SLI numbering was ceased.” (Source: Federal Legislation Register glossary)
Most databases only provide access to regulations and court rules, commonly labelled as ‘Regulations‘. Only the Federal Register of Legislation provides access to all legislative instruments.
Current Commonwealth Legislative Instruments
Current versions of Legislative Instruments, i.e. with amendments consolidated into the text.
| Federal Register of Legislation – Regulations and Court Rules |
- Coverage: Regulations and court rules.
- Browse by title or use the search box in the top menu bar to find current regulations and rules.
- To search full text, use the advanced search. Change the default setting in the ‘choose contents’ menu to ‘full text including title and description’ and then select ‘Regulations and Court Rules’ in the ‘choose type(s)’ menu.
- To find the instruments made under a particular Act, locate the Act, click on the ‘View Series’ link, then click on the ‘Enables’ tab.
- Items marked with the ‘tick’ logo are authorised (pdf version only; access via the ‘download’ menu).
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| Federal Register of Legislation – all Legislative Instruments |
- Coverage: all Legislative Instruments
- Browse by title or use the search box in the top menu bar to find current regulations and rules.
- To search full text, use the advanced search. Change the default setting in the ‘choose contents’ menu to ‘full text including title and description’ and then select ‘Legislative Instruments’ in the ‘choose type(s)’ menu.
- To find the instruments made under a particular Act, locate the Act, click on the ‘View Series’ link, then click on the ‘Enables’ tab.
- Items marked with the ‘tick’ logo are authorised (pdf version only; access via the ‘download’ menu).
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| Lawlex |
- Coverage: Regulations and court rules (i.e. not all legislative instruments)
- Type in the name of the instrument in the ‘keywords’ field and the year in the ‘year from’ field. Set the jurisdiction to ‘COM’ and the document type to ‘principal Regulation’.
- Each instrument on Lawlex has a ‘home page’ – click on the title to go to the current version of the instrument on the Federal Register of Legislation.
- You can also browse legislation by subject. Use the check boxes to limit by jurisdiction.
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| Legify |
- Coverage: Regulations and court rules (i.e. not all legislative instruments)
- Type in the name of the instrument – matching titles will appear as you type. Click on the relevant item to be taken directly to that instrument on the Federal Register of Legislation.
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| AustLII |
- Coverage: Regulations and court rules (i.e. not all legislative instruments)
- Browse alphabetically or use the search box to find current regulations / rules.
- The search box defaults to ‘this database only’ and ‘full text’. You can change this setting to ‘titles only’ by clicking on the arrow on the left hand side of the search box.
- An advanced search option is also available.
- You can also search the full text of particular regulation / rule – once you have located an item, the search box default changes to ‘this legislation only’.
- Check the update status for legislation page to see how frequently the database is updated.
- Once you are viewing an individual provision of a regulation / rule, click on ‘note-up’ to find cases and commentary referring to that provision.
- Classic AustLII is still available. Use the ‘name search’ to search the titles and the ‘database search’ to search the full text. PDF / RTF versions are available in the ‘download’ tab.
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Commonwealth Legislative Instruments as made
| Federal Register of Legislation – Regulations and Court Rules |
- Coverage: 1904 onwards
- Browse by title or by year and number.
- Items marked with the ‘tick’ logo are authorised (pdf version only; access via the ‘download’ menu).
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| Federal Register of Legislation – all Legislative Instruments |
- Coverage: 2005 onwards, plus selected earlier instruments (mostly regulations and court rules)
- Browse by title or registration date.
- Items marked with the ‘tick’ logo are authorised (pdf version only; access via the ‘download’ menu).
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| AustLII |
- Coverage: Regulations 1979 onwards
- Browse alphabetically or use the search box to find regulations / rules.
- The search box defaults to ‘this database only’ and ‘full text’. You can change this setting to ‘titles only’ by clicking on the arrow on the left hand side of the search box.
- Classic AustLII is also available. Use the ‘name search’ to search the titles and the ‘database search’ to search the full text. PDF / RTF versions are available in the ‘download’ tab.
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| Legislation tables |
- Table of Select Legislative Instruments / Statutory Rules from 1903-2015, arranged alphabetically under the short titles of enabling Acts.
- Commencement information for Select Legislative Instruments / Statutory Rules from 1992 onwards.
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Point-in-time Commonwealth Legislative Instruments (historical versions)
| Federal Register of Legislation – Regulations and Court Rules |
- Coverage: 2005 onwards
- Locate the current version of the regulation / rule, then click on the ‘view series’ link to see all historical versions of that title.
- If the relevant regulation / rule has been repealed, use the ‘Legislative Instruments no longer in force’ screen instead, (has the same ‘view series’ functionality). Select ‘Regulations and Court Rules’ in the ‘classified as’ menu.
- Regulations / rules marked with the ‘tick’ icon are authorised (pdf version only; click ‘download’ to access).
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| Federal Register of Legislation – all Legislative Instruments |
- Coverage: 2005 onwards
- Locate the current version of the legislative instrument, then click on the ‘view series’ link to see all historical versions of that title.
- If the relevant regulation / rule has been repealed, use the ‘Legislative Instruments no longer in force’ screen instead, (has the same ‘view series’ functionality).
- Items marked with the ‘tick’ icon are authorised (pdf version only; click ‘download’ to access).
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| Lawlex |
- Coverage: 2005 onwards
- Type in the name of the Regulation in the ‘keywords’ field and the year in the ‘year from’ field. Set the jurisdiction to ‘COM’ and the document type to ‘principal Regulation’. If the Regulation has been repealed, select ‘include repealed / failed legislation’.
- Each Regulation on Lawlex has a ‘home page’ – click on the ‘historical versions’ link to go to historical versions of the Regulation on the Federal Register of Legislation.
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| Legislation tables |
- Legislation reprinted in hard copy. Gives details of the latest paper reprint of each instrument. Paper reprints are useful when the online compilations do not go back far enough.
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Repealed Commonwealth Legislative Instruments
| Federal Register of Legislation – Regulations and Court Rules |
- Coverage: selected repealed regulations and court rules (approx. 2005 onwards)
- Browse by title or use the ‘filter results’ feature (enter phrase from the title).
- To search full text, use the advanced search. Change the default setting in the ‘choose contents’ menu to ‘full text including title and description’ and then select ‘Regulations and Court Rules’ in the ‘choose type(s)’ menu. You can also set a date range.
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| Federal Register of Legislation – all Legislative Instruments |
- Coverage: selected repealed regulations and court rules (approx. 2005 onwards)
- Browse by title or use the ‘filter results’ feature (enter phrase from the title).
- To search full text, use the advanced search. Change the default setting in the ‘choose contents’ menu to ‘full text including title and description’ and then select ‘Legislative Instruments’ in the ‘choose type(s)’ menu. You can also set a date range.
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| Lawlex |
- Coverage: selected repealed regulations and court rules.
- Type in the name of the regulation in the ‘keywords’ field and the year in the ‘year from’ field. Set the jurisdiction to ‘COM’ and the document type to ‘principal Regulation’. Select ‘include repealed / failed legislation’.
- Each regulation / rule on Lawlex has a ‘home page’ – click on the title to go to the item on the Federal Register of Legislation.
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| AustLII |
- Coverage: selected repealed regulations.
- Browse by title. You can also use the ‘name search’ to search for Regulation titles (useful if you have incomplete information).
- Use ‘database search’ to run a full text search.
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Explanatory Statements for Commonwealth Legislative Instruments
Last updated: 23 March 2019
