The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) is Australia’s national maritime regulator and national search and rescue coordination agency. Established as an independent statutory authority under the Australian Maritime Safety Authority Act 1990, AMSA’s mission is to:
- promote maritime safety and protection of the marine environment
- prevent and combat ship-sourced pollution in the marine environment
- provide infrastructure to support safe navigation in Australian waters
- provide a national search and rescue service to the maritime and aviation sectors
- provide, on request, services to the maritime industry on a commercial basis.
This statement outlines AMSA’s approach to delivering our regulatory functions, consistent with AMSA’s Statement of Intent for the period 1 October 2024 to 30 September 2026.
Stakeholder engagement
AMSA uses our stakeholder engagement framework to ensure engagement is consistent, appropriate, comprehensive and meaningful for all stakeholders.
We foster strong relationships to ensure our policy and regulatory development work is informed by the real-world experiences of our regulated community, partner agencies and organisations to encourage higher compliance, improve industry practices and inform future standards.
Clear communication
Clear and transparent communication educates and supports our regulated community to meet their obligations and assists our compliance partners to understand our approach.
- We publish guidance on the legislation we administer to support the regulated community to comply.
- Our National Compliance Plan provides our regulated community and compliance partners with visibility of the compliance areas we will focus our efforts on each year.
- We are transparent about our decision-making and how we exercise our powers to ensure our regulatory approach is clear and accessible to stakeholders.
- Our annual regulatory program communicates planned reviews of regulations and standards to allow the regulated community to engage and shape the changes.
In return, AMSA expects the regulated community to:
- engage openly and honestly when communicating with AMSA
- maintain their understanding of their obligations
- comply with their obligations.
Risk-based, data-driven and proportionate regulation
We focus our attention and resources on higher risk areas when carrying out our regulatory functions.
A risk-based regulatory framework, informed by data, helps us to address safety and environmental risks by focussing our efforts and interventions on high-risk and low-compliance operations.
In carrying out our compliance activities, we will endeavour to ensure that our approach does not unnecessarily impede the efficient operation of the regulated community.
We will achieve this by applying a risk-based, streamlined and proportionate approach to the risks being managed. We encourage our regulated community to proactively identify and manage risks relevant to their operations and comply with all regulatory obligations.
Regulatory performance and continuous improvement
AMSA is committed to regulatory excellence, guided by the Australian Government's Regulator Performance Guide. This involves enhancing transparency, accountability and capability while driving continuous improvement.
We periodically review our regulatory settings, simplify processes and where possible adopt modern outcomes-based practices, balanced against safety and environmental priorities.
We aim to progressively reduce regulatory burdens and support industry innovation by enabling digital transactions and self-service platforms, ensuring operations are convenient and efficient for the regulated community. We may also develop new activities or amend existing ones as the risk environment evolves over time.
Fair and consistent decision making
At AMSA, integrity and fairness are central to our regulatory approach. We operate independently, ensuring our actions are impartial, objective and ethical.
Our commitment to good decision making is reflected in our adherence to principles of fairness, natural justice and procedural equity. We strive to make timely decisions aligned with legislative requirements and equitable outcomes.
Uphold international obligations
AMSA performs its functions in a manner consistent with Australia’s international obligations under the conventions and treaties to which Australia is a party.
We seek to influence international maritime standards and obligations at international forums, including the International Maritime Organization, to ensure Australia’s maritime interests are represented.
Effective interactions with other government bodies and regulators
AMSA works collaboratively with state and territory workplace health and safety authorities and maritime safety bodies, port authorities and other regulators to consider the impact across the sector and ensure the compliance cost of regulation on our regulated community is minimised, consistent with the Australian Government Guide to Policy Impact Analysis.
We also engage with other federal, state and territory agencies on issues under the remit of AMSA and cooperate with Parliamentary Committees and other Commonwealth public accountability mechanisms to achieve our shared objectives.