Productivity Commission

Economic regulation of harbour towage and related services

Inquiry report

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Contents

  • Preliminaries
    • Cover, Copyright, Signing Page, Terms of reference, Contents
  • Overview
    • Key points, Overview, Recommendations and findings
  • 1   Introduction
    • 1.1   Background
    • 1.2   Scope of the inquiry
    • 1.3   The Commission's approach
    • 1.4   Conduct of the inquiry
    • 1.5   Report structure
  • 2   Harbour Towage and its market
    • 2.1   The Australian harbour towage industry
    • 2.2   Industry performance
    • 2.3   Related services
  • 3   Reform of harbour towage and the port environment
    • 3.1   Towage reforms
    • 3.2   Reform of the port environment
  • 4   The regulatory environment for harbour towage
    • 4.1   Commonwealth regulation
    • 4.2   State government prices oversight
    • 4.3   Towage guidelines
    • 4.4   Pilotage
    • 4.5   Training and qualifications of tug crews
    • 4.6   Licencing and contracting of towage providers by port authorities
    • 4.7   Port safety
    • 4.8   Other services
  • 5   Port authority governance
    • 5.1   Reforms of port authorities
  • 6   Market power in harbour towage and related services
    • 6.1   Introduction
    • 6.2   Competition in the supply of harbour towage services
    • 6.3   Other determinants of market power
    • 6.4   Indicators of current market power in towage
    • 6.5   Market power in related services
  • 7   Options for economic regulation of harbour towage
    • 7.1   Notification procedures
    • 7.2   Notifications by harbour towage operators
    • 7.3   Assessment of notification of harbour towage services
    • 7.4   Prices oversight options
    • 7.5   Access and general competition law
  • 8   Options for increasing competition in the provision of harbour towage
    • 8.1   Generating competition 'within' the market
    • 8.2   Generating competition 'for' the market
    • 8.3   Issues with competitive tendering
  • 9   The Commission's assessments and recommendations
    • 9.1   Is economic regulation needed?
    • 9.2   Competitive bidding, contracts and licences
    • 9.3   Should price regulation continue?
    • 9.4   Economic regulation of related services
    • 9.5   Concluding remarks
  • A   Public consultation
  • B   Efficient pricing of harbour towage
  • C   International regulatory arrangements
  • D   Port ownership and governance
  • E   Competitive tenders, contracts and licences
  • F   Links between harbour towage and salvage capability
  • References

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Productivity Commission acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we live and work, and we pay our respects to Elders past and present.

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