NSW government scrubs remaining Covid fines in $5.5m refund

The NSW government will withdraw 25,000 fines issued during the Covid pandemic and refund about $5.5m after fresh legal advice.

Police conduct public health order compliance checks at Bondi Beach in mid-2021. Picture: Getty

The NSW government will withdraw the remaining 25,000 fines issued during the Covid pandemic and refund about $5.5m after fresh legal advice suggested the notices could also be non-compliant with the Fines Act.

In a significant move, which will likely be welcomed by those that paid and those that didn’t, all the 60,000 or so fines issued for breaching public health orders during the pandemic are now null and void.

However, the decision won’t have an effect on Covid fines that are now in front of, or already finalised by, the court system, given that those have been taken out of the government’s oversight.

The Australian understands that NSW fines administration commissioner Scott Johnston, in consultation with the NSW Police, made the decision after new legal advice recommended that the information contained in each notice may not comply with requirements of the Fines Act.

Plainly speaking, each notice didn’t contain enough and all information required under the act when being issued to alleged offenders.

About $5.5m will be refunded to people who fully or partially paid the now-void fines, and Revenue NSW is expected to start contacting customers this week.

It comes after 36,000 penalty notices were withdrawn in 2022.

That withdrawal followed a December 2022 NSW Supreme Court ruling, which found those notices also failed to provide enough information.

Revenue NSW and state police had, until today, refrained from a full withdrawal of the remaining 23,539 penalty notices, which were formulated differently and believed to contain the requisite information to not fall foul of the Supreme Court.

Mr Johnston had told a February budget estimates hearing that Revenue NSW would not withdraw the remaining fines, rather the body would review on a “case-by-case basis”.

The then-premier, Gladys Berejiklian, pictured in mid-2021. Picture: Getty Images

But, since receiving further legal advice, the Revenue NSW believes it now appropriate to withdraw those fines, finding those also would be technically deficient, placing their validity in doubt.

Given the fast-paced social and political environment of the pandemic, affecting both citizens and governments, many of the notices were frequently revised, due to changing public health orders.

The state police were the body responsible for investigating public health order breaches and for issuing fines, while NSW Revenue were responsible for collecting those fines.

It comes after a January NSW Supreme Court judgment found that a $3000 Covid fine issued to a then-homeless woman did not pass the “bare minimum test” after it failed to indicate the relevant act she was being fined under.

The 2022 NSW Supreme Court case was brought by the Redfern Legal Centre, who have campaigned since for the fines’ full withdrawal. Its supervising solicitor, Samantha Lee, said Tuesday’s decision was a “significant win for accountability”.

“(Our) goal has always been to seek justice for all people in NSW who were issued with an invalid fine,” she said.

“The impact of Covid fines on marginalised communities and on children was disproportionate, unreasonable, and unjust.”

In his valedictory speech upon leaving parliament in August, former NSW premier Dominic Perrottet declared that Covid mandates were a “mistake”. He had been treasurer in the Berejiklian government at the time.

“Without dwelling on every decision, I believe it’s important to point out one mistake which was made by governments here and around the world: the strict enforcement of vaccine mandates,” he said in August.