Gas (Amendment) Act, 2000

Conferral of powers of compulsory acquisition, etc. under Principal Act on certain persons.

20.—(1) In this section, “relevant person” means—

(a) save to the extent that this section has application to section 26 of the Principal Act, a person—

(i) in respect of whom the Minister has imposed a requirement under section 40(2)(a) of the Principal Act, or

(ii) who has obtained the consent of the Minister under section 40(1) of the Principal Act,

in relation to the construction or operation of a pipeline,

(b) to the extent that this section has application to the said section 26, a person who has notified the Minister in writing of his or her intention to give a notice or make an application for the Minister's consent under section 40(1) of the Principal Act in relation to the construction or operation of a pipeline and in respect of which notification the Minister provides a certificate to the person, after having made such inquiries, if any, as the Minister thinks appropriate, stating that the notification demonstrates a bona fide intention on the part of that person to give such a notice or make such an application.

(2) The powers conferred by the provisions of the Principal Act referred to in subsection (3) shall, in addition to being exercisable by the Board, be exercisable by a relevant person and those provisions shall otherwise apply to such a person as they apply to the Board and, accordingly, on and from the passing of this Act, each reference in those provisions to the Board shall be construed as including a reference to a relevant person.

(3) The provisions of the Principal Act mentioned in subsection (2) are: sections 26, 27 and 31, section 32 (other than subsection (1) or subsection (1A) (inserted by this section)), section 33 and the Second Schedule.

(4) Section 26(1) of the Principal Act is amended—

(a) by the substitution in paragraph (a) of “under this Act” for “for a purpose of this Act”,

(b) by the substitution in paragraph (b) of “over the land,” for “over the land.”, and

(c) by the addition of the following paragraphs:

“(c) if the purpose, or one of the purposes, for which any such land or right is being so acquired or is being considered for such acquisition, is in connection with the construction or operation of a pipeline, for carrying out thereon any investigation or examination preliminary or incidental to the making of an application for consent under section 8(7) or 40(1) of this Act or, as the case may be, the giving of previous and reasonable notice under the said section 40(1), in relation to that construction or operation, and

(d) in case the land is in the vicinity of land which, or a right over which, is being so acquired or is being considered for such acquisition and the doing of any of the things referred to in paragraph (a), (b) or (c) of this subsection in respect of that land or right cannot be accomplished without entering on the first-mentioned and in this paragraph and, as the case may be, doing thereon any thing necessary to ensure a thing as aforesaid is accomplished, for those purposes.”.

(5) Section 32 of the Principal Act is amended by the insertion of the following subsection after subsection (1):

“(1A) A relevant person (within the meaning of section 20 of the Gas (Amendment) Act, 2000) may apply to the Minister for an order under this section (which order is in this Act also referred to as an ‘acquisition order’) to acquire compulsorily any land or right over land which is required by the relevant person in connection with the construction or operation of the pipeline concerned referred to in the said section 20 and, subject to the following provisions of this section, the Minister may make an acquisition order in relation to the land or right over land.”.