ACT Drink Driving Penalties: Fines, Interlock and Awareness Course

ACT drink driving penalties run under the Road Transport (Alcohol and Drugs) Act 1977, with court fines reaching $32,000 at the fixed $160 penalty unit for the top offence tier, a mandatory roadside suspension that reaches even a first-offence low-range reading, and a confirmed statutory reinstatement gate requiring an alcohol or drug awareness course.

Which laws apply and how ACT's offences are structured

ACT spreads its drink and drug driving scheme across three separate instruments, all current for this page: the Road Transport (Alcohol and Drugs) Act 1977 (RTADA), which sets out the offences, penalties and disqualification periods; the Road Transport (General) Act 1999 (RTGA), which holds the roadside immediate-suspension power at section 61B; and the Road Transport (Driver Licensing) Regulation 2000, which sets the alcohol interlock and awareness-course conditions.

For the underlying BAC limits and how the ACT compares nationally, see Australia's drink driving limits by state. This page covers the offence and penalty layer the ACT builds on top of those limits.

The core BAC-tier offence, section 19, uses a defined "level" system:

Level 1 is not an offence at all for an ordinary driver; it only matters for a "special driver." That category is drafted more broadly than most states' equivalent lists: anyone without an Australian or recognised-country licence, a suspended or disqualified person, any learner, provisional, probationary or restricted-licence holder, anyone with an interlock condition on their licence, anyone driving outside what their licence authorises, drivers of vehicles over 15 tonnes gross vehicle mass or combination mass, dangerous-goods-placarded vehicles, public passenger vehicles including taxis and rideshare, light rail vehicles, heavy-vehicle learners, and driving or heavy-vehicle instructors and supervisors while instructing. For a special driver, the prescribed concentration of alcohol is literally more than 0g, true zero tolerance rather than a low nonzero threshold.

Penalties by offence, first vs. repeat

The maxima below are read directly from each RTADA provision and are court maximums, not fixed fines.

s21 is a combined alcohol-and-drug offence, not a drug-only offence; s20 is the drug-only presence offence. Section 23, refusing a blood test, matches the s22/22A/22C refusal group exactly: 100 penalty units ($16,000) or 12 months for a first offender, 200 penalty units ($32,000) or 2 years for a repeat offender, confirmed directly against the Act's text.

Penalty unit value: $160 for an individual, $810 for a corporation, set directly by section 133 of the Legislation Act 2001 and repeated verbatim in the RTADA republication's own front-matter penalties note. This is a fixed figure set by statute, not annually indexed like NT's or Victoria's; the Legislation Act requires only that the Attorney-General review it at least once every 4 years.

Disqualification periods: minimum vs. default

ACT's disqualification tables all follow the same pattern: a default disqualification applies unless the court orders a shorter period, which cannot go below the table's stated minimum.

A genuinely surprising finding, checked directly: the refusal group's default disqualification matches section 24's (under the influence, incapable of proper control) exactly, 2 years first offence and 4 years repeat, and is actually harsher on that default measure than a first-offence level 4 conviction, whose default is only 18 months against refusal's 2-year default. But the two offences are not drafted identically at the minimum a court can go down to: refusal's court-discretion floor is 6 months first offence / 12 months repeat, twice as much downward room as section 24's floor of 12 months first offence / 2 years repeat. The penalty-unit figures match section 24 exactly regardless: a first offender under section 22, 22A or 22C faces 100 penalty units or 12 months, identical to section 24's first-offender figure and higher than level 4's 75 penalty units or 9 months. Refusal in the ACT should be treated as matching the fault-based under-the-influence offence's default periods, not as identically drafted at every point on the table.

Immediate roadside suspension: mandatory, and it reaches a first low-range reading

The roadside-suspension power lives in a different Act from the offences themselves. Section 61B of the Road Transport (General) Act 1999 states that if a police officer believes on reasonable grounds that a person has committed an immediate suspension offence, the officer must give the person an immediate suspension notice, mandatory language triggered by reasonable belief, not by a charge or a conviction. The immediate suspension offence list covers section 19 at every level, including level 2, from the first offence, along with sections 20, 21, 22, 22A, 22C, 23 and 24, carved out only for driver trainers on the section 19/20/21 group. Section 22B, merely failing to stay for a screening test, is not on the list.

This is a broader immediate-suspension trigger than some other jurisdictions use: in the ACT, a first-time level 2 (0.05 to under 0.08) reading gets an on-the-spot suspension the same way a level 4 reading does. The notice must disclose a right to apply to the Magistrates Court for a stay; the ACT's court of first instance for this purpose is named "Magistrates Court" directly in the Act's own text. Time served under an immediate suspension is credited against any eventual court-ordered disqualification.

The mandatory alcohol interlock program

Section 73T of the Road Transport (Driver Licensing) Regulation 2000 sets a narrower interlock trigger than a blanket rule for every conviction. Mandatory interlock applies to a person convicted of section 19(1) only if the court finds the reading was at level 4, the top band, not a blanket rule for every section 19 conviction; or section 21 (combined alcohol and drug, any level); or a section 22, 22C (alcohol) or 23 (alcohol) refusal-related conviction; or an alcohol-related section 24 conviction; or a habitual offender, defined as someone found guilty of an alcohol-related disqualifying offence who has 2 or more other alcohol-related disqualifying offences within the preceding 5 years, counted from a conviction or finding of guilt anywhere (ACT or elsewhere), or from an undisputed infringement notice issued under another jurisdiction's law. A first-offence level 1, 2 or 3 section 19 conviction alone does not trigger mandatory interlock.

The mechanism is built around early eligibility rather than a bolt-on tail after full disqualification: once interlock-eligible, a person may apply for a probationary licence with a compulsory interlock condition once they have served at least half the disqualification period. If they do not apply early, any probationary licence issued after the full disqualification period must still carry the interlock condition unless the person holds an interlock exemption. A person under an interlock condition is themselves a special driver, zero tolerance, for the interlock period.

Before sentencing anyone caught by section 73T, a report must be prepared by the Court Alcohol and Drug Assessment Service (CADAS) assessing whether therapeutic treatment would help, with recommendations to the court under section 73U. What the court can then actually order, and whether completion affects sentence length or disqualification, was not read past the report requirement for this page, so treat the therapeutic-program pathway as confirmed to exist without assuming specific outcomes. No interlock installation or lease cost figure, comparable to another state's fixed fee, was located for the ACT during this page's research.

The alcohol and drug awareness course: a confirmed reinstatement gate

Sections 73C to 73I (alcohol) and 73L to 73R (drugs, a mirrored structure) of the Driver Licensing Regulation create a real, enforceable reinstatement condition, one of the more concrete features in this page's research:

• Not disqualified (section 73C): anyone found guilty of an alcohol-related disqualifying offence who isn't disqualified from driving must complete a road-transport-authority-specified alcohol awareness course within 6 months of the finding of guilt, or the authority must suspend the licence; the suspension lifts once evidence of completion is provided.
• Disqualified, not restricted-licence-eligible (section 73D): the course must be completed before the end of the disqualification period, or the authority must not issue a probationary licence at the end of disqualification, a hard reinstatement gate rather than a fine.
• Disqualified, restricted-licence-eligible (section 73E): if the Magistrates Court has authorised a restricted licence, the road transport authority must not issue it unless the alcohol awareness course is completed first.

Exemptions exist through a separate application and decision process under sections 73G and 73H, which were not read in full for this page.

Drug driving

Section 20 is a pure presence offence: a prohibited drug detected in oral fluid or blood, strict liability, carrying 25 penalty units for a first offence and 50 penalty units or 6 months for a repeat one. Section 21 requires both a prescribed alcohol concentration and a prescribed drug present at the same time, so despite its position next to the drug provisions it is not a drug-only offence. Drug-impaired driving without a companion alcohol reading, to the point of incapacity, falls instead under the alcohol-or-drug-worded section 24, under the influence of intoxicating liquor or of a drug, which lets the prosecution allege alcohol or a drug or both and secure a conviction on whichever the evidence establishes, without needing to specify which substance in the charge. The ACT does not appear, on this page's research, to have a drug-specific standalone impairment offence separate from section 24's general under-the-influence wording.

Vehicle impoundment: no drink driving trigger in any of the three Acts

A direct search of both the Road Transport (Alcohol and Drugs) Act and the Road Transport (General) Act found no mention of vehicle impoundment anywhere in their text. The ACT's vehicle-seizure and forfeiture scheme lives in a third instrument, the Road Transport (Safety and Traffic Management) Act 1999, sections 10A to 10C: up to 3 months' impoundment for a first offender and forfeiture on repeat. That Act's own definition of an impounding offence, in section 10(3), is an exhaustive list of its dangerous-driving and hoon provisions (sections 5A, 5B, 5C, 7 and 8) plus a Road Rules speeding offence; no section of the Road Transport (Alcohol and Drugs) Act appears in it. So a drink or drug driving charge on its own does not trigger vehicle impoundment in the ACT under any of the three Acts, the same outcome as the Northern Territory reaches through its own regulations, though by a different drafting route.

Court process and getting your licence back

Contested matters go to the Magistrates Court, cross-referenced directly in RTADA's own disqualification provisions back to the Magistrates Court Act 1930. A restricted, or work, licence mechanism exists in the Act, and section 73E's own precondition, that the course must be completed before a restricted licence can issue for a disqualified person, confirms the restricted-licence pathway does apply to an alcohol-related drink driving disqualification specifically. The detailed eligibility criteria and waiting periods for that Magistrates Court application were not confirmed for this page.

Reinstatement runs through the disqualification or default period set for the offence, completion of the alcohol or drug awareness course where one applies, and, where mandatory interlock applies, satisfying the interlock condition for the required period before an unrestricted licence is available again.

For related ACT driving-law topics, see the ACT's demerit points system and the Australia driving laws hub.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much is the ACT's penalty unit worth for drink driving fines?

$160 for an individual and $810 for a corporation, fixed directly in section 133 of the Legislation Act 2001. Unlike NT's or Victoria's annually indexed figure, the ACT's penalty unit only changes when the Attorney-General reviews it, which the Act requires at least once every 4 years, so there is no financial-year ambiguity to resolve.

Is refusing a breath test in the ACT punished more harshly than failing one?

Yes on the default period, confirmed directly against the Act's disqualification tables. Refusing a breath, oral fluid or screening test carries a 2-year default disqualification for a first offence, matching the under-the-influence offence's default exactly and exceeding even a first-offence level 4 (0.15 or above) reading's 18-month default. The two offences are not identical at the court's minimum, though: refusal's floor is 6 months for a first offence, versus 12 months for under-the-influence, so a court has more room to go below the default for a refusal conviction.

Will my licence be suspended immediately for a first low-range reading in the ACT?

Yes. Section 61B of the Road Transport (General) Act makes roadside immediate suspension mandatory once an officer reasonably believes an immediate suspension offence has occurred, and the list of immediate suspension offences includes level 2 (0.05 to under 0.08) from the first offence, not only repeat or high-level offences.

Do I need an alcohol interlock after a drink driving conviction in the ACT?

Only in specific circumstances. Mandatory interlock under section 73T of the Driver Licensing Regulation applies to a level 4 conviction, a combined alcohol-and-drug (section 21) offence, a refusal-related conviction, an alcohol-related under-the-influence conviction, or a habitual offender with 2 or more other alcohol-related disqualifying offences in the preceding 5 years. A first-offence level 1, 2 or 3 conviction alone does not trigger it.

Do I have to complete an alcohol awareness course to get my licence back in the ACT?

Yes, if convicted of an alcohol-related disqualifying offence. If not disqualified, the course must be completed within 6 months of the finding of guilt or the licensing authority must suspend the licence. If disqualified, the course must be completed before the disqualification ends or the authority must not issue a new licence.

Can my car be impounded for drink driving in the ACT?

No. None of the three relevant Acts makes drink or drug driving an impounding trigger: the Road Transport (Alcohol and Drugs) Act and the Road Transport (General) Act contain no impoundment power at all, and the Road Transport (Safety and Traffic Management) Act 1999, which holds the ACT's seizure and forfeiture scheme (sections 10A to 10C), lists only dangerous-driving, hoon and speeding offences in its section 10(3) definition of an impounding offence.

Is there a restricted or work licence available in the ACT during a drink driving disqualification?

A restricted-licence mechanism exists in the Act, and section 73E confirms it does apply to an alcohol-related drink driving disqualification specifically (it requires the alcohol awareness course to be completed before such a licence can issue). The detailed eligibility criteria and waiting periods for the Magistrates Court application were not confirmed for this page, so check those directly rather than assuming a figure.