Australian Government: Attorney-General's Department
Australian Government: Attorney-General's DepartmentAchieving a Just and Secure Society

Ongoing professional development

This is the official site of the Australian Marriage Celebrants Program. Anything you read elsewhere that is inconsistent with this site is not accurate.

Finding out about your OPD obligations

This website is the only source of official information for all of your OPD obligations as a Commonwealth-registered marriage celebrant.  Please continue to visit this website regularly.

Essential legislative obligations

The following obligations are provided in subsection 39G(b) of the Marriage Act 1961 and regulation 37M of the Marriage Regulations 1963.

  • Marriage celebrants must undertake five hours of OPD each registration year (1 January to 31 December).
  • OPD consists of compulsory and elective activities.
  • There will be one compulsory activity each year of one hour’s duration.
  • In addition to completing the compulsory activity each year, each marriage celebrant will need to complete elective activities that total a minimum of four hours.
  • OPD activities must be selected from the activities that will be listed on this website soon.

Panel of OPD providers

OPD can only be completed through one of the following registered training organisations on the panel of OPD providers:

  • AssentTECS
  • Australian Celebrations Training, and
  • Gordon Institute of TAFE.

Panel members must be contacted directly to organise completion of your OPD obligations.

Information about the OPD activities available for 2010 and how to contact the members of the panel will be available from this website soon.

Important changes

  • The OPD registration year to complete your OPD now runs from 1 January to 31 December each year.
  • The five year ‘no repeat’ activities rule has been abolished.  This means that you can repeat an activity you have previously completed within the last five years.
  • As mentioned on the Annual Return page, once you have submitted your annual return for the annual registration year of 1 September 2008 – 30 August 2009, you are no longer required to send in an Annual Return. The panel of OPD providers will provide the Registrar with details of marriage celebrants satisfactorily completing OPD.
  • You must undertake the activities through one of the OPD panel members listed on this website.
  • You are no longer able to seek approval for an activity available to you locally to count towards your OPD obligations.
  • The activities must come from the list that will be available on this website soon.

Frequently Asked Questions and Answers – OPD

If you have further questions about OPD, please see Frequently Asked Questions and Answers - OPD [DOC 102KB].