Statutes Amendment Bill (No 2); and Bills Therefrom

I move, That the Biosecurity Amendment Bill (No 3), the Cadastral Survey Amendment Bill (No 2), the Crimes Amendment Bill (No 2), the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Amendment Bill (No 2), the District Courts Amendment Bill (No 4), the Fisheries Amendment Bill, the Historic Places Amendment Bill (No 2), the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 2), the National Parks Amendment Bill, the New Zealand Horticulture Export Authority Amendment Bill, the Radiocommunications Amendment Bill (No 4), the Reserves Amendment Bill, the Summary Proceedings Amendment Bill (No 3), and the Veterinarians Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank members of the Government Administration Committee, who have been instrumental in the passage of this Statutes Amendment Bill (No 2). I would also like to place on record my gratitude to the officials who work very hard on Statutes Amendment bills. They are an important vehicle. They cover a wide range of subject matters, and some of them involve some unique challenges. This particular bill contained amendments to some 14 Acts, covering subject areas as diverse as biosecurity, fisheries, district courts, the regulations of veterinarians, and the criminal law.

I guess that although statutes contained in Statutes Amendment bills do not by their nature address significant policy issues, the bills do provide a regular vehicle for minor, non-controversial, and technical amendments required to keep our statute book up to date. Of course, none of these amendments would have received the necessary priority in the House if they were stand-alone measures. However, gathered together in a Statutes Amendment Bill they assist in achieving an aim of all parliamentarians, and that is to keep the law up to date, accurate, and user-friendly.

I would again like to thank committee members and members of the House tonight for all their time and effort, and again I acknowledge the many officials who have contributed to the passage of this legislation. I commend these bills to the House.

It is with pleasure that I rise again in support of the Statutes Amendment Bill (No 2). As the Minister of Commerce spelt out in the second reading, the bill went to the Government Administration Committee for consideration.

There was one interesting submission that I would like to briefly touch on. It came from a Wellington-based lawyer, Graham Edgeler, who raised a concern about the amendment in clause 27 of Part 7—which is the part that modifies the Historic Places Act 1993—that was potentially on the cusp of what would have an impact in a Statutes Amendment Bill. He said he was a person interested in legislation and procedure, and he raised with the committee that he considered it was stepping slightly over the line. The committee took advice on that and it was our conclusion that it did not, but that it did get close to it. I raise that with the Minister in the House today.

Mr Edgeler said that Statutes Amendment bills are legislative procedures and although they involve the same parliamentary scrutiny as other laws, they necessarily involve a lesser degree of public scrutiny. He is right about that. It is therefore important that an amendment advanced through a Statutes Amendment Bill does not offend against important rule-of-law principles such as accessibility of the law, particularly where the amended statute is unlikely to be reprinted as a result of the changes. What does that mean? The select committee needed to find that out. We sought advice from a range of advisers on that, and, as I said before, satisfied ourselves that it does fit within the statutes amendment ambit given that they are omnibus bills that are intended to amend minor legislative misprints, to fix up slightly technical redrafts, and suchlike. In this case it probably did get very close to not meeting those criteria, but, that said, we accepted that the intent of the bill was just a minor adjustment, and so it went.

The legislation this amends that I took a particular interest in was the Biosecurity Act 1993. I am the National spokesman on the biosecurity portfolio. I found that the amendment was useful and sensible because it gives the deputy chief technical officer the power to appoint inspectors, authorised persons, or accredited persons when that is necessary, and in a timely fashion. That was a weakness in the old Act and there have been occasions when that weakness has caused concern for a number of people, so I am pleased to see that happen.

A number of other Acts have also been amended, such as the Cadastral Survey Act, the Fisheries Act 1996, and the Veterinarians Act. The list goes on and on and includes, as I mentioned before, the Historic Places Act, the Misuse of Drugs Act, the National Parks Act, the New Zealand Horticulture Export Authority Act, the Radiocommunications Act, the Reserves Act, and the Summary Proceedings Act. That is a large number of Acts—14, I think—which is not something we should take too lightly. In its deliberations, the select committee decided that they all met the criteria of a Statutes Amendment Bill and we were happy to support it.

I will take a very brief call because I understand that we want the vote to be taken before the adjournment tonight. I must say, as a lawyer member of this place, that I do not really tolerate this kind of stuff with much ease. I think a lot of legislative drafting could be better than it is. I do not think it reflects very well on this House that from time to time we have to pass bills such as the Statutes Amendment Bill (No 2) because of sloppy work done in the past.

I refer, for example, to the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act 1995, where reference to the term “video record” was changed to incorporate the passage of the Evidence Act 2006. How it is beyond the wit of people to deal with that kind of issue, which is a very straightforward issue, simply escapes me. But there we have it. Every year we seem to pass this kind of legislation to patch up sloppiness. It has been done for years, and it will be done for a long time—

💬 Hon Lianne Dalziel: It was 1995.

The Minister says, in that plaintive voice of hers, that it was 1995. The point I am trying to make is that when the Evidence Bill was going through, this matter should have been dealt with. It is sloppy drafting, and the Minister should be disgusted with herself.

The other point I will make is that—[Interruption] We will go beyond 6 o’clock if the Minister interjects on me. I will make one point, and it is a very serious point, to put the history right, because of that extraordinary revisionist speech made by one of Labour’s trade union members, Darien Fenton—mind you, they are all trade union members these days. That speech tried to rewrite history in relation to Part 3, which deals with the Crimes Act 1961. That extraordinary speech, for Mr Hughes’ benefit, was all about how the Labour Party was responsible for getting rid of the death penalty in this country. That is simply wrong. Even in a speech to deal with this kind of minor stuff in the Statutes Amendment Bill (No 2), Labour tries to rewrite history. Labour members are like cancer: they never sleep.

Let the record show that the death penalty in New Zealand was done away with as a result of the sterling efforts of the former member for Invercargill, the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice in Sir Keith Holyoake’s Cabinet—for Mr Hughes’ benefit—the Hon Ralph Hanan. That is the reality of the matter. The Labour Party, under Walter Nash, never had anything to do with it. The last execution was under Walter Nash’s premiership. So I cannot understand how, in the context of a debate on this kind of issue, we have Labour trying to rewrite history.

It is like the issue—and I must be very careful not to go on too long—of privatisation, because Labour members stand in this House in a shameless manner and go on and on about the dreadful 1990s. They forget, of course, that they were the ones who privatised Telecom and Air New Zealand. But they never stop.

I ask Labour members to please deal with the facts as they are. I do not want to sound like Thomas Gradgrind, but I ask Labour members to please give me the facts and spare me the kind of ludicrous rubbish that we had from Darien Fenton the other night. With those comments in mind, and having corrected the record as to who abolished the death penalty, I will take my leave.

Bills read a third time.

The House adjourned at 5.58 p.m.