Limitation Bill

I move, That the Limitation Bill be now read a third time. As I stand to speak on the third reading I reflect on how lucky we are as members of Parliament to be debating limitation law at 11.15 on a Wednesday night.

💬 Grant Robertson: Hear, hear! There’s nowhere else I’d rather be.

There is nowhere else I would rather be. I have to say, with respect, that I thought the discussion in the Committee was excellent. I particularly note the contribution of my friend Ms Pillay, and I say “my friend” advisedly because we enjoyed working together, she as chairperson and I as deputy chairperson of the Justice and Electoral Committee, even though we disagreed on everything and she took the Labour members off on a wonderful jaunt to Australia and I pulled the National members out because I thought that they should be at home working. The one substantive point raised in the course of the discussion came from Mr Parker, who I thought made a substantive contribution to improving the bill with the amendment to clause 16, and I acknowledge the discussions we had. He wanted to amend the Building Act longstop period. It could well be that there are very cogent arguments for so doing and that there are benefits, as he said, in uniform limitation periods, but I think this is an issue that needs to be canvassed in the context of the current Building Act review, and his proposed amendment, which was a very serious amendment with very serious consequences, would really need to be consulted on. That was the proposal I put in the Committee stage. It was not accepted, but I do think that that is the best way to move forward.

I am very pleased to be able to move that the bill be read a third time. It replaces 60-year-old legislation. It is very important because, as Ms Pillay says, it addresses the problems that have been identified with the current Act’s substance and drafting. It clarifies and improves general limitation rules, although there are specific limitation rules in other statutes. These rules determine how long people have to bring a civil claim before defendants can argue that the claim is time-barred. The justice system gives people access to the courts to settle disputes they cannot otherwise settle themselves, but these kinds of rules are needed—and I think Mr Parker alluded to this on a number of occasions in the Committee stage—as it is unjust for people to have to defend claims about something that may have occurred many years earlier, merely because the claimant has delayed bringing the case. These rules are designed to strike a fair balance between the conflicting interests of claimants and defendants. Without these rules people could face potential liability for an indefinite period for which they would need to maintain records, professional insurance, and so on. Importantly, the rules address the important public interest in the timely resolution of claims.

The path to the reform of the 1950 Act has not been entirely straightforward. I acknowledge the work of the Law Commission over many years. It started with a preliminary discussion paper in 1987. There were then further discussion papers and reports in 1998, 2000, and 2007. It is a tribute to the Law Commission—and Sir Geoffrey Palmer took a very special interest in this reform—that we are where we are now. An exposure bill was published in 2008, submissions were received on the bill, and the Law Commission then convened a working group of interested persons to consider these changes. The then Minister of Justice gave permission for me to be on that working group—I thought that was very sporting of Annette—and this further work resulted in some significant restructuring and refinement of the bill before its introduction in 2009.

I conclude by thanking the Law Commission for its work, and I also thank the Justice and Electoral Committee for its good work. I think that what we have now is very sensible legislation that will stand the test of time, although I hope it is not another 60 years before this Parliament takes another look at this very important area of law. The primary 6-year limitation period is carried forward. We have this new 3-year late knowledge period, which is introduced to address the problem identified by the courts and other experts whereby people sometimes discover they have a claim only after a limitation period has ended. Then we have the 15-year longstop that has been the subject of quite a lot of debate tonight. The new periods will not apply if there is fraud, or if a claimant is incapacitated. As has been canvassed tonight, in some rare cases where minors, for example, have been abused or where the evidence of a personal injury develops over many years, the court will be able to exercise a discretion to grant monetary relief. I think all speakers have noted that limitation law can be complex—

💬 Grant Robertson: But fascinating.

It is truly fascinating. I say to Mr Robertson that if he wants a riveting read he should go to the transitional provisions of this bill. They are very, very interesting. I know that he will enjoy that, more than anything he has done in recent times. I echo the words of Lynne Pillay. This bill is a major achievement in ensuring that the rules are fairer and easier to understand and apply. I thank everyone who has played a part in the debate, and I commend the bill to the House.

I rise to speak in support of the third reading of the Limitation Bill. I agree with just about everything that the Attorney-General said in his address.

💬 Amy Adams: This is so boring. Find something to describe.

Amy Adams says that this is so boring.

💬 Amy Adams: No, you’re agreeing that everything is so boring, I’m afraid.

Oh, I am being boring.

💬 Amy Adams: Yes.

Well, Amy Adams’ contributions have been riveting tonight, have they not?

I will recount the policy balance that Limitation Acts try to achieve. They try to balance the rights of injured parties to pursue through the courts those who have caused them injury in order to get redress for the injury that they have suffered through the wrongful actions of a wrongful party. We want to empower people to do that. We want to encourage them to use court processes, rather than gangs or fisticuffs, because we live in a civil society. But we want to make sure that if they have rights, they exercise them promptly. The reason for that is that the longer one leaves it, the greater the chance of injustice. Memories fade, witnesses die, and documents are lost. In addition, there is the need to let people, even the wrongdoer, get on with their lives eventually and not have the sword of Damocles hanging over their heads for ever.

We balance those rights by saying that if people have rights, they generally have to exercise them within 6 years. But we make some exceptions. We make an exception if people do not know enough to know that someone has wronged them, or do not know who it was who wronged them. So we have an exception that says that if a person does not know enough within that 6-year period, he or she will be given another 3 years. If a person has late knowledge, that person will be given another 3 years. But even that has to come to an end sometime, so we have a longstop period of 15 years. That is essentially what this bill does. It has a number of exceptions, because there are exceptions to be made to those general rules.

The exception that the Attorney-General has raised in respect of sexually abused or abused young people is a case in point. A young person could be abused within his or her family at a very young age, could still be under the care and control of the very people who abused that young person, and could have no effective way of bringing an action, partly because the young person is not of a contractual age and does not know how to go to a lawyer, and partly because he or she may still be living at home. We do not want those people to lose their rights. They should have some prolonged period in which to exercise their rights, because that is fair, and so we have an exception for them.

There was another exception that the Attorney-General agreed to, following some overseas precedents, including precedents from Canada. A person might have a process injury, such as asbestosis or some other workplace injury that takes a long time to arise, and there should be an exception in respect of that person. The logic around that provision was slightly confused at one stage, as a consequence of accident compensation. People thought that if process injuries were covered by accident compensation, then the Government would not need to provide for them under the Limitation Act. But that logic was not quite right. The accident compensation scheme speaks with its own voice. If someone has an accident compensation remedy, it is covered by accident compensation, and he or she does not have the right to a non - accident compensation claim. The accident compensation claim trumps that and says that those people do not have any residual tortious right. But there are cases that may fall outside accident compensation cover, either because of the current rules covering accident compensation or because those rules may change in the future. So it is important that the Limitation Bill provides for gradual process injuries in the event that they are not covered by accident compensation. So that is another exception.

The general rule in respect of the limitation period should also apply by analogy to equitable claims. Equitable claims are not claims under statute or under common law; they arise using the equitable jurisdiction of the courts. None the less, the courts apply periods that are limitation periods, by analogy, to equitable claims. They apply similar rules to those that apply to common law claims. An amendment was made at the Justice and Electoral Committee to make sure that that is carried forward under this legislation.

I do not want to give the impression that there will no longer be disputes about whether an action is within time. Although this legislation does simplify things somewhat, and attempts to minimise the number of disputes and the injustice that can result from them, we will still have disputes about when people had sufficient knowledge so as to be properly informed of their rights, and were therefore obliged to bring their cause of action before the courts if they wanted to pursue it. There will be claimants who say they did not have enough knowledge, when the other party to the claim will say that that the claimant did know enough and sat on their rights for too long, lost their rights, and can no longer sue the other party. There will still be disputes as to when people did or did not have sufficient knowledge to trigger the 6-year limitation period or, indeed, the 3-year late knowledge period. Not all disputes will be avoided, and, perhaps, speaking as a lawyer, that is a good thing.

💬 Amy Adams: Ha, ha!

Amy Adams liked that. She is a lawyer, too.

The one area where I remain a little disappointed is in respect of the inconsistency that we have for Building Act claims compared with non - Building Act claims. The general 15-year longstop period is not being applied to Building Act cases, and the 10-year longstop period is being left as it currently is. There is a genuine and fair debate as to whether the longstop period should be 10 years or 15 years. Indeed, the Law Commission initially recommended a 10-year longstop period for everything. It modified its position in its subsequent report and said it should be 15 years. But we have this exception introduced for Building Act cases that says it should be only 10 years. I still am not convinced as to the logic that lies behind that. I think it is a pity that that was not cleared up in this bill, because we had the opportunity to fix it up now.

There will, of course, be pressure from the building industry to keep it at 10 years. It is in the industry’s self-interest to have a shorter period because it limits its liability. But I am not convinced that it is right. I think that if we have a 15-year longstop liability period for other breaches of contract or tortious claims, I cannot see why it should be different for Building Act claims. I again make the point that this is not of any import in respect of the current leaky home problems in Auckland, because this new bill applies only to wrongs, if you like, or causes of action that accrue from the date after the passage of this bill, rather than things that have already happened before that date. But, none the less, that principle should have been consistent, in my view, for buildings as well as for other claims.

Perhaps the most valuable asset that most people own is their house. If they lose a substantial portion of the value of their house because of a latent defect they do not know about, which does not become apparent for more than 10 years—and that does not happen often but it does happen sometimes; foundations might fail after a period of time because they were not appropriately taken down to hard fill—then under this legislation they will have only 10 years to pursue their claim because of the longstop liability under the Building Act. That is unchanged. However, if it were a claim in contract and a claim for something less serious that did not involve their biggest asset, they would have 15 years to pursue it. I am not convinced of the logic of that, and I am not convinced that the complexity of Building Act cases is so different because of the multiplicity of parties. I agree that it is a relevant factor, but there is already a built-in protection whereby it is for plaintiffs to prove their cases on the balance of probabilities. If they do not do so because the effluxion of time means that they are not able to bring to the court sufficiently good evidence to prove their case, then they lose. So the other parties to that litigation have that level of protection, in any event.

Having said all of that, I say that the Labour Party thinks this is a good bill. I thank the Attorney-General for the consideration he showed for some of the issues that Labour raised in respect of gradual process injuries, and I commend the bill to the House.

I take it as a privilege to be able to take a call on the third reading of the Limitation Bill. I am pretty fired up about it at half past 11 at night. I have had a coffee and a wine gum, and I reckon I could talk for hours about this bill.

I would like to commend the contributions of those in the House. In the course of my cousin’s dissertation in the third reading he transported me back to studying civil procedure at Victoria University. I know that in hindsight he would prefer to have given me a grade higher than 51 percent. I find it incredible that someone who can be so eloquent has yet to discover the noble art of voice modulation. I do not know whether the rest of the House feels that way, but I am just stating the way it is. It reflects that in the time that he was our lecturer on civil procedure he went off to Rome to do a course on conversational Latin. Does that explain why we are here debating the Limitation Bill at half past 11 at night?

I also commend other contributors, such as the honourable member Lynne Pillay, who struggled to the top of the beer crate and managed to look over the top. She towered over Carmel Sepuloni! Carmel looked up at Lynne Pillay and asked her how the weather was up there. Lynne Pillay was thinking “Boy, if only Pansy Wong could see me now!”.

This bill is a wonderful piece of legislation. As I understand it, the Minister of Justice, who is in charge of this legislation, was away, and the Attorney-General, the Hon Christopher Finlayson, was sitting in his chair. After he had eaten all of the Minister’s peppermints and had found his pencils and given them a wee sharpen, he started looking in the Minister’s bottom drawer for something to read. He came across the Limitation Bill and thought “Ah, this is what I’ll do. While the Minister’s away the cat will play.”—or the mouse, in this case. And away it went. The Limitation Bill came before our hard-working and efficient Justice and Electoral Committee, and tonight it is at the zenith of its long career in the House. I know that Ms Pillay, who was in form 1 when the first Limitation Bill went through, is only too pleased to see this one overtake it before she steps down and hands the mantle over to somebody else. Congratulations.

As members have said, it is not often there is a bit of camaraderie in this rather sad place. Despite the very good control of the Speaker, we see some terrible things happening in this House—things that would bring tears to a glass eye, quite frankly. But this is not one of those occasions. I am pleased to acknowledge that the Limitation Bill is a bill that everyone on all sides of the House supports going forward. There were some amendments that Labour members would have liked to see. Time will tell; often we on this side of the House have to say to the Government: “We told you so; we tried to tell you.”

💬 Grant Robertson: Almost every day.

Actually, every day, if we are being really honest. Every day we have to say “We told you so.” I believe that my colleague David Parker put up a very good amendment. If we had extended the time and had given more consideration to it, perhaps we could have had a full house on it and got full support for it. But we are not a petty party—certainly not. I will not comment on other parties, because I do not want to get niggly at this time of night. We are not petty, and if we look at the bill in its entirety we know that, even though common sense did not prevail on one small part, it will, as many members have said, provide a lot of certainty and enhance our legal system. Indeed, that is what Parliament is about, even though it does not happen all the time. I had not picked up that it is 60 years to the day—is that the case?

💬 Grant Robertson: What else in here is 60 years old?

I do not think we need to go on to that. But I know that 60 years is very, very special.

💬 Grant Robertson: It is a special time.

It is a very special time for many, many things and people, and I want to acknowledge in this House how important 60 years is. I think we should all acknowledge that. In going back to the bill, Mr Deputy Speaker, I say that I think that the reference to people’s height, given that you are sitting in the Chair, was most inappropriate. I think a few feathers will be flying in the National caucus next week, with those sorts of comments from Chester. It was completely out of character. Perhaps it was a case of his showing off at the last—

💬 Grant Robertson: One too many wine gums!

That could well be the case. But, goodness me, if we all took offence at personal comments in this House, we would never get anything done, would we? So I will let that one go.

💬 Hon Clayton Cosgrove: Wayne Mapp would be a basket case!

That is exactly right. So I will let that one go and go back to the Limitation Bill. This is a third reading speech, and tempted as I am to go into the detail and all the technical stuff, I will not do that.

💬 Simon Bridges: I’ll remember you for this speech, Lynne!

I thank that member very much. I do not have cool glasses for people to remember me by, so I have to rely on referring to the bill. This is a third reading speech, and, all nonsense aside, third reading speeches are a time to acknowledge the work that has gone into the bill.

I will start with the Law Commission, which made the recommendation and has done so much work. Most of its work was enacted under the previous Labour Government. In fact, if we look at the previous Labour Government’s record, we see that so much work was done. Sadly, all of the work that was done on the Sentencing Council was not enacted. We on this side of the House, the Green Party and, I am sure, many National members who have a bit of knowledge of the good that the Sentencing Council would have done, are rather disappointed at that. But, notwithstanding that, the Law Commission has done a lot of good work, and I acknowledge that good work in this House.

In an earlier speech today I acknowledged—but I will do it again because it cannot be done often enough—the hard work that the Justice and Electoral Committee’s clerk and his hard-working staff put in. He has to manage many different people on that committee. We have acknowledged Chester Borrows as a very competent chair, which was pretty predictable. We cannot say that of Paul Quinn. Paul Quinn is a difficult member to manage. Even the National members will say that. So I acknowledge the select committee staff, who look beyond members’ quirky little ways and manage to keep things running pretty smoothly.

I also acknowledge the hard-working people from the Ministry of Justice who give us advice. We always listen to that advice, but in this situation there was very little controversy. That advice was appreciated, and most of it was taken.

As we have said before—and I do not want to be churlish—the bill provides that a defence of limitation cannot be used in cases of child sexual abuse, no matter how much time has elapsed since the abuse took place. That is really significant. We cannot extend that goodwill to such cases. I do feel a bit bad about doing this, but I cannot miss the opportunity to say what a dreadful Minister for ACC we have and how much damage has been done to survivors of sexual abuse in this country. It is certainly good to know that those cases are exempt from the provisions of the Limitation Bill. There is no limit under the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. This bill matches that situation. Money claims under the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act are covered by the 6-year limit.

As my friend and colleague David Parker said, the only matter of any disagreement in the select committee was the longstop period. Although Government members listened to many of Labour’s arguments on the bill, and improvements were made, it was very sad that that disagreement occurred. I know that Grant Robertson spoke on this matter, as did David Parker and, indeed, Jacinda Ardern. Jacinda Ardern will probably speak about it again, because I know she has much to say on this bill. I know she will want to take a call on it. We believe that it is appropriate for the same longstop period to apply to all policy areas for which limitation periods apply. The reason for the shorter period for building cases could apply equally to all other types of cases. As I said earlier, the problem of fading memories—I am quite blessed in that I do not suffer from it—does happen. Also, with regard to the complexities of having multiple parties, we firmly believe that owners of houses that have a latent defect should have as long a time to bring their claims. The one little, teensy black mark in terms of the goodwill and camaraderie around this bill’s progress is that that limitation period was not extended to 15 years.

However, as I said, we on this side of the House are not petty-minded. We are supporting the bill. We are looking forward to its enactment. Goodness me! I do not think anyone in this House has spoken about when the bill will be enacted, and I think it is something we all really want to know. Oh yes, it was to commence on 1 July 2010. Well, that date is no longer feasible, because we have clearly gone past that date, but the hard-working select committee picked that point up and recommended that the bill come into force on 1 January 2011. That is really fitting. We will start the new year of 2011 with a fresh start to limitations. On that basis, I commend the bill to the House. Thank you very much.

Lynne Pillay is absolutely right—there is no fading memory there. She remembers Woodstock like it was yesterday. She talked about the current Limitation Act having come into force 60 years ago, I think it was—I feel like listening to Chester Borrows more than her—and her 60 years have passed by very quickly indeed. I talked in my first reading speech, I think, about the 5 o’clock shadow that I was developing. It has now turned into a quarter to 12 mild, mildewy moss.

We have had some good speeches, and like Lynne Pillay, I will do a bit of backslapping. I agree with all the comments that she has made about the people who deserve thanks. She did not actually mention—or maybe she did, but only in passing—someone who deserves a lot of praise in this process: Paul Quinn. Paul Quinn asked quick-fire questions in the Justice and Electoral Committee because of the rapid way that his mind works. He quickly got to the heart of the matter in the select committee, and we need to keep that on record. Despite being quite a diminutive character who does not like to cause confrontation, he cut through things very quickly, unlike Hekia Parata, whom we could not shut up! She just could not stop talking about this bill and raising important questions.

I will very briefly, in my last 30 seconds, pick up on the issue that David Parker raised. I agree with what Chris Finlayson said when he was the Minister in the chair not long ago. He said that uniformity in limitation periods is to be encouraged. I would say that it does not need to be overly encouraged. As he pointed out, there are many different pieces of legislation with different limitation periods. If we think about criminal law, then that is obviously quite a different area of law with different policy considerations. In that area, there is no longstop period, at all. The best that one can hope for if one has been accused of a crime, even 40 or 50 years down the track, is a stay of proceedings, and that would be in a case where one simply could not get a fair trial. So there are different longstop periods. There are different policy considerations at play. I do not think that we need to be afraid of that. Although uniformity is to be encouraged because it adds certainty to some extent, it does not always need to be the case.

I state for the record my disappointment that during this debate the Sentencing Council has not been mentioned, because I always find it to be a key part of any discussion by the Justice and Electoral Committee. I also begin my remarks by acknowledging the chair of the select committee, Chester Borrows. It has already been mentioned in the House that Chester Borrows deals with a diverse select committee, which has robust debate within it.

Although some of the difficult members have been named tonight, I have to say that Lynne Pillay is not one of them. She is a picture of politeness, she has an inquisitorial mind, and having been a select committee chair herself she knows the difficulties of managing a select committee. But it would be remiss of me in this debate not to mention Paul Quinn, as my colleague Simon Bridges has, because Mr Quinn always makes a robust contribution. If Chester is to offer courses in the noble art of modulation, I say for the record that I will offer courses on the art of using one’s inside voice. Paul Quinn has never mastered the art of the inside voice in the select committee, nor has he mastered it in the House. I think that all the members in this place would benefit from the use of the inside voice, not only in terms of tone and volume but also perhaps in terms of the art of thinking before one speaks.

I acknowledge the work of the Attorney-General, Chris Finlayson. In his defence, I would ask who needs modulation when one has mastered the art of the personal attack. I know that Minister Finlayson would like to claim that he never makes things personal, but he is so good at it that sometimes we do not even know that it is happening. I also acknowledge the fact that he has worked for a number of years on this legislation. I will go over a little bit of the history of this bill in my remarks, but before I move on from my notes of thanks, I also acknowledge the work of the officials. At every point during the discussion on this bill, whenever we raised the need to go back, for instance, and look at some additional jurisdictions to see whether we were in keeping with what was happening overseas, the officials were always more than willing to bring forth not only what we asked for but also more again. I want to thank them for their assistance.

To go back briefly to some of the history of this legislation, I start with the Law Commission report, which is really where it all began. There were reports in 1988, 2000, and 2007, but this was probably the one that substantively triggered the work that we see before us now. It was the Labour Government at that time that asked for a substantive review by the Law Commission, as we did with many other more controversial errors than this. One that may spring to mind is the Law Commission’s extensive work on alcohol reform, a piece of work that is the most comprehensive work we have seen in this House probably in our lifetimes, no matter what age members in this House may be. It traverses every element of our alcohol legislation. I note for the record that it is a shame that not all of those recommendations were put before a select committee for it to decide on.

Going back to the Law Commission report, it is one of many that Labour instigated. In December 2007 it became the basis for which a draft bill was sent to stakeholders for consultation, but that was not the end of it. There was a reference group, and I think that Minister Finlayson may have referred to it. It was set up in 2008 and was chaired by Justice Blanchard. It included representatives from the New Zealand Law Society, the Bar Association, the Ministry of Justice, and the Parliamentary Counsel Office. As Minister Finlayson acknowledged, the goodwill of the Minister of Justice at that time, the Hon Annette King, meant that she included Chris Finlayson himself, who at that time was an Opposition MP, in that reference group. I think that that again demonstrates that limitation legislation is incredibly important within our justice system. It sets the boundaries and it seeks out the balance between giving certainty to defendants in access to justice for claimants. I think that that is a particular area that goes beyond political boundaries, and that was acknowledged by Annette King. I acknowledge her in this final reading.

In this final reading I will go over some less controversial elements of the bill that we did not touch on in the Committee stage but that were picked up on in the discussion in the select committee. That means that they were slightly more substantive. I believe that we have talked a bit about equitable claims. The committee recommended inserting new clause 8A into the bill to clarify that the court will not be prevented from applying statutory limitation provisions to equitable claims for which no limitation defence is set out in this bill already. There is a limitation there that exists for the court, so an element of discretion applies.

We have already discussed at some great length one of the areas, and this is a significant one, where disputes still lie around longstop periods. I think that it was the right thing to do for the Hon David Parker to put up an amendment to try to bring consistency between what is in the bill and the Building Act. It was disappointing that the Government chose not to adopt that amendment. Only time will tell as to whether we will see people’s access to justice limited by the fact that the Government has chosen not to adopt this element of consistency, which we advocated for. In particular, there will be areas—Auckland probably most significantly so—affected by the leaking building phenomena. I remember distinctly when it arose. Maurice Williamson himself will be the one who ultimately will have to relook at cases if we find that the limitations that have been set are not working. Again, only time will tell, but for the record I say that Labour believes in consistency in setting a 15-year longstop period in limitations and in the Building Act.

There was not much discussion from my recollection on the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. From memory, the select committee only very briefly looked at claims under that Act and whether they should be subject to discretion, similar to the discretion that we looked at in terms of time-barred claims for sexual abuse of a minor. We decided against including discretion in that area. Again, we were erring on the side of certainty in that regard.

Defamation is another area that I recall us touching on a lot in the discussion, but it is worth flagging again that there was discussion on it. We heard concerns that the late knowledge period for defamation is 3 years, as set out in the bill as it was introduced and given to us. Anomalies might arise, so our recommendation was that the late knowledge period should be shortened to 2 years. I think that that is in keeping with the types of claims we are likely to see under that heading. We have already discussed claims of sexual and non-sexual abuse of a child, and I touched on the claims of gradual process disease or infection. I wish to flag that it was Labour that pushed quite hard that the exception for the gradual process claim be inserted into the bill, and I am proud that we did that. I still have ongoing concerns around the interaction between accident compensation and the limitation requirements, predominantly because of the changes in policy and practice we have seen within accident compensation. Any constituency member of this House will know those all too well.

The final amendment is on actions based on acts or omissions around the late knowledge exception. I believe that my time is about to expire, so I will not dwell on that. This was a useful discussion with good cooperation between the members of the select committee. It is an important bill.

💬 Hone Harawira: Fabulous speech.

I call that a standing ovation from Hone Harawira, as he is literally standing whilst applauding. I note for the record and for some viewers, who gave me feedback that I need to reduce my airline-type gesturing, that I hope they saw some improvement in that last address. Kia ora koutou.

In this third reading of the Limitation Bill, it is great to see that the bill has support from all parties, which is very uncommon. This bill is part of the process that this Government took over to simplify the judicial system. The Justice and Electoral Committee has dealt with more than 17 different bills since the Government took over in November 2008. Members of this Government have been working hard to make sure that New Zealand has the best judicial system. This bill is an example of the important work Parliament can do in improving the quality of legislation in order to make it more accessible and less confusing to the public. I would like to acknowledge the hard work of the Justice and Electoral Committee, and the officials, who have been providing excellent support during the hearing of this bill. It is my privilege to be part of the select committee, which is led by Chester Borrows, and I acknowledge the Hon David Parker, and other Labour members, for their contribution. I commend this bill to the House.

It is a great pleasure to take a call. We heard the Attorney-General describe the day that the Limitation Bill passed its first reading as “a great day for black-letter law”. That reminded me of a 2007 Supreme Court case, where the Supreme Court observed: “What is required in New Zealand, and has been required for some considerable time, is a complete legislative overhaul of the Limitation Act. … The surgery now required is beyond the proper province of the courts.” So this bill implements the Law Commission’s recommendation to replace the current Limitation Act 1950 with a new, modern regime. The new regime will encourage claimants to make claims without undue delay, in order to protect defendants from the unjust pursuit of stale claims. The Limitation Act 1950 is an old piece of legislation, and it needs to be updated. The Labour Party supports the proposed changes in this bill. The bill simplifies the limitation regime by providing a general civil limitation defence to most claims.

Debate interrupted.

Sitting suspended from 12 midnight to 9 a.m. (Thursday)