Statutes Amendment Bill

I want to briefly table three Supplementary Order Papers that make urgently required amendments to the bill. The first is Supplementary Order Paper 385, which amends section 63 and section 64 of the Senior Courts Act 2016. This Supplementary Order Paper inserts new clauses 122A and 122B into the bill. These new clauses pluralise references to the deputy registrar for the Court of Appeal. Sections 63 and 64 of the Senior Courts Act provides for the appointment of only one deputy registrar, due to a previous drafting error. However, the Court of Appeal currently has eight deputy registrars, four of whom were appointed before the Act came into force. The court relies upon multiple registrars and it’s, therefore, important that their roles are correctly described in law.

The second Supplementary Order Paper is Supplementary Order Paper 386. This inserts a new Part 22A into the bill to make a minor amendment to the New Zealand Film Commission Act 1978. This new Part repeals section 19(3) of the New Zealand Film Commission Act in order to allow the New Zealand Film Commission to give guarantees or indemnities a new interpretation of the New Zealand Film Commission Act, which is preventing the New Zealand Film Commission from entering into a valid indemnity contract without approval from the Minister of Finance. This is out of step with other Crown entities, and is hindering the commission’s procurement of business software and may affect its online presence. This Supplementary Order Paper resolves this issue and brings the New Zealand Film Commission into line with other Crown entities in the cultural sector.

The third and final Supplementary Order Paper is Supplementary Order Paper 387. This inserts a new clause 133B(5A) into the bill. This amendment clarifies that once a person admits liability for an infringement offence then they may only make written submissions to the court and are not entitled to appear in person. The amendment is needed because it is an unnecessary waste of the court’s time to hear from people who have already admitted liability for an infringement offence, and it was never intended that this should happen.

Can I simply acknowledge and thank the Governance and Administration Committee for their work. I want to thank all the parties and all members of Parliament; as the chair has rightly pointed out, anyone can declare that they do not support clauses of the bill. All of the amendments that are part of this bill fit the purpose as minor and technical and can be introduced as part of this Statutes Amendment Bill. I hope that helps with the deliberation. I’m anticipating that all of you simply support this. Thank you.

I seek the leave of the committee for all provisions to be taken as one question.

Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There appears to be none.

Parts 1 to 42, Schedule, and clauses 1 and 2