Secondary Legislation Bill

We come now to the debate on clause 2. This is the debate on the commencement clause. The question is that clause 2 stand part.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I think it’s been well canvassed at previous stages of this bill being considered by the House that it’s widely supported. I can at least speak for National, and, of course, the Government putting forward the bill will continue to support it, no doubt.

So a couple of contributions as we go through the committee stage, really, for the purpose of placing on record a couple of points about the way that it will operate. Obviously, it’s pretty technical, and I don’t propose to do that in a way that is anything other than helpful for the public record in terms of the way that the mechanics of this will all work out. So in terms of the commencement date, which Madam Chair has invited us to consider as a committee of this, the whole House, I wonder if the Attorney-General can speak to the way that that’s intended to roll out. Obviously, we’ve got a mechanism where different dates can be set by Order in Council, and it seems to me that that might be quite fragmented in the way that we get this coherent regime quite slowly over a long period of time. So I wonder if there’s any advice that the Attorney-General can give us in that regard.

I see that he’s consulting with officials, so I’ll just continue speaking for a couple more moments, I think. [Interruption] Ha, ha! I’m encouraged not to be helpful by the devil on my shoulder, but the angel on my shoulder says to continue on. I wonder, then, in that case, if I can also add in a question whereby the Attorney-General might advise how it is as a House that we are dealing with the fact that we’ve got a piece of legislation that was contemplated and, indeed, drafted some time ago. I see that, you know, originally it would’ve come into effect in 2019, but we’ve had quite a lot of time having been passed since then and quite a few laws as well. I presume that his answer will involve the very considerable Supplementary Order Paper that’s almost as big as the Act itself—quite a feat, and I congratulate all those involved in putting it together.

But if the Minister is now ready to provide an answer in relation to the timings, the way it will all be brought forward, that would be much appreciated.

Thank you for those questions. There are essentially three categories of change that are implemented through this bill. The first is the long list of statutes that are made consistent with the new arrangements, and that is, as we all know, a huge list that goes right across the statute book. An Order in Council is envisaged to bring those changes into effect for all of those different pieces of legislation on the same date, which is set by Order in Council but is expected to be around October this year.

In respect of another class of instruments, those are the much smaller list of empowering statutes that have regulation-making powers or that are being exempted from some of these provisions. Again, they are being grouped so that those exemptions will come into effect on the same date, not necessarily the October date but it might be. So it might be the same date, but it doesn’t have to be.

Then the third different commencement date, which is less certain, is the date on which there is centralised publication required of future instruments, and that’s dependent in part on technology, and therefore it’s less certain, and I don’t know the date for that yet.

Thank you, Mr Chair. As the member Chris Penk just noted, it is a very large Supplementary Order Paper that we have in front of us, and, as you note, a lot of it is repeating the various statutes that are amended. I note, I guess with some irony, that in the commencement provision one of the changes is that “An Order in Council under this section is secondary legislation”—as per the legislation there for publication requirements. And it is, really, that “publication requirements”. You just touched on it and mentioned the technology, but have you got any further time frames on that or any discussion of what some of the difficulties might be with that?

We’re actually not envisaging difficulties in choosing a date to trigger all of these processes across the statute book to line up and become more consistent across the many arms of Government; nor are we envisaging difficulties in choosing the date when we regularise the exceptions, or exemptions—I’m not sure which we’re calling them. In respect of how we bring into effect the better publication requirements, we’re less certain of that, because we haven’t yet finished the technological changes that are necessary to enable it. I’m sure officials will tell me if I’m simplifying that.

Thank you, Mr Chair. Also on the Supplementary Order Paper, in your commentary on it, in the explanatory note, at page 6, you refer to the correction of some of the “empowering provisions that inadvertently catch as secondary legislation instruments that do not have legislative effect”—so that difference between the secondary and something that is not secondary. So I was wondering if you had any examples that you could give us of that.

In a minute. Well, look, what I can say in respect of that—I’m asking for officials to give me a particular instance, but I understand it’s some of the rules that are made by organisations that are bound by statute, aren’t of statutory effect. I might have this wrong, but you could tell me—from memory, it could have been some of the provisions under the Racing Act, where sometimes clubs have rules which really aren’t, we think, of sufficient import to be treated like regulations and therefore go through that route. So there has been a cataloguing across the statute book of things that are important enough to be seen to be of statutory effect, or regulatory effect, that should be within this regularised regime. There have been some things that, really, are lower-level rules that we don’t think meet that threshold, and, therefore, those latter ones are being excluded. I think there has been some discussion at the Regulations Review Committee about those issues. I wasn’t there for those discussions, and I’m sorry I can’t remember the individual instances.

Thank you, Mr Chair. It’s a pleasure to be able to stand and make a brief contribution to what I understand is affectionately known as the “SLAB” of a bill, and that it is. I want to first acknowledge on that point the extraordinary amount of work that the Parliamentary Counsel Office and other staff actually across several Government agencies that administer primary legislation have put into this bill.

Now, there might not be many people whose eyes light up when it’s time to talk about secondary legislation. However, despite the hour—and we’re getting a bit late now—I see several colleagues from the Regulations Review Committee are looking bright-eyed and excited as we consider this bill at committee stage, as they should be. Because there are important rules set out in secondary legislation, as in this bill and the Supplementary Order Paper, that govern much in the day-to-day lives of New Zealanders.

Of course, it’s the role of the Regulations Review Committee to at various points review—

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): I’m sorry to interrupt the member, but this is quite a narrow debate. It’s clause 2, not the whole bill.

Of course.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): So you need to relate your comments to the commencement in clause 2.

Can I refer to page 6 of the Supplementary Order Paper, where the Minister makes some points about various sections that needed to be reviewed. I just ask the Minister if he could speak to the second-to-bottom point relating to the correcting of amendments to ensure that empowering provisions and related procedural provisions will integrate correctly with the Legislation Act 2019. Are you able to provide us with further information on that?

The question is that the Minister’s amendments to clause 2 set out on Supplementary Order Paper 12 be agreed to.

Amendments agreed to.

Clause 2 as amended agreed to.

Clause 3 Amendments to Acts as set out by administering agency in Schedules 1 to 32