Civil Aviation Bill

The House in committee for the Civil Aviation Bill. We will start with Part 1. This is the debate on clauses 3 to 12, “Preliminary provisions”, and Schedule 1, “Transitional, savings, and related provisions”. The question is that Part 1 stand part.

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

Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is. The question is that Part 1 stand part.

Thank you, Madam Chair. ACT welcomes this bill coming back to the House. It’s about time that we modernised some of the regulation and red tape that is stifling New Zealand businesses, and the Civil Aviation Bill, when it becomes law, will go a long way. However, there are some issues that have been raised at the Transport and Infrastructure Committee with the performance and operation of civil aviation, particularly with respect to the independent review of decisions made by the Director of Civil Aviation, and while submitters in the industry have indicated that they are somewhat satisfied by the changes made to the bill, they are not entirely satisfied.

ACT also has raised concerns about the performance of some entities that fall under civil aviation—in particular, the monitoring and the independent assessment of aviation security services, as we referred to in the report back to the House. So I would like to ask the Minister to please explain why only yesterday, on 28 March, two Supplementary Order Papers (SOPs) have been tabled which make some rather significant changes to some aspects of the bill, what it is that the Minister and officials mean to achieve by tabling those SOPs, and why have members and stakeholders not had an opportunity to review those SOPs until yesterday? Minister.

It’s a pleasure to be here in the Chamber this evening under urgency. Very briefly, in response to the member’s questions: they have been tabled because they are Supplementary Order Papers, and they’ve been worked through a fulsome process going back to 2021. Stakeholders have been engaged the whole way through. It was good to be able discuss these—actually, at the same function that Mr Court was at last night—with some key stakeholders again. These are minor in the scheme of things, and they do nothing other than what has been previously indicated that this Government will do.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for the opportunity to take a call. I would like the Minister to actually outline some of the key changes that are being made by the two Supplementary Order Papers. One of them appears to be splitting the bill; the other one appears to be making a range of different amendments to the bill, which, of course, has gone through a fulsome select committee process. The National Party has supported this piece of legislation because it is important that we do update the legislation around our civil aviation in New Zealand.

There have been a number of issues, though, where there has been contention in the select committee, with a range of views put forward by submitters, and I would appreciate if the Minister could take some time to talk through what the specific changes are in relation to the Supplementary Order Paper. She said they were minor and technical, but the Supplementary Order Paper is an entire 18 pages long, and it amends multiple clauses throughout the piece of legislation, and as my colleague Simon Court said, this was only tabled to Parliament yesterday.

The explanatory note for it is less than one page long, and the Ministry of Transport considered that the departmental disclosure statement was not required for the Supplementary Order Paper, which gives us as MPs a very limited ability to scrutinise what is a significant reform of the civil aviation legislation in New Zealand. And so I would like the Minister to outline the key changes. I note that it makes changes for airports in relation to the Public Works Act, which was a contentious issue in regards to holding and disposal of land. There are questions that were raised in the select committee as to whether public works provisions should be able to be retained by airports, or whether Land Information New Zealand should be able to take on board those powers, which would, of course, limit airports to be able to make those decisions around whether they could dispose of land.

Having the Minister answer those questions would be useful. I note that it also includes some additional fees and charges for people under the new body which was set up to review decisions of the Civil Aviation Authority. I know they’re going to make some changes now around that as well. It would be good for the Minister to actually tell the committee exactly what this Supplementary Order Paper does so that the committee can have confidence in relation to her statement that these are only minor and technical improvements.

I’m happy to respond to the member’s question in so far as this relates to Part 1. The Part 1 amendments are very limited. In that Supplementary Order Paper, it’s clause 2 only, which relates to the extension of the commencement date of the bill to 24 months after the Royal assent.

Can the Minister provide rationale to the committee for why the extension from 18 months to two years is provided as being made in this Supplementary Order Paper?

I can: because it was a change that was sought and it was one that the Government has agreed to.

Minister, who sought the changes and on what grounds? Did they believe they required an additional six months in order to give effect to the bill?

Yes, it’s a significant bill. It’s going to have large implications. The member will have heard about this with the people he was with last night. But, indeed, over the significant period of time that this—

💬 Matt Doocey: What happened last night? I missed out.

Yes, he was at a function last night. It was an airports function; one that I think your mayor might have been at. It was a good function. But, look, as you’ll be well aware, it’s a significantly large bill, massive implications for the entire civil aviation environment. Primarily, the changes have been sought by the Civil Aviation Authority and the Ministry of Transport, but that’s been through engagement with the sector.

So, were there specific reasons that the authority, the Ministry of Transport, and any stakeholders that might have been consulted about the extension—were there any specific reasons that they gave? Because there are many things in this bill that the industry has been asking for to streamline the way they operate to make it more efficient and to update the regulations. So, while some of it might be complex and difficult to implement, based on current state, I’m surprised that that extension of time has been asked for, for the date of when the bill comes into effect. So if the Minister could just tell us who asked for the extension and what was the reason, that would be very helpful.

I’m happy to reanswer that question because I think I was relatively clear, but I’ll restate it for the member. Clause 2, “Commencement”—it will extend the commencement date of the bill for 24 months after the Royal assent. So that won’t have a specific date because the Royal assent is yet to be determined, subject to tonight and other matters, and, secondary to that, as I said before, the secondary legislation—its substantive programme is large. This has been well canvassed with the industry, and we’re giving effect to those changes.

💬 Simon Court: Madam Chair.

If I may, Simon Court, before you ask another question about commencement, commencement is not actually to be debated until right at the end of the bill. Clause 2 only talks about the preliminary parts, not the actual commencement date. So go ahead and ask other questions, but we will debate the commencement much later on.

I just want to come to clause 5, Madam Chair, the definition of “eligible New Zealand operator”. There was a lot of debate, a lot of questions in select committee, Minister, about whether local council owned and operated airports should come under the same regime as the larger commercial airports. And there were some significant concerns that, actually, they would have a different regime of treating the way they operated. So would the Minister provide some explanation as to why, in clause 5, the definition of “eligible New Zealand operator” now includes after Part 6 in section 4(10). Because when we look at section 4(10), it requires a whole lot of information about, essentially, climate-related disclosures, which are quite extensive, quite onerous, and look like they would put quite significant costs on airport operators. So would the Minister please explain why airport operators appear to have to supply a whole lot of information that actually looks like it’s quite onerous.

Thank you; this is a good question. It’s at clause 226 of the bill, where it’s really expanded upon, so it clarifies who the exemption to operate an airport commercially applies to and specifically ensuring that we capture Crown and local authority joint venture airports who choose not to operate commercially. So the eligible New Zealand operators—it’s really about emissions from international airlines primarily, where Air New Zealand would operate out of.

I’d like the Minister to just provide a bit of clarity in regards to that particular point about eligible New Zealand operators. Is the Minister saying that clause 410 doesn’t operate—doesn’t apply—to all airports, or is it only applying to some airports? Currently, the definition of “eligible New Zealand operator” doesn’t refer at all to clause 410, but this Supplementary Order Paper is adding in reference to 410 which, as has been mentioned, is in relation to “Regulations relating to carbon offsetting and reduction scheme for international aviation”, and relates to “how an eligible New Zealand operator may be attributed to New Zealand”, “how flights … be attributed to an eligible New Zealand operator”, “the content of an emissions monitoring plan”, and “the method or methods by which fuel emissions may be calculated.”

So it has a variety of things which are very different to the variety of things which are referred to in clause 206(2). So it seems to be that the bill is now pointing us in a very different direction from what it was originally pointing us towards. Appreciate any clarification around why that new definition has been added to this particular clause.

Yes, thank you, Madam Chair. Look, I apologise if I wasn’t as clear as I could have been, and I’m remiss if that was indeed the case. So, a “New Zealand operator” is defined at 206(1)(a) and (b), and you’ll see there that it specifically applies to airlines. Clause 410 is aligned in that the definition it refers to, indeed, what we were trying to capture, which is international aviation, so it’s really related directly to those airports that operate internationally.

So, Minister Allan, just with respect to clause 410, clause 410(1)(a) refers to a convention, and to “Annex 16, Vol IV of the Convention:”. So would the Minister like to describe—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Jenny Salesa): Point of order to the member: even though clause 5 refers to clause 410, you can’t actually debate clause 410 at this time, because that is part of Part 6.

Right. Well, thank you, Madam Chair.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Jenny Salesa): Go ahead and ask questions about clause 5, though.

Yeah. So when it comes to clause 5 and we’re looking at the definition of an “operator”, it is actually material what they’re required to do. I would have thought that actually getting a bit more clarity on this from the Minister would be helpful, because we are talking about definitions of who operates in New Zealand airspace and what their obligations are. And if their obligations, by being defined as an “operator”, include having to report on their carbon emissions and so on, with a whole lot of other international obligations, it would just be helpful if the Minister would just clarify that now. And happy to come back and debate it later, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Look, I mean, this is drawing into that broader part of the debate. This sits under subpart 3 of Part 6, as the member Simon Court’s well aware, under clause 206, and, as I said, is defined there. I’m happy to read it out, but I’m sure the member has it before him as well. For the sake of clarity, though, clause 206(1)(a) reads, “has a registered place of business in New Zealand and holds a New Zealand AOC with ANZA privileges; and (b) operates an air transport service offering air transport services to 1 or more places outside New Zealand as a New Zealand airline”. So just to reiterate my point, for the third time: this applies to international airlines, and specifically Air New Zealand. This is directly tagged to eligible New Zealand operators, for the purposes of emissions.

Point of order, Madam Chairperson. I seek leave to have all parts taken as one question.

Is there any objection to the motion? There are no objections. We will take the rest of this bill as one.

Parts 1 to 11, Schedules 1 to 10, and clauses 1 and 2