English Language Bill

Committee of the whole House

Thank you, Mr Chair. I did want to ask a few questions around the purpose of this clause. I know the Minister’s a busy person, and I just want to know what is the purpose of this Act. From her answers previously, it seemed that she accepted what officials said and what also came through the select committee that English is an official language of New Zealand, so I wanted to know, in the purpose section, what is the purpose of using Parliament’s time to make English an official language in statute when, in fact, that already is the case.

Committee of the whole House

I think the differential here is that we have treated the English language in a status that doesn’t have legal protection in the law, so this is about ensuring that it has that legal status so that te reo Māori and the sign language will all have equal status in law.

Committee of the whole House

Thank you, Mr Chair. Further to that response, why does it need to have status in law, Minister? In the opening explanatory note, “The English language has long been a de facto official language”, as you rightly acknowledge. Is the Minister aware that no other Anglosphere nation has made English an official language through its Parliament, other than Canada, where there were two competing colonising languages, French and English? Even the United States, where Trump has passed one of his orders, has not brought the question of whether English should be an official language to the Congress. So why, in this Parliament, are you wasting your time for something that I do not believe and that the Minister has not believed?

You have not articulated the actual problem that this bill solves, because other jurisdictions rightly recognise that the de facto status of English means it does not need protection in law, and the purpose of making languages official is to protect them in law because they are threatened, because they are marginalised, and because they may be a particular indigenous language. What is the case, Minister, for needing to pass legislation to do this? It is not sufficient simply to say that it’s not recognised in law; therefore, we need to recognise it in law. That is not a sufficiently satisfactory answer. In fact, it has the stink of a cultural war position that has been adopted directly out of the foul mentality of the United States of America off the back of the attitude of Donald Trump.

Hon Members: Oh!

STEVE ABEL: These moaning, groaning fellows of your coalition seem to not have the temerity to stand up and speak against the sort of garbage that has been passed through this committee tonight. What is the actual, meaningful problem that is being solved by this legislation? None of us has any issues with the de facto status of the English language.

Dr David Wilson: Then why are you talking?

STEVE ABEL: Because the House, while people are struggling to put food on the table, is wasting the time of this Parliament with a bill that has no purpose and no credible justification. It’s, indeed, a pathetic bill, and we will not be supporting it, obviously, but can the Minister give us a serious reason for what the problem is right now in Aotearoa New Zealand that requires you to pass a law to let us all know that we’re speaking English all day and every day?

Committee of the whole House

I think that it’s clear, without all the emotion and rhetoric of the previous speaker, Steven Abel, that an official language is generally understood to be a language that is recognised by State for use in Government functions such as legislation, courts, education, and public administration. Official language status can be symbolic, but it can also support language to be used in circumstances where it may not otherwise have been provided for, such as in court proceedings or in Parliament. This is about ensuring that English is an official language, as are others, rather than just in terms of current practice. I would highlight that it is not only Canada that has English as an official language. The United States and Ireland also have it as an official language, and Wales has it as an official language of Parliament.

Committee of the whole House

Thank you, Mr Chair. Just while we’re talking about the legal aspects of it—and I’m happy to have a debate based on the legal arguments on this—English is an official language at law. That is a fact. It may not be in a statute, but it is at law an official language now. In fact, all of our laws—most of them that aren’t in te reo Māori—are written in English. I think it is regretful that there is a lack of acknowledgement around the common law, because it is such an important part of our statutory system, and, in fact, as a country without a written constitution, our conventions carry a huge amount of weight. It is clearly a part of our legislative convention that we speak English as an official language. Today, it is not required to have a statute in place.

Because we are talking about the legal issue in this very short bill and, I think, because this has been addressed in this purpose part, I’ve got two questions that I thought were very convincing at select committee around this. The first one was raised by Dr Dean Knight. He said that if statutory recognition was to be given to the English language, in his view—and he is a law professor—it should be in the constitution Act. All of the three official languages could be there together in the Constitution Act. I wonder why this wasn’t considered, and I would like the Minister to address that.

The second question that I wanted to raise was—this is uncomfortable because this is a bill that we feel compelled to support. The reason for that is there are issues with playing around with legal statuses of languages and of the way that we communicate official decisions. I think it’s accepted widely now that English is an official language, and that’s why you can conduct all of your business in English. The problem is, if you start to change that, there could be minor risks, and we have a lawyer, Graeme Edgeler, stating that there are minor risks with adopting English as an official language through statute. The reason for that is it may undermine the current status of English as an official language now.

I think the further thing, and it does bear explaining Labour’s position on this as we are not supportive of this bill coming to the House, but we don’t want a situation where a bill that proposes to make English an official language is voted down because it is clearly and plainly obvious that English is an official language. I don’t think there’s a proposal from anyone to change that, although there are proposals that are very meaningful and proper and deserve support to support the other official languages that we have in New Zealand—te reo Māori and Sign Language—and that should be done.

The legal question really is: has the Minister of Customs been advised—this came up in the Justice Committee from a lawyer—of any risks associated with the subsequent transference and codification of what is, at common law, an official language into a statute? Because we received submissions at select committee that said there were risks. I believe there would be further risks in voting a bill like this down, even though I don’t agree with bringing it to the House. These are not meaningless discussions. They certainly have no impact, but there are valid concerns raised, and I appreciate the Minister if she could respond to those questions.

Committee of the whole House

Thank you, Mr Chair. I want to start by picking up from some of the responses by the Minister of Customs, and I do want to check if the Minister wouldn’t mind clarifying some of her statements from before, because one of the things she said is that we are looking at English as an official language, and sometimes you give official language status to a language for protection. Can I first ask the Minister: what are we protecting the English language from here in Aotearoa New Zealand?

I also wanted to check that the Minister also stated that having an English language as an official language would allow for circumstances otherwise not provided for. Could the Minister indicate or give examples of situations here where English is not being provided for? Because it does then tie into the whole premise of the legislation we’re seeing in front of us.

Additional questions that I have are looking at the departmental disclosure statement, that when we’re looking at consistency with Government’s Treaty of Waitangi obligations, it does state that the Ministry of Justice analysed this bill. But can I check if the Minister sought any advice, or if the ministry sought any advice, with Te Puni Kōkiri around this bill as well? Or has, for example, the Māori Language Commissioner, or the Māori Language Commission, or even a Whaikaha from a disability and New Zealand Sign Language perspective, been consulted on this bill?

Finally, just to pick up on what my colleague Camilla Belich said and some of the concerns that we did see through the Justice Committee constitutionally, which also could potentially create anomalies through this bill, as well as some of the broader constitutional implications of this bill undermining any previous official language status that English may have held. That is an important question to ask, but I think the keyword here is “legislative” recognition. The issue that we see with this bill is that this bill is not attached to any other bill. It’s not referencing any other bill; it’s not referenced by any other bill; it’s not an amendment bill; and so, as a bill in itself, where does this bill sit on our books at all?

I think if this is something that the Government is interested in to provide consistency, I do want to support what my colleague Camilla Belich, as well as other submitters—particularly Professor Dean Knight—refer to, which is that it would have been better to put it as a constitution amendment bill, or constitution (English language) amendment bill, so that it sits alongside the other two official languages. Because right now, the way that this bill is set doesn’t really sit anywhere other than simply being a legislation.

I do want to check those couple of questions with the Minister, and I will be keen to hear the Minister’s responses, and I may have further questions to the Minister depending on the response.

Committee of the whole House

In response to the question about whether it should have been in the Constitution Act: the Constitution Act deals with significant constitutional matters such as the role of Parliament and the Governor-General, so it would not have been appropriate for the English language to be recognised within the Constitution Act. The discussion is generally about the need for this bill standing alone. It is being recognised that it would have greater consistency to ensure that all three official languages have their own individual Acts and that’s what is being proposed here.

Committee of the whole House

Thank you, Mr Chair. What evaluation was made of the impact of making English an official language on te reo Māori—that is recognised as an official language alongside New Zealand Sign Language—given that the need for its recognition was based on the fact it was prohibited from being spoken in schools and suffered the significant negative consequences of colonisation? Children were beaten, in fact, for speaking Māori within living memory. Children who were alive in the 1950s and 1960s can recall directly, people who are alive still today.

Given that the purpose of recognising te reo Māori as a taonga was to protect it from the threats that it faced and had survived over decades, what are the consequences of treating English as somehow in a similar category of needing a legislative framework to protect it? Has the Minister of Customs considered that it diminishes the taonga status of te reo Māori and diminishes the long-fought struggle by Māori to get te reo recognised as an official language?

My other question is: one of the two key impacts of the Trump executive order, which made English an official language in the United States—it did not go through the Congress, as I said earlier, but since the executive order, there has been a roll-back of State-funded sign language interpretation. What consideration did the Minister have of the effect of recognising English, insofar as it will diminish the status of those existing official languages? It also led, in the United States, to the roll-back of legislative provisions for people who have limited English proficiency. I wonder what consideration the Minister gave to those factors where English has been recognised through the executive order in the United States.

My final question is: is English an official language in England? Is the Minister aware of the answer to that question?

Committee of the whole House

Just in response to the earlier question: Te Puni Kōkiri was consulted in the development of this legislation. The legislation will have no wider impacts, either operational or social, including on other languages used in New Zealand. The bill creates no rights or requirements and is solely declaratory in nature. It cannot prevent or influence operational decisions, nor does it impact the Crown’s obligations arising from Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

The legislative recognition of the status of English as an official language will not affect the status or use of te reo Māori or New Zealand Sign Language as the two other official languages of New Zealand. The bill does not change the relationship between the official languages and their respective Acts. Beyond legislative requirements, there will be operational decisions as to how each official language is provided for in relevant circumstances.

Committee of the whole House

Thank you, Mr Chair. I have some follow-up questions from the Minister of Customs’ response to my previous question. Now, the Minister has responded that this is not an amendment to the Constitution Act because any amendments to the Constitution Act are significant, but I felt it’s perplexing because—[Interruption]

Hon Casey Costello: Point of order. I was misquoted there. I said that the Constitution Act is for significant matters such as Parliament and the Governor-General. That is the reason that this isn’t included: that it would be inappropriate for the language to be included in the Constitution Act.

CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): OK, that’s not necessarily a point of order, but I think the point has been made and that correction is useful for the committee.

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: Thank you, Mr Chair. I do appreciate the Minister’s clarification. I think it is important, but, with that, I thought that what the Minister has said—and, again, please feel free to correct me if I misrepresented what the Minister said—is that this is something that is considered seriously and that this is to replicate the fact that the other two official languages also have their own Act.

Having just looked at both, in terms of the Māori Language Act and also the New Zealand Sign Language Act, they are a lot more substantial than what we’re seeing here, because there is legitimate effect to having a language as an official language. For example, the Māori Language Act refers to the establishment of the Māori Language Commission. The New Zealand Sign Language Act refers to the specific effect that the legislation will have on the way we look at New Zealand Sign Language. But what we see here is not any sort of effect that is attached to this. In that case, the question then is: what, then, would be the effect? We have a purpose, sure, but what would be the effect of such a recognition for the English language? That follows on from some of the effects that we see in other jurisdictions that my colleague Steve Abel has also just referred to. I think that is an important question to respond to.

I also want to check—noting that I’m waiting for the Minister’s response on my other questions regarding what we are protecting the English language from and to give me an example of where English is otherwise not provided for—if it’s simply that anyone or any member or any Government is able to introduce an Act such as this and then put it down as an official language, what consideration has the Minister or the Government considered if any Government could then simply add to the list of official languages? I mean, we could be adding Mandarin Chinese as an official language. We could be adding Hindi. We could be adding Samoan as an official language. That is something that I think the Minister may also want to consider—the broader legislative implications and, I guess, the example that legislation such as this will set and the precedents it will set for future Governments.

Committee of the whole House

As I’ve stated previously, this legislation is declaratory in nature. For those other two languages, legislation was considered necessary to protect the rights of linguistic minorities and to legislate for the right to use each of those languages. English has never required protections, and that is why that has not been included in the bill. As I’ve stated previously, it is declaratory in nature, and it is provided an official language status in law.

CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): Before I take the next call, I do want the committee to note that there was a select committee process and that there is a number of pages there. I would encourage members who were not on that select committee to consider that report—it isn’t actually very long—before you ask your questions, just so that we’re not repeating things and discussions that have already happened at the select committee. I do welcome the new questions which build on the responses from the Minister, which could be useful in terms of understanding this bill. If people could keep that in mind as we move through this bill.

Committee of the whole House

I move, That debate on this question now close.

Committee of the whole House

Thank you, Mr Chair. This will be brief. For understanding the context in which we sit globally on this position, I would appreciate if the Minister in the chair, Casey Costello, would answer my question as to whether English is an official language in England. I wonder, also, if the Minister knows whether English is an official language in Australia, to give us some context for the necessity of this being passed.

A party vote was called for on the question, That clause 3 be agreed to.

Ayes 101

New Zealand National 48; New Zealand Labour 34; ACT New Zealand 11; New Zealand First 8.

Noes 20

Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 14; Te Pāti Māori 4; Ferris; Kapa-Kingi.

Clause 3 agreed to.

Committee of the whole House

Clause 4 Act binds the Crown

CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): We now come to clause 4. This is the debate on clause 4, “Act binds the Crown”. The question is that clause 4 stand part.