Regulatory Responsibility Bill

RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) Link to this

I move, That the Regulatory Responsibility Bill be now read a first time. This bill is addressing an issue, I think, that concerns the entire House, in that there is a concern about red tape, excessive compliance costs, and the often conflicting and contradictory rules we are placing on the citizens of New Zealand. I think where we would disagree in the House often is on just what is red tape and on particular legislation; one member’s red tape might be another member’s good law. So I am conscious of that, but I know that at the last election every political party, when asked, had a concern about red tape and expressed a desire to deal with it better. Indeed, the majority of political parties, in response to a query by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of New Zealand, said they would certainly look at supporting a regulatory responsibility bill that would address it.

The ACT party, as members know, has just two MPs, but with a little bit of help we have been beavering away in relation to how we can address the issue of red tape, and indeed bring better lawmaking to this Parliament and to New Zealand. The response we have made is to come up with the Regulatory Responsibility Bill. I want to put the bill into a context: this is really the legislative equivalent of the Fiscal Responsibility Act or, indeed, the Reserve Bank of New Zealand Act, which are legislative approaches to political decision-making that in and of themselves do not determine what politicians or what a Government can or cannot do, or indeed in any way undermine the sovereignty of Parliament. But they do provide a legislative process, if you like, that Parliament and Governments can follow, in order to get better political decision-making. So they are quasi-constitutional arrangements by which Governments and parliamentarians operate.

I think it is fair to say that those initiatives have served us well. An example would be the Reserve Bank of New Zealand Act when we had had a generation of high inflation driven by political expedience. With that Act we have actually put ourselves into a decent framework. We can argue around the edges but the result has been a low inflation environment where we know from one year to the next what the dollar will be worth against a basket of goods here in New Zealand. Likewise, the Fiscal Responsibility Act was quite controversial when it was introduced in 1994, but its provisions are now hardly controversial. It survived the introduction of MMP, changes of Government, and several elections. Again, that legislation did not constrain a Government or a Minister of Finance in any way, but it required a transparency about the decision making of Cabinet and, therefore, an accountability that hitherto we had not seen.

Before the Fiscal Responsibility Act we had Governments in power making financial commitments, on behalf of the taxpayer, that no one knew about—or could know about—till after an election, which would always come as a surprise to an incoming Government. Indeed, we had a situation where it made sense for a Government, essentially, to borrow to fund consumption spending, to fund Government spending, in order to buy votes, and to leave the bill for future generations, which was the exact opposite of how we think now about good environmental policy. It certainly should be the exact opposite of how we think about good Government policy or good economic policy.

We had Governments borrowing endlessly to pay for their election promises—so much so, that by the 1980s one dollar in four of the income tax bill was spent entirely on servicing that debt, which was loading down future generations, future taxpayers, and of course voters who were not able to vote in the election; hence its purpose. With the introduction of the Fiscal Responsibility Act, Governments had to undertake to follow a process whereby every 6 months they advised the Treasurer of all spending decisions, and every 6 months the Treasurer was required to do a Budget, stretching out 4 years. So there was a transparency to decision making that Governments previously had not had. Also within that legislation a Government had to demonstrate or test its Budget against some key criteria, such as a surplus or a deficit. Again, there was no requirement that it ran a surplus or did not run a deficit. But that simple requirement of transparency has meant that since 1994 Governments have run a surplus, which I think has been a fantastic thing in the long run. Hitherto, for three generations Governments had run deficits.

The Regulatory Responsibility Bill attempts to do that for law. It is a bit harder, and I have to say that I am not clever enough to have done this on my own; I have had a great deal of help. The bill sets up a similar process, whereby Parliament and Governments have to be more transparent and more open about their lawmaking. Indeed, I have tried to set out some criteria of good lawmaking, against which proposed legislation would have to be assessed. Those criteria are set out in clause 6. Again, I hasten to add, I do not believe that I have got it all right or that this is the last word on the subject, but I think it is a good first cut at the issue of asking how we would provide, in a comprehensive way, in a systemic way—that is to say, across all legislation—a proper process whereby we have transparency, and therefore accountability, of a Government, of a Parliament, for the laws we are making.

I hasten to add that nothing in this bill undermines parliamentary sovereignty or a Government’s ability to pass law. That would be the wrong approach to this bill. There is nothing in this bill that attempts to tie up a Government in red tape; there is nothing in this bill to slow down the process by which a Government could pass law. All it does is require that a process be followed and information be supplied, which has to be a good thing.

I have to say that nothing has gladdened my heart more than the constructive engagement that I have had with all political parties in this House on the matter, and the constructive engagement that I have had with people who are concerned about this issue. I am pleased to say that we do have the numbers to put this bill to the select committee. The select committee that I will be recommending is the Commerce Committee, and I am hopeful, with the National Party’s support, to be subbed on to it to hear this bill. I have been to see and would like to thank the Law Commission and Sir Geoffrey Palmer, who has some criticism of this bill, particularly the ouster clause—he thought that would be more mischief than it is worth. Although he has some concerns, he does appreciate that this is an important issue. Getting the bill to a select committee for a proper debate will be a good first step, and I am sure we will be hearing from the Law Commission.

I should also say to my friends in the Māori Party, who obviously have a concern about collective rights and, in particular, the rights of tribal groups, which have often been trampled in the history of New Zealand, that I may not have expressed this well in the bill but, of course, collective rights all spring from individual rights. There is not an inherent conflict between recognising the rights of the individual and recognising the rights of a group. In fact, if we put group rights first, the rights of the individual are trampled, so I believe that this bill strengthens the Māori position in respect of, say, customary title, to the extent that it is recognised in our common law traditions very, very well. I certainly want to give a commitment to recognising existing rights and customary title, and with that, I look forward to the debate and the discussion.

MARYAN STREET (Labour) Link to this

I find myself in the novel position of rising to speak in support of a bill in the name of Mr Rodney Hide. People may be surprised at how much Rodney Hide and I have in common. We both used to spend a lot more time than we do now with Richard Prebble and Roger Douglas, myself in the 1980s and Mr Hide more recently. We are both refugees from academia, although we have yet to establish a parliamentary alumni club.

Labour is prepared to support this bill going to a select committee. While we may not initially be very attracted to it, it should be seen in the context of a range of other work being done currently, and a member’s bill is a worthwhile mechanism to apply more light to the area of regulation than might already be being applied by the work currently being undertaken. So if we are to see this bill in the context of other work, there are two other pieces of work that the House needs to be aware of, and certainly that the Commerce Committee needs to take into account, in considering Mr Hide’s bill.

The first is the Quality Regulation Review that the Minister of Commerce, the Hon Lianne Dalziel, has been pushing through since last year, and I want to refer to some of the work that has been done in the context of that Quality Regulation Review. One of the very important aims of that review was in fact to do away with a substantial amount of red tape, where it was proven to be unnecessary and restrictive. Some of that work has clearly been done already, and has been released into the public arena, and the Quality Regulation Review is heading into its final stages and is on track for completion in July 2007.

Good progress has been made to address the regulatory concerns of business, with a number of initiatives having been achieved. Those solutions have varied in nature and in scope, and include, amongst many other things, some direct responses to individual businesses, some changes to administrative processes and procedures, some legislative enactments, some proposals for further legislative amendments, and some changes to Government mechanisms and processes for developing legislation and regulation. Relevant departments have been directed to undertake further work and report to the ministerial group overseeing the review on a number of other issues. Much of this has been outlined in the second milestone report that the Minister released at the beginning of May this year.

In amongst that work, there has been a range of work streams. One of them that has been completed has been the sector studies, which have involved interviews with businesses of four sectors, and regulatory issues pertaining to those four sectors have been passed to the relevant departments for their response. The final report on that is due in the middle of this year—in fact, next month, I think. Another area where there has been work on the issues of regulation has been the interface study, which concerns the interaction of building and resource consent processes, and the findings on that were released in February 2007. A number of other instruments and work streams have also been used to apply to this area of regulation.

It is important to note that new, strengthened regulatory impact analysis requirements were agreed by Cabinet at the end of last year, and came into force on 1 April this year. The standards and conformance infrastructure review will also be enacted, and has already been reported. I highlight these things because they are all important areas of activity, and, as I mentioned earlier, the member’s bill should be seen in the context of contributing to that ongoing discussion—which is across-party—that there should be as much regulation as necessary, and as little as required, across business in particular.

I want to mention one other piece of work, as well. It comes because I am also a member of the Regulations Review Committee. The Regulations Review Committee is currently undergoing a review of all regulation. Such a review was last done in 1993, I think, and that resulted in a whole lot of unnecessary regulations, which had long since been superseded by events, being taken off the books. That was a good thing, and it is clear, even from our preliminary investigation as a select committee into regulations, that a similar benefit could be gained, already, from the work we have done.

But the more important point—and this is one of the points that I think Rodney Hide’s bill may draw out and put into the public arena for discussion—is the relationship between legislation and regulation. We have a lot of delegated regulation, delegated from primary legislation, and that relationship is worth exploring again to see whether we are addressing it in the most efficient way, in the most useful way and, in fact, in a way that allows our statute book to be kept up to date and pertinent, and that allows for regulations needing to be applied to remain before those people who need to enact them, who need to respond to them, and, further than that, who need to report on them.

So I welcome a number of the issues that Rodney Hide’s bill raises, in the context of the work already being done on our regulatory environment. The Labour Party has no problem with this bill being referred to the select committee for further public discussion. I welcome dialogue on the measures contained in this bill, just as I welcome dialogue between the parties in this House on all matters, on a case by case basis. In that spirit, I am pleased to advise the House that the Labour Party will support this measure going to the select committee. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

JOHN CARTER (National—Northland) Link to this

It gives me great pleasure to rise to speak to this bill and to say that the National Party will be supporting it to the select committee. I want to say to the author of the bill—

R DOUG WOOLERTON (NZ First) Link to this

New Zealand First will support the Regulatory Responsibility Bill, in Rodney Hide’s name, going to a select committee. We think that bills such as this stimulate thought and allow a select committee and Parliament to re-examine current law and lawmaking practices. But we can give no guarantee, and none is expected, I know, that we will support it any further. We will look to see what the select committee says about it, and we will hear what lawyers and those sorts of people say about it, as well. We know, and Rodney Hide has told us, that those people have some concerns already, and I have a report to that effect. So there are some deep concerns about this bill.

Sometimes with the best will in the world, bills such as this that try to improve transparency, improve good lawmaking, and try to make things easier as it were, in fact do quite the opposite. I suspect that might be correct, if the Law Society is to be believed, in the case of this bill. If that is so, we will not support it. If that is incorrect, we will have another look at the bill, and, hopefully, support it further.

In a select committee today we had such a situation. Mr Hide mentioned the fiscal responsibility legislation, where part of that is being looked at because things that were brought in during the late 1990s to make life easier and more transparent and to make Ministers more accountable have ballooned out to at least twice the size they were when they were originally mooted. They are not serving the purpose they were designed for. The ministries involved have said of their own volition that we need to relook at this, and that we need to make these things serve the purpose that was originally intended.

In many cases the modern way of reporting is no better than that in past years. It is different, it is sharper, it is flasher, and it is more colourful, but in many cases it is not necessarily better. It is up to us in this Parliament to re-examine these things from time to time, and that is why we support this bill. We believe that the select committee will be prodded to look at the way we do business. Hopefully, if this bill is not to go through, perhaps some good can come of it in another way. Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker.

NANDOR TANCZOS (Green) Link to this

I was reflecting while I was preparing my speech on this Regulatory Responsibility Bill on how times have changed since I came to this House in 1999. At that time, a member’s bill from the ACT party—or the Green Party, for that matter—would usually attract the response of: “Well, we kind of like the idea, but we are not going to support it, because it’s from them.” Today we have parties saying: “Well, we are not sure whether we like the idea, but let’s see if we can support it, because it’s from them.” I think that is a good thing, and I have to say that I think the Green Party has been part of promoting a different approach to cooperation across this House. It is our view that MMP parties should support members’ bills, at least for the first reading—especially of other MMP parties but also across the House, because members’ bills have made an important contribution to our democracy—except where there are good reasons not to. So we approached this bill looking for reasons to support it.

Mr Hide has done an excellent job of going around and talking to the parties, and I congratulate him on the wide degree of support he has for this bill—I think he has done a very good job in that. Mr Hide mentioned to the Greens that although the bill does not currently contain any provisions around green issues, nevertheless that is something we could look at and there might be opportunity to introduce some of those things. I am certainly very attracted to the idea of a kind of environmental vet on legislation and regulations, similar to a kind of New Zealand Bill of Rights Act vet. In the context of a Parliament such as ours—a majoritarian, single-Chamber Parliament, with no single constitutional document—the idea that there would be some kind of environmental constraint on the executive is an attractive one.

In the way that the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act recognises human rights and we recognise children’s rights, it would be something that would recognise environmental rights. Environmental rights are not just the rights of humans to enjoy a clean environment, but also the intrinsic rights of other species to inhabit the planet that they are a part of just as we are. So there are some things to attract us there.

We also looked at the bill in light of the fact that the Greens are suspicious of the power of the State. The libertarian tendency that we share with the ACT party is one of the things that has joined our two parties at various times.

TE URUROA FLAVELL (Māori Party—Waiariki) Link to this

Tēnā koe, Mr Deputy Speaker; kia ora anō tātou katoa i te pō nei.

[Greetings to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and to all of us again tonight.]

The Māori Party welcomes the focus of responsible regulatory management as an opportunity to debate principles. We share an interest in the study of Acts and regulations, seeking to observe and preserve principles that will enhance the law in a way that is coherent and workable. Uppermost in our analysis of any bill will be whether the legislation aligns with kaupapa and tikanga Māori.

We do not have any argument as such with the rationale for this Regulatory Responsibility Bill to respond to the fact that too many Acts and regulations are a result of undue haste, poor quality processes, and inadequate scrutiny. Clause 6 of the bill, and subclause (2)(f) in particular, reinforces kotahitanga, the principles of unity of purpose and direction. We absolutely agree that Acts and regulations should be written in such a way as to avoid imprecision and complexity, thereby enhancing the likelihood of citizens being able to understand and comply with the law. Helping ordinary people to understand laws by moving away from legal jargon to plain English is to be applauded, and it is a move that the Māori Party, at least, fully supports. But we are not convinced that this bill is the only vehicle for achieving that change.

Clause 6 in particular has generated some concern for us; subclause (2)(f)(vi), to be precise. It states that one principle of regulatory management is that Acts and regulations: “respect the principle of equality under the law, to which end legislation is to be general and abstract and is not to confer rights or benefits on particular categories of persons per se whether on the basis of gender, race, creed, religion, time, place, or otherwise.”

We have a saying: “kia ngaki i te mate”, which, loosely interpreted, means “to make right that which is wrong”. The provision of affirmative action is consistent with such a principle. It is a means of balancing out an uneven playing field; a field in which one-half of New Zealand owns 95 percent of our total net worth. And the other half? Well, unsurprisingly, it is Pasifika peoples and Māori, the young, and the members of single-parent families, who are left to fight it out for the remaining 5 percent of our national wealth. As it stands, clause 6(2)(f)(vi) disallows legislation from conferring “rights or benefits” on particular categories of persons. We believe that this point needs some consideration.

You see, the clearest statement about the equality of New Zealanders is in article 3 of the Treaty of Waitangi, where the Crown extends to Māori the Queen’s protection, affording to Māori “all the rights and privileges of British subjects”. The ideal that everybody is equal should, of course, translate into people being treated the same, but there are enough examples to demonstrate that this is not actually the reality for many, many people. Just this morning it was reported that there is a rate of pay for workers being dubbed “the South Auckland rate”, and guess what? The rate is less than that paid in any other part of the country where the firm concerned has outlets. Further, the workers are the working poor, many of whom are Māori and Pasifika.

Equality depends on that level playing field—the basis from which one assesses the right to equality. As any analysis of our nation today would confirm, all are not equal. Just as wealth is not evenly distributed, so too are many of the victims of crime. Unsurprisingly again, those most at risk from crime are Māori and Pasifika peoples, the young, the single, solo parents—those living in the most deprived deciles of our community.

What this nation really needs to engage in is a debate about how substantive equality is achieved in practice. Equity of outcomes may require differential treatment, because we know that justice is not served by a simple matter of equality of treatment.

We have considered seriously the bill presented by the ACT party, and we were certainly keen to cooperate in supporting different ideas and different views going to the policy table as a part of the formula of the MMP environment. But we need to say that any proposal that cuts across initiatives to support the poor, the brown, and the disadvantaged minority cultures is not a proposal that we believe to be in the best interests of a healthy nation. We will be looking at this matter very closely.

Finally, regarding the rights of people, there are already well-established principles, we think, that are meant to protect the individual rights and the collective rights of indigenous peoples, as recognised at common law. Unless this bill specifically recognises indigenous rights, experience shows that they will not be protected and indeed that they would be subordinated to the individual property rights of Pākehā, as happened in the foreshore and seabed legislation. Therefore, I say to Mr Hide that the question for the ACT party would be whether it is willing to acknowledge the distinct nature of indigenous rights, and thus acknowledge the broader notion of tino rangatiratanga.

The Māori Party has considered Mr Hide’s bill and will support the motion for it to go to a select committee in the hope that it opens up the debate, but we ask that the concerns we have expressed at this point in time be taken cognisance of. We, like Mr Tanczos, appreciate the efforts made by Mr Hide to consult us over this matter. Kia ora tātou.

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future) Link to this

I want to begin by congratulating Mr Hide on bringing the Regulatory Responsibility Bill to the House, and to say that we will certainly be supporting it enthusiastically. Only he could make the extraordinary achievement of representing a deregulatory party that brings a bill to the House to regulate responsibility, and of getting the support of virtually all parties in the House. It is a considerable achievement.

But, seriously, it is an important bill. I feel a little embarrassed standing here speaking in favour of it when I have a bill before the House, at the moment, that is 2,700 pages long—the Income Tax Bill—because I am sure that Mr Hide would say that there is a lot of unnecessary regulation in that. But, actually, as he well knows, it is a rewrite of the legislation in plain language. This bill is important, and I hope it receives more than a cursory consideration by a select committee, because some of the provisions it contains, particularly in clause 6, are relevant not just to the way in which entities of Government behave, but to the way in which we make law in this country.

I want to draw attention to a couple of the provisions in clause 6(3). One of the things we do in this country—and we have been known for it for years—is legislate whenever we are in doubt. We pass a law to make something legal or illegal, as the case may be, but we are not so rapid when it comes to deciding whether the use-by date of that law has been reached. I welcome the provision in this bill that the regulatory responsibility statement needs to indicate whether there is actually a continuing need for the Act or regulation that is under consideration, and, if so, to identify the purposes and the reasons why such a need is there. That is something we could regularly take on board and apply to all legislation in this country.

As I say, we pass a lot of laws, but we do not repeal very much of that legislation subsequently. Nor do we do much in terms of actually assessing what the national interest is, when it comes to the passage of legislation. The Minister will get up and make a speech saying why a bill is needed, and the select committee will be advised by officials as to why Government policy is being implemented, but we do not have a more thorough analysis of the national interest than that. It is ironic that we now have a more thorough national interest analysis for foreign treaties that we enter into than we do for legislation passed by this Parliament. So I think that if some of those principles could be considered as part of the normal Government legislative ebb and flow, that would be a positive step forward. It would also be a positive step forward to look at setting out the agency that will actually be responsible for the administration of the Act, or the regulation as the case may be. Again, we tend to make the assumption that this department or that department will have a general responsibility for administration, but in the normal course of events we are not particularly good at sheeting home where that responsibility lies.

I suspect that beyond the particular provisions of the bill, if it survives to make its way into law, its real impact will be attitudinal. Its real impact will be on bureaucrats and on Ministers, in terms of making them consider whether a law or a regulation is actually required to give effect to a particular policy choice, and whether a law or a regulation ought to be retained once that policy choice has been either implemented or exhausted. I suspect that is as much what Mr Hide is driving at as the need to have less legislation passed by Parliament each year. I think he is also looking at whether, in fact, we need to be going down, as we invariably do, the legislative route on just about every occasion.

There are good cases made for legislation at particular times, but I think that too often we adopt that as the way forward because it is the safe way forward. That then becomes the bureaucratic way forward, and what it then tends to do is create a climate and a culture around it that sees some very good ideas being perverted by the way in which they are interpreted. I will give the House one example. It is one I have some personal interest in, because I was responsible for its early preparation—that is, the Privacy Act. The notion of protecting people’s privacy is a very good one, but I have to say that the bureaucracy that has grown up around it is in many cases farcical, irrelevant, and far beyond what was intended by the original legislation. I think that had something like this bill been in place at the time that that legislation was passed, then, first, a number of those attitudes would have been curbed, and, secondly, maybe the legislation itself would have been much tighter in the way in which it was drafted.

I welcome the introduction of this bill, but I hope that it does more than just go to a select committee, get cursorily considered there, then be discharged by the House at a later date. I think this is important. The bill deserves to pass, and I congratulate Mr Hide on bringing it to our attention.

HEATHER ROY (Deputy Leader—ACT) Link to this

I stand up very proudly to support the Regulatory Responsibility Bill in the name of my colleague Rodney Hide, and I am very pleased indeed that it will pass through this first reading tonight and go to a select committee for further hearing, investigation, and public submission, which is a very important part of the process that we value hugely. This bill will, in fact, change the political landscape in which we all operate and in which laws and regulations are passed.

What exactly does the bill do? The Regulatory Responsibility Bill means that each law and regulation will have to be measured against principles of responsible management. Those people who live in a business environment and those of us who take the passing of law and regulation very seriously will recognise the value of this. Important questions will have to be asked and answered before a new law or regulation is made. These would be questions like why this regulation is needed, what side effects it might have, and whether there any unintended consequences we have not thought of.

All laws and regulations will have to be reassessed every 5 years so that rules that are failing to meet their aims, and regulations that have passed their use-by dates—and we can all probably think of any number of those that are on our statute book at the moment—can be identified and removed. These assessments would be published, so that the public can see whether the Government is acting responsibly. Each and every one of us who sits in this House has a public duty to do just that.

Here are some of the questions that would be asked. Why is this bill needed? What will it achieve? What is likely to happen if it does not pass? Are there any unintended consequences or side effects of a particular piece of legislation? Are there any alternatives? What makes this the best option? If anyone’s legal rights or property rights are being infringed, whose are they? Do they consent, and are they being properly compensated? Does the regulation follow the principles of responsible regulatory management? When will the regulation next be reviewed? These are all very important questions, and questions that I think are very often overlooked or not given a moment’s thought when regulations and laws are put in place.

What if a regulation does not meet the principles? None of us, of course, can limit the things that future Parliaments might do or are able to do, but we can make sure that they explain why decisions are made, so that Kiwis can make up their own minds about whether the right actions are being taken. A law or regulation can still be passed that does not follow the principles of responsible regulatory management, but the Minister for Economic Development would need to publish an explanation of why it was passed in this instance.

Some of these matters may be approached in very different ways. Rodney Hide himself has said that this bill is not perfect, but it is very important that it goes to select committee so that those who may have greater expertise than we had when putting this bill together, and those who feel they have something to contribute—maybe an alternative to achieve the same aim—can come to the committee and have their concerns heard. In fact, those members around the select committee table can make changes if it is deemed that those changes are a better way of achieving our aim.

Something that ACT members have talked about ever since we have been in this Parliament is how to cut red tape. There is always a lot of talk from both sides of the House about this. So how will this bill cut red tape? We certainly believe that it will. The bill will not directly remove red tape but it allows new and existing rules to be measured against the principles of responsible regulatory management, making it easy for ineffective rules and those with high compliance costs to be identified. Letting the public find out which rules fail the test puts pressure on politicians, as is right and proper, to clean up bad laws and regulations from the past and encourages us all to think carefully about, and to pass, rules that are good for our future.

We thank those parties that have supported us in this measure. This is a very good bill; it considers very important measures and very important principles. It gives us great pleasure that it will pass through its first reading tonight and be referred to the select committee.

DAVE HEREORA (Labour) Link to this

I take this opportunity to take a call and restate my colleagues’ comments surrounding Labour’s position—that is, that we will support this bill’s referral to the select committee. I do think it is important that we have that debate, and the select committee process will allow us to enjoy some of the advice that might come to us in relation to regulatory responsibilities. Having said that, it is good sense, I think, that we are monitoring, talking about, and debating good lawmaking systems and processes, because we do not necessarily want to find that there are unintended consequences, where the rights of people are compromised.

The possibility of a regulatory responsibility bill was considered, and not pursued, by both recent National and Labour-led Governments. Instead of setting high-level principles for public service legislation, the Government has focused on strengthening institutional measures to improve regulatory design.

The aim of this bill is to ensure that principles of responsible regulatory management are always in the minds of those responsible for legislation, and that is about ensuring we have good lawmaking systems and processes. Many of these principles are equivalent to those in a proposed regulatory responsibility bill from 1997 and 1998, with a few significant exceptions. They are also largely the same as the current requirements and processes set out in the Cabinet Manual, the Regulatory Impact Analysis requirements, the Code of Good Regulatory Practice, the Generic Policy Development Process, and the Legislation Advisory Committee guidelines. So essentially this bill would be, in some way, a duplication.

During April and March of 1998 the Government considered introducing a regulatory responsibility bill. The proposal was canvassed with a group of experts. The group did not reach agreement on whether legislation was needed to catalyse cultural change in the public service or to reinforce institutional measures such as the Code of Good Regulatory Practice. The experts group also debated and came to no clear consensus on whether the problem of poor regulation at the time could instead be addressed by improving the capability of public servants to develop good regulation, contracting for good regulation through the employment contracts of chief executives, the further development of best practice and the greater provision of this throughout the public service, the private sector, interest groups, and the public review of regulations by analysis with regulatory oversight, and whether this review should be of the process or of the process and substance of regulation, and the creation of a ministerial portfolio that may have additional powers of review.

Other discussions concerned whether the legislating of high level principles would be a good way of signalling a cultural change in the public service or whether it would limit the future development of principles and good regularity practice, whether the legislation would need to be subject to judicial review to be effective, and whether that would leave the Government open to litigation and give courts an undue influence on policy. Many of the instrumental measures identified during discussions on the 1998 bill have since been implemented.

I want to make a note of future deliveries to 31 July 2007. A business-cost calculator that determines the compliance costs of proposed regulation on business will be ready for application within Government departments in the first half of 2007 for a 2-year trial, and Cabinet has agreed to a detailed work programme to be undertaken during 2007-08 by the Department of Building and Housing, the Department of Internal Affairs, the Ministry for the Environment, and Local Government New Zealand to help resolve issues around the interface of the Resource Management Act and the Building Act, including possible legislative amendments.

So having said that, I reiterate that we are supporting the passage of this bill to the select committee. I also reiterate that it is good sense to have this debate and to seek advice to ensure that we are, indeed, setting the right systems and processes in place for good lawmaking.

MARK BLUMSKY (National) Link to this

I am delighted to have this chance to stand and support this Regulatory Responsibility Bill, and good on Rodney.

RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) Link to this

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and I thank everyone who spoke on this Regulatory Responsibility Bill and the important issue that we need to address. In particular I thank John Carter and Mark Blumsky for their good words. I also thank Chris Finlayson who, when ACT went around speaking with the other parties, had some good ideas on how the bill could be even further improved. So I look forward to Mr Finlayson’s input.

I also thank Maryan Street and Dave Hereora for their kind words on the bill, and, in particular, Prime Minister Helen Clark for supporting the bill at least to select committee, realising that this is a serious issue. I think it is a great maturing of MMP, because the easiest thing for a Government to do when a bill comes up from an Opposition party—particularly from a small Opposition party—is just to kick it away. What we have seen is a Prime Minister and a Government that are prepared to look at an issue that is not necessarily their preferred or ideal solution and say: “Well, actually, let’s get it to a select committee and see what happens.” Thankfully these days no one thinks that that is a big disaster for the Government or a big win for the Opposition; it is just an MMP Parliament at work, and I appreciate that. I also appreciate the support of United Future and Peter Dunne—he has consistently been keen on a bill of this nature—and, indeed, New Zealand First for its support.

I say to the Green members that I am sorry they could not support the bill. I know what it is like. Sometimes we too have to sit outside and watch the rest of Parliament hold hands and vote for something. But I hope the Greens can come along to the select committee, because I do think that there are issues regarding the environment that could be treated, if Parliament was of a mind, within a framework whereby we give consideration to environmental issues. I do not have the answer on that front, but I think it would be interesting to have some good input from people who are expert on the matter as to how that might be done. I imagine a sort of environmental checklist on legislation, again, not constraining Parliament or a Government, but just ensuring good policy-making and good legislation.

I think the Māori Party raises an important issue, and it is this: we do not want to lock in the status quo. We do not want to be in a position whereby we are all fine and we do not worry about particular groups in our community or country. Where we have issues where people have historically been wronged or missed out, it is important that we address them and try to get everyone in New Zealand succeeding. So I take the Māori Party’s concerns to heart, and I think it is important that all legislation has particular regard to minority groups. I use the word “groups” carefully and well in the sense that it is very easy to be a member of the majority and think that everything is going OK and that this or that particular legislation is OK. But if one identifies with a particular group for whatever reason—sexual orientation, ethnicity, or tangata whenua status—then it is very easy in the whole legislative process to feel that one is shut out and that the majority does rule. So anything we can do within the bill to be more respectful of the many minority groups we have in New Zealand would, I think, be a good thing.

So I think there is work to do in the select committee. I think the bill can be improved, and I value every political party’s consideration of the bill, even the Greens’. Although they voted against it, I know that they considered it well. I believe that with good will we can come up with a better approach to making good law in this Parliament.