Legal experts have raised concerns about the Regulatory Standards Bill, dubbing it the Treaty Principles Bill “2.0”.
Claimant lawyer Tania Waikato and law academic Dr Carwyn Jones appeared on TVNZ’s Marae yesterday to raise their concerns over the legislation and its widespread impact.
Their comments come after the Waitangi Tribunal last week recommended the immediate halt to the bill after a claim was lodged by Māori rights group Toitū Te Tiriti.
The legislation, which was expected to be approved by Cabinet for introduction in the House today, has been led by the ACT Party as part of its coalition agreement with National, with the Minister of Regulation David Seymour leading its charge.
For the full Marae interview, watch on TVNZ+
What is the Regulatory Standards Bill?
According to the minister, the bill’s aim is to “ensure regulatory decisions are based on principles of good law-making and economic efficiency”.
“In a nutshell: If red tape is holding us back, because politicians find regulating politically rewarding, then we need to make regulating less rewarding for politicians with more sunlight on their activities,” Seymour said in a statement.
The bill will require all future and existing legislation to conform to a particular set of criteria.
But the difficulty of that, said Jones, is the criteria is a “very limited set of principles”.
“It is very much focused on things to do with protection of property rights and wealth, and doesn’t include things like environmental protections, and requirements for equity, or indeed any protections for Te Tiriti.
“So all of those rights are weakened by this bill and the assessments that will be required in terms of all law trying to conform with this.”
Treaty Principles Bill 2.0?
Waikato dubbed the proposed legislation the Treaty Principles Bill “version 2.0”.
“We had all of these principles in the Treaty Principles Bill which were going to undermine Te Tiriti, copied and pasted, put it over here, dress it up in complex, legal language that nobody understands, make it sound really boring, not consult with anyone, and then try and shove it through.”
Jones said the Regulatory Standards Bill will provide a means to weaken Treaty protections and remove the legal meaning and effects of Te Tiriti from the law, “which is what the Treaty Principles Bill’s all about”.
“So I think I see the Regulatory Standards Bill really is just finishing off the work that was started by the Treaty Principles Bill, [that was] ultimately rejected.”
Waikato believes all New Zealanders should be concerned, not just Māori.
The power the bill will give to the Regulation Minister over “every single law that comes in” and “every single existing law that we’ve got” is “really dangerous” and “really concerning”, she said.
“Professor Jonathan Boston [academic and professor of policy studies at Victoria University of Wellington], who gave evidence for us in the Tribunal, he calls this ‘the Everything Bill’ because it literally covers everything: every single law, every aspect of society will have to pass through… this control gate that David Seymour is in charge of.”
She said that if the legislation is passed, it will cause a fundamental constitutional shift in Aotearoa.
Seymour responds
ACT leader Seymour reacted to the tribunal decision at the end of last week, saying: “The Tribunal’s main objection is that the Bill requires ‘equality before the law’, which is mentioned repeatedly in the document.
“What it doesn’t understand is that equality before the law is fundamental to a functioning democracy. We can address New Zealand’s problems without racial discrimination.”
