Thrice thwarted previously, the Act Party’s Regulatory Standards Bill is set to pass in 2025, ushering in a new – and potentially controversial – era for government rule-making. Here’s everything you need to know.
Before public submissions for the Treaty principles bill came to a close on Tuesday, a separate Act Party-led bill some believe to be “flying under the radar” saw a flurry of 11th-hour attention. The Regulatory Standards Bill, to be introduced to parliament in the first half of this year, aims to shake up all levels of government regulation in Aotearoa, and, unlike the Treaty principles bill, is destined to pass into law under the National-Act coalition agreement.
Submissions on a proposal document discussing the bill’s likely key components closed on Monday night after an eight-week consultation period that was largely overshadowed by the introduction of the Treaty principles bill (submissions opened on the day the hīkoi against that bill arrived in Wellington). But with some considering the two bills natural companions, there has been a burst of last-minute social media campaigning against the Regulatory Standards Bill, with some legal scholars issuing grave warnings about its potential implications.
What’s all this about?
The current iteration of the bill is yet to be drafted, but it will be based on a 2021 Regulatory Standards Bill that Seymour introduced as a member’s bill, which did not pass its first reading. That was Act’s third attempt to introduce essentially the same bill, with the first attempt, 2006’s Regulatory Responsibility Bill, being blocked by Labour at select committee stage. After Act signed a confidence and supply agreement with the new National government in 2008, party leader Rodney Hide became regulatory reform minister, and a “regulatory responsibility taskforce” was set up the following year. It recommended the renamed Regulatory Standards Bill in 2011 but it failed to pass amid opposition from Treasury. The original idea for the bill came from a 2001 report titled Constraining Government Regulation by the New Zealand Initiative (then known as the New Zealand Business Roundtable).
The 2025 iteration will have one key change from the 2021 version: the establishment of a regulatory standards board to consider complaints about existing regulation being inconsistent with the principles laid out in the bill. The earlier bill gave these powers to the courts. The board would be made up of members appointed by Seymour and would have the power to initiate its own reviews, and provide non-binding recommendations to ministers, though it would not be involved in assessing new regulatory proposals.
Sorry, but this all sounds… kind of boring.
Fair. The eyes of many of us would likely glaze over on hearing the bill’s purpose: its official line is “to improve the quality of regulation in New Zealand so regulatory decisions are based on principles of good lawmaking and economic efficiency”. But regulations can impact us in myriad ways and at myriad levels, from ensuring our homes are healthy, to preventing homes from being built at all. These have been kept in check in the past through regulatory impact assessments, the Regulatory Review Committee, judicial review, the Office of the Attorney-General and more recently, the Ministry for Regulation.
With the Regulatory Standards Bill, Act Party leader and minister for regulation David Seymour argues issues with poor productivity, low wages and a lack of transparency in lawmaking will be addressed by setting a benchmark “for good regulation through a set of regulatory principles that all regulation should comply with”. Though some principles are uncontroversial, others have been criticised for their decidedly libertarian flavour, with an emphasis on personal liberty, property rights and “equality”.
The bill will require that “every person is equal before the law”, and that legislation should not reduce personal liberty, security, freedom of choice or action or right to own, use and dispose of property (except when necessary to protect the freedoms and rights of another). Laws would be unable to take or impair a person’s property without consent, or “good justification” or “fair compensation” (the principles do not include a scope of what would be considered reasonable justification or compensation). The will also say that “unnecessary regulatory burdens and undue compliance costs should be eliminated or minimised”.
What are the main concerns?
An interim regulatory impact statement (RIS) on the bill prepared by Seymour’s Ministry of Regulation expressed concerns about embedding rigid principles in legislation as they wouldn’t be able to be adapted to evolving regulatory best practice or societal expectations. It preferred building on the current disclosure statement regime – to assist in parliamentary and public scrutiny of every new bill, a document with information about the development and content of it is published – plus new legislative provisions to support regulatory stewardship and the review and reporting roles of the Ministry for Regulation.
The ministry also released a preliminary Treaty impact analysis, which noted that a lack of any reference to te Tiriti o Waitangi “may be seen as politically significant for Māori and could be perceived as an attempt by the Crown to limit the established role of the Treaty/te Tiriti as part of law-making”.
Legal scholars, meanwhile, have expressed concern over the bill’s apparent goal of embedding ideological principles – some of which Victoria University law lecturer Dean Knight described as “strongly libertarian in character” – in our “constitutional blueprint”. “The key point is that many of these legislative design principles are not above politics or universally agreed – and therefore unsuitable for the type of constitutional blueprint this bill contemplates,” Knight tweeted. “Better ways forward would be to create a legislative design select committee charged with vetting for compliance with constitutional, human rights and legislative quality principles in the Legislation Guidelines, Bill of Rights, te Tiriti, etc.”
Jane Kelsey, emeritus law professor at the University of Auckland, has been a longtime critic of all versions of this bill, and earlier this week reiterated her concerns to RNZ about the potential consequences of light-handed regulation or self-regulation, which she said had “helped deliver the leaky buildings crisis, the Pike River mine tragedy, workplace deaths in forestry and on farms, finance company collapses, unsafe aged care and dangerous adventure tourism, among other failures”.
She also criticised the bill’s focus on private property rights over other considerations. “All of those things that might be precious to many of us, social considerations, environment considerations, Te Tiriti o Waitangi, will be subordinated, if not, deemed irrelevant, in the policy and legislative making processes,” Kelsey said.
Writing in the NZ Herald, Lady Tureiti Moxon, chair of the National Urban Māori Authority, criticised the bill for failing to honour the Treaty and for its focus on equality over equity. “This bill is a regression, a backward step when what we need is a fair and just future built on justice, equity, and respect,” she wrote.
The 2011 version of the bill was criticised by former chief parliamentary counsel George Tanner. Though he agreed that “no one would deny the necessity for legislation to be of a higher standard”, he wrote that the bill “suffers from an acute lack of problem definition and does not properly identify and assess workable alternatives”.
A year prior, former Herald economics editor Brian Fallow feared that “radical legislation, gravid with constitutional danger, will be smuggled into the statute book disguised as a measure to relieve business of vexatious red tape”. He noted that a group of lawyers and economists who had been at a presentation for the proposed legislation “almost without exception were critical of the draft bill”.
In 2023, economist Brian Easton wrote of his concerns about Act’s proposal to introduce the bill, saying its focus on private property rights and compensation was particularly “troubling”.
Does the bill have any support?
Business lobby group BusinessNZ has been positive about the forthcoming legislation, with chief executive Katherine Rich saying, “Our members have consistently called for something to be done about poor regulations holding back many businesses from achieving profitability. They know that excessive regulation holds back productivity and wage growth.” In the group’s draft submission, however, Rich warned that “a strong focus on rights and liberties might conflict with public interest goals, such as safety protection. This could require trade-offs that are politically and socially challenging.” The submission also emphasised that appointments to the regulatory standards board should be based on expertise and not politically motivated.
What happens next?
According to a proactively released cabinet paper, Seymour will report back to cabinet by February on the outcome of consultation and to “seek agreement to policy decisions”. The bill will be introduced to parliament in the first half of the year, and will be open to public submissions at select committee stage.
