Submission on Regulatory Standards Bill

Jan 13, 2025

The Regulatory Standards Bill, as I understand it, seeks to bind parliament to a specific range of law-making.

For example, it seems to ensure primacy of individual rights over that of community, environment, te Tiriti and collective interests.

It also binds future parliaments, irrespective of voter intentions, to a particular ideological direction. Part 1, Paragraph 5 of the Bill states clearly and simply:

Act binds the Crown
This Act binds the Crown.

Ref: https://www.legislation.govt.nz/bill/member/2021/0027/latest/whole.html#LMS477250

The wording of the Bill declaring its purpose is subjective, to put it mildly:

The purpose of the Regulatory Standards Bill is to improve the quality of regulation…
The Regulatory Standards Bill aims to improve the quality of regulation in New Zealand…
…provides a benchmark for good regulation…
The Bill provides transparency by requiring those proposing and creating regulation to certify whether the regulation is compatible with the principles…
et al…

The references to “improve the quality of regulation”, “provides a benchmark for good regulation”, etc, is so open to interpretation as to render definitions open to multiple views, depending on who is reading it and what day it is.

For example, placing primacy on “protection of individual liberties, protection of property rights” may elicit full-throated approval from Act Party supporters (246,473 voters in the 2023 General Election), but would be viewed with dismay by those Labour, Green, Te Pāti Māori voters (495,505 in 2023) for whom environmental, social, urban, and te Tiriti issues are generally paramount.

ref: https://archive.electionresults.govt.nz/electionresults_2023/

The Bill appears to impact on how people build their own communities, placing their interests secondary to those of, for example, property developers. Even when property development is in the interest of society as a whole, communities still expect to have a voice, to be heard and to have agency.

A clear example is when citizens in the leafy suburb of Epsom rose up in arms to oppose a Kāinga Ora/Housing NZ development amongst their multi-million dollar homes.

Far from supporting the property rights of Kāinga Ora/Housing NZ to develop its property as it saw fit, Minister Seymour took the side of angry ~~pitchfork-wielding villagers~~ Epsomites to oppose the project.

Dispute over proposed Epsom complex boils over
RNZ - 6:46 pm on 23 May 2018 - Gia Garrick, Political Reporter, @giaisonline
A stoush over a proposed Housing New Zealand complex in an upmarket Auckland suburb shows no sign of being resolved, with the Epsom MP doubling down on his contentious remarks.
ACT Party leader David Seymour sent a letter to locals last week with a line warning that some of the future tenants would have social and mental health issues.
"There is also a chance that some of the future residents will have social and mental health issues who will need to have special support measures in place," the letter read.
It also included lines about the pressure the extra residents would put on local infrastructure, and concern about a lack of on-street parking.
The Banff Avenue site currently holds two rundown social housing buildings, built in the 1970s. Housing New Zealand wants to bowl them and build a five-storey, 25-unit complex in their place.
The government's housing agency has applied for resource consent for the development, but many locals were not happy about the prospect of new neighbours.
"The stories about what some of these precious tenants are like are hair-raising. They're really, really horrible experiences," a Banff Ave resident said.
"We're not actually totally against it, so long as there aren't too many people that cause trouble," another local resident said.
One of the locals with children said he was particularly concerned about safety.
"It is going to mean a lot of law and order and security issues. My children, we already don't allow them to pass that area at night, and we pick them up and drop them off at the bus stop as we don't feel safe in that area as it is. With 25 more residents coming in there, it's going to be a problem for us," he said.
Last week, Epsom MP David Seymour called a public meeting for residents to meet with Housing New Zealand representatives and voice their concerns.
But the invite to the meeting has riled up advocates like Shaun Robinson, the chief executive of the Mental Health Foundation.
Mr Robinson called Mr Seymour's comments misguided and irresponsible.
"Many of the constituents that Mr Seymour wrote to will currently be experiencing mental health problems themselves. To kind of equate it with poverty and undesirable people in your community is completely unacceptable, it's ignorant, and it's completely counter-productive."
"Mental health problems are actually extremely common right throughout the community - 50 percent of all Kiwis are likely to experience a significant mental health problem during their lives," Mr Robinson said.
However, Mr Seymour said locals had genuine concerns about the proposed complex.
"They've had public urination, people yelling at and intimidating them, women being grabbed while going running, parents fearful for their children in the area - and bearing in mind this is a street with a church and a major school on it - people are concerned," he said.
Housing Minister Phil Twyford said he thinks Mr Seymour was "pandering to people's worst prejudices and stirring up NIMBY-ism."
"And the thing that I find most offensive about it is he's stigmatising mental illness in the process," he said.
Housing New Zealand said the current buildings should have been demolished some time ago - and the redevelopment was better use of taxpayers' money than refurbishment.
In response to the criticism that residents were not properly consulted on the matter, an agency spokesman said they first wrote to residents on 18 January, 2018 to let them know Banff Ave was being investigated for future redevelopment. It then informed them on 10 May via letter that Housing New Zealand had applied for resource consent for the redevelopment.
The agency was now working with Mr Seymour's office to set up a community representative group and a meeting was planned before the end of the month.

Ref: https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/358055/dispute-over-proposed-epsom-complex-boils-over

This is a timely reminder that it is the same Minister Seymour (with his Ministry for Regulation) who is promoting this Bill that would have removed the right of Epsomites to object.

(Even National Party supporter, blogger, and Curia Poll director, David Farrar, thought that Mr Seymour was exhibiting double standards by promoting property rights with the one hand, while encouraging NIMBYism with the other.)

https://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2022/04/act_being_nimby_on_housing.html

It is simply undemocratic to expect a government of the day to attempt to bind future parliaments with law limiting their powers.

It would be akin to a socialist government passing an Enabling Standards Bill mandating current and future parliaments to promote legislation that fit only with Marxist-Leninist doctrine. (Many might see no problem with this.)

I am fairly certain that Mr Seymour and his colleagues, especially in the Atlas Network, would have a thing or three to say about such a proposal, none pleasant.

It should also be noted that this Bill appears to be silent on environmental matters. Whether it is fouling our waterways with industrial and agricultural run-off or the existential crisis of climate change, the Bill seems to favour individualism and business activity over all else.

Making a profit while ruining the environment seems a poor way to live on this planet.

Perhaps think of that as we continue to pour megatonnes of carbon dioxide into our atmosphere, acidifying our oceans and instigating even more erratic weather events.

Just how many more Cyclone Gabrielles can we cope with?

How will the Regulatory Standards Bill address such critical problems? Short answer, it won’t. Is this what we really want to leave our children, grand children, and future shareholders?

Conclusions

(A) Therefore, I oppose the Regulatory Standards Bill, its content, its impinging on the democratic process and that this process, along with the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi Bill, has unfairly sought public submission during the Christmas/New Year holiday period.

Far from being transparent as the Bill declares, this process is shrouded in obscurity whilst most people are still on holiday or otherwise engaged in fine-weather (Wellington being the exception) activities, the media is on-hiatus and (ironically) nearly all Members of Parliament are still away on break.

(B) I question the motivation of this Bill’s architect, David Seymour, in carrying out this process at this time of the year.

(C) I call for the next Labour-Greens-Te Pāti Māori coalition to repeal this Bill, should it become law, in their first “100 Days of Action”. It deserves to be binned, never to see the light of day again.

(D) If this Bill is not rejected, its content should be deleted and replaced with this alternative statement:

“(i) Parliament and its standing committees shall not call for submissions on Bills, except in time of civil or international emergency (eg; earthquake, war, pandemic) from 1 December to 31 January.
(ii) If Submissions are called, all of Parliament will be recalled, without exception, to work the process through.”

If the public are expected to read through screeds of parliamentary material and then spend hours or days formulating submissions, then MPs should be on-duty as well to shepherd the democratic process.

[Submitted 13 January 2025, 10.41PM]

POSTSCRIPT (not part of submission)

This was one of the questions and accompanying field-box posed by the Ministry for Regulation, within it's submission process:

It appears that the Ministry for Regulation, intended to reduce bureaucracy and red tape, is pondering (in question form) whether to have more bureaucracy and red tape.

This Mickey Mousery just gets better…

References

Legislation: Regulatory Standards Bill

Electoral Commission: 2023 General Election - Official Result

RNZ: Dispute over proposed Epsom complex boils over

Kiwiblog: ACT being NIMBY on housing

Additional

Ministry for Regulation: The Regulatory Standards Bill

Bluesky: Eddie Clark - The regulatory standards bill as proposed would do 4 things

Other Blogposts

Kiwiblog: ACT being NIMBY on housing

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