UPDATED: Our submission on the Regulatory Standards Bill
We have written a submission on the Regulatory Standards Bill (the Bill). We urge the Government to not proceed with the Bill in its current form.
The purpose of the Bill at first sounds benign: to improve the quality and transparency of New Zealand’s law-making. But the way in which it seeks to do that is incredibly flawed, and would make climate and environmental lawmaking harder, more expensive, and slower.
The climate context
The realities of climate change are already here. NASA and the World Meteorological Organisation have confirmed that 2024 was the warmest year on record, with temperatures already surpassing 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. Last year, the Climate Change Commission warned that New Zealand is not on track to meet its statutory 2050 net-zero target, and the Government’s Second Emissions Reduction Plan does not put New Zealand on track to achieve its third emissions budget.
The Bill must be viewed within this context. It’s critical that our laws and regulations enable Aotearoa New Zealand’s transition to a low-emissions economy - rather than hold it back.
Why this Bill would hold back good climate and environmental law-making
At the heart of the Bill are the “principles of responsible regulation” set out in clause 8, which provide the benchmark for laws to be tested against. While purporting to embody abstract aspirations for “good” legislation, in reality, these principles promote a set of subjective values about “liberties” and “property” - placing a disproportionate emphasis on private interests, while failing to give weight to countervailing collective interests in environmental and climate protection.
For climate and environmental lawmaking, the consequences of the narrow and selective principles are potentially significant:
This Bill could have a chilling effect on pro-climate and environmental laws and regulations by assuming the prioritisation and protection of individual liberties and property rights, while not providing any weight to collective interests such as the right to a safe and healthy environment. In practice, for instance, it means that laws or regulations designed to protect natural areas will be viewed primarily as restrictions on a landowner’s use of their property, rather than in terms of the benefits that arise from things like preserving biodiversity acting as a carbon sink.
The principles embed norms of rule and regulation-making that are inconsistent with our international obligations and the complex needs of modern society. Omitting consideration of the precautionary principle, for instance, risks favouring law-making that is short-term in focus and reactive, leading to worse decision-making on climate and environmental issues and imposing higher costs on the public in the long run. This is compounded by the lack of an intergenerational lens.
The principles are open to a wide range of interpretations that will create uncertainty, confusion, and delays.
We also submitted on the discussion paper for this Bill in January 2025, see our submission here.