O'Rourke Denis: Land Transport (Speed Limits Validation and Other Matters) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeO'Rourke Denis: Land Transport (Speed Limits Validation and Other Matters) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading[Sitting date: 21 July 2015. Volume:707;Page:5141. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First):With regard to Part 1 I would like to address clause 3 the purpose of the bill. The bill says that the purposes are threefold. First of all they are to “remove any doubt about the validity of speed limits set by road controlling authorities” and so on but the truth is that there has not ever really been any doubt about this. The real situation is that the law as it was stated in the legislation was quite certain especially with regard to the review provisions which seem to be one of the main reasons for this bill.The law was quite clear: the review had to take place and in some cases it did not take place. Where is the doubt about that? There is not. So the purpose in clause 3(a) really is not quite true. The fact is that there was no doubt about that; it is just that some agencies—some councils—did not do as they should have done. Unfortunately as I said in my earlier speech today the result of that was a default to the 100-kilometre-an-hour speed limit which was bad law and it should never have been drafted in that way but it was. These things are not a matter of doubt and the purpose clause should not say so so I object to that in the first place.In clause 3(b) it refers to: “protect enforcement action taken under those bylaws;”. What that really means—and I disagree with Mr David Parker about this too—is that there has been a muck-up and the law that was in force was actually unenforceable and now we want to make new laws that are enforceable. So actually it was not a case of a genuine mistake; it is a case of just plain ineptitude. The fact is that the old law did not do what was required of it and people did not follow the procedures under it and now the Government wishes to rectify that situation by actually making new law out of bad old law. So this situation is not actually in the way that Mr Parker stated it I believe. When it says that the purpose is to protect enforcement action that is really not very true either. The truth is that it is to rectify a cock-up and it cannot say it in those words but there would be words available to say it in a more decorous way.Thirdly it says in clause 3(c) that its purpose is to “provide clear authority for the setting of speed limits by road controlling authorities in the future.” What it should have said is to provide new authority because that is what is actually what was always required and that is what this bill does but it does it unfortunately in a way that has a retrospective effect. I agreed with Dr Russel Norman when he said that we should never adopt retrospective legislation especially where it relates to criminal sanctions. That is the worst possible kind of retrospective legislation. People who have already paid fines that they were not liable to pay should actually have those fines refunded and so on. But I understand that it would be very difficult and impracticable to undo all that so that is why New Zealand First is in fact supporting the bill.But we should be more honest—this is the point I am making about the purpose clause clause 3—instead of using these weasel words. So I actually object to the whole drafting of clause 3. We should simply call a spade a spade and do what we have to do but tell the truth about it and that is not what the purpose clause does in this case. It is in fact new legislation and it should not be dressed up as some kind of save-the-world move by the Government. It is actually a cock-up by the Government—and probably the previous one as well—and new legislation has been needed to redress the situation. It is not pretty; it is not good. It does have to be done but let us tell the truth about it. This clause does not and I object to it.Unfortunately New Zealand First will still have to vote for it because to fail to do so would be wrong given the whole circumstances of the case. But I just wish that we were more careful about the way that some of this legislation was drafted in those respects. I will have some more similar comments to make when we come to Part 2.