Chauvel Charles: Statutes Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Chauvel Charles: Statutes Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:659;Page:8329] 
CHARLES CHAUVEL (Labour) 
: 
 I will begin my brief contribution this evening by thanking the Labour spokesperson on justice matters the Hon Lianne Dalziel for delegating to me as her associate the responsibility for liaising with the Government on Statutes Amendment bills. I also thank in the same vein the Associate Minister of Justice Nathan Guy for his scintillating contribution. 
Labour will support the amendments contained in this Statutes Amendment Bill but we reserve the right to reconsider any individual amendment in the select committee and obviously in the Committee of the whole House if and when further information arises. I will point to just one or two bits of the legislation that raise some concerns and I signal to the Minister that they are concerns we are going to need to hear more about. These concerns arise in respect of nine of the proposed amendments that appear in the legislation. I did flag these matters to the Minister when I wrote to him on 8 September in response to his letter consulting the Opposition dated 24 August but I think it is appropriate to register the concerns at this very early first reading stage. 
The first of the nine concerns that Labour has relates to the definition of “foreshore” in the National Parks Act 1980 because there is a proposal that that should be amended. At the moment the National Parks Act refers to the definition contained in the Harbours Act 1950 but that has been repealed. So the new definition proposed in clause 103 is: “… any land covered and uncovered by the flow and ebb of the tide at mean spring tides”. In my letter to the Minister I expressed concern that this could have unintended consequences given that there was in progress a review of the Foreshore and Seabed Act at the time of the letter. Now the review has been reported and is being actively considered by the Government and we all await its outcome with baited breath. The Associate Minister of Justice has assured me that the Ministry of Justice and the Attorney General are both satisfied that the change will have no direct effect on the 2004 legislation or the review; we will certainly be keeping that matter under close review. 
The second substantive issue I wanted to draw to the House’s attention was the intended amendment in clause 25 to section 9 of the Births Deaths Marriages and Relationship Registration Act 1995. The intention is to substantively change the meaning of when a parent is unavailable within the meaning of the legislation to sign a birth registration form. Although we in Labour concede that that is a sensible amendment on its face we think that it sails quite close to the definition of what would be a substantive policy change so we want some assurance that it is merely a machinery change. 
The third matter relates to the proposed amendment to section 26ZZQ of the Conservation Act 1987 as substituted under clause 53. The proposed amendment seems to extend the scope of an offence rather than merely correct an error. Again at the select committee or in the Committee of the whole House we are going to want some reassurance about that. 
I will deal more briefly with the other six concerns that I have pointed out to the Minister. First the Juries Amendment Act 2008 is legislation not yet in force that amends the 1981 legislation. That Act is amended by clause 96 to expand the range of jury districts from 30 kilometres to 45 kilometres. That might well just be a sensible amendment but we will want to test the reasons for it. There is also an amendment under Part 26 to the Marriage Act 1955 to change the criteria for the appointment of celebrants. Again it will be important for us to be satisfied that that is appropriate. 
There is an amendment to the Property Law Act 2007 in two sections under clause 117 section 139 and section 156 concerning the circumstances when a mortgagee obtains a court order for possession of mortgage property. The suggestion is that possession should be backdated to the date of the application so that the mortgagee can collect any income from the property from that date. Again we will want to go through and understand the justification for that. 
An amendment in clause 119 to section 94A of the Protection of Personal and Property Rights Act 1988 which concerns the independence of witnesses to enduring powers of attorney seems to be a policy-related amendment. Again we will want to understand the justification for it. 
There are two proposed amendments in Part 35 to the Radiocommunications Act 1989. These will allow regulations to be made concerning the importation for supply and the offering for sale of radio apparatus in the same way that regulations can be made that control the supply of that equipment. We want to be satisfied that that is merely a machinery change. 
Finally there are amendments under Part 5 to sections 405 and 412 of the Building Act 2004. The concern that I have personally as chair of the Regulations Review Committee is that there will be through these proposed amendments a diminution of the ability of the House to scrutinise certain instruments. Although this legislation might simply be correcting a drafting error generally speaking members on this side of the House will not be supportive of legislation that diminishes the House’s duty to scrutinise the delegated power of the executive. 
Other than those nine matters which Labour will be paying close attention to in the course of the passage of this legislation through the House I am happy at this stage subject to the comments that I have made to commend the bill.