Hide Rodney: Crimes (Substituted Section 59) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Hide Rodney: Crimes (Substituted Section 59) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:638;Page:8892] 
RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) 
: 
 The ACT Party rises to support the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 107 too because we should be reviewing legislation. I accept Mr Peter Brown’s point that we pass laws in this Parliament then forget about them and those laws lie there for years and years. It would seem to me to be a matter of good sense that we should review what we do particularly when we have a bill like this which has been controversial as to its effect and its operation. 
So here we are passing this legislation and setting down a timetable for its review. Of course social mores would have changed by the time of the review—for the better I am sure—so the bill could be assessed probably more dispassionately than it can be at this stage. In fact I would like to go further. Is it not odd that we do not always do this? What else do we do in life that we do not go back and review? Parliament makes laws and can change laws. It can amend laws and render them redundant. Everything we do in life that we have the opportunity to change and review obviously we do so because not to do so is to be foolish. Circumstances change understandings change and the facts of the matter can change. It has always perplexed me that we do not review laws. We are constantly reviewing anything we do in a business or in running our own house or in running our own life. That is what it is to be human; we get feedback all the time and say: “Oh I didn’t know that’s how that worked. I didn’t understand that. In that case I’ll make this slight adjustment and I’ll do this differently.” 
It is also very important when we are setting ourselves goals to review our progress and to see whether what we are doing is achieving the goal. If we are looking at legislation such as this we see that it very clearly has a social goal that people want to achieve. I have to say in listening to the debate there is some dispute about what that goal actually is and I am sure that when there is a review maybe it too can be better clarified. But again is that not what we do in life? For example I may be trying to do X and I am doing Y to get to X. After a while I will look at Y and ask whether I am heading in the right direction. By the way if the Labour Government did a bit more of that there would be a bit more humility and a bit better policy-making because it seems to me that Labour passes things because they sound good and to hang with the consequences and to hang with the result. 
I think that what we have here is a model for how we should be treating all legislation. Legislation should be subject to review against the original goals that we are striving to achieve. It should be subject to review against the circumstances within which we find ourselves. It should be subject to some feedback in terms of what is happening operationally. Let us be honest in Parliament: whenever we have an inquiry or an investigation into something we are always a bit astonished at what we learn. I make the point that members should not worry: help is on the way. With my Regulatory Responsibility Bill a mechanism would be established for review of all legislation which would make it more rational and more subject to feedback and common sense. 
So the ACT Party will be voting for this Supplementary Order Paper but not for this bill. Thank you.