Bridges Simon: Land Transport (Speed Limits Validation and Other Matters) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBridges Simon: 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:5142. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Transport):I just want to deal—hopefully very briefly—with the points made regarding of course the phrase in clause 3 “remove any doubt”. I understand the points that are being made—in one sense you could say quite strongly and persuasively—by the member for New Zealand First Denis O’Rourke. I think that if experience and certainly legal experience in interpretation teaches us anything—and I am not in any way casting aspersions on the member—it is that there is a requirement and say so for a certain amount of humility in these matters because laws made by Parliaments do have mistakes. I think that in a situation like this where there is one—albeit a most important piece of legislation but other ones following that therefore add some complexity—we need to deal in the realm of best legal arguments and most persuasive legal arguments. There will always be doubts and indeed good lawyers in this traffic law area can create them believe you me. But we felt on the basis of robust pored-over legal positioning on this matter which we took very seriously indeed that the Government—and I am grateful—and I think Parliament needed to act to ensure public certainty. That speaks to the retrospective nature of this bill which I will come to but also to public safety in this area.The crux of the issue is—I think as both David Parker and Denis O’Rourke have made clear in this Committee—the 2002 Local Government Act. Then post that there really is a cascade of laws that effectively sets up a by-law regime for councils. At one level and this is where I go some way with Denis O’Rourke the responsibility on councils had some clarity. Ultimately they were to pass by-laws for their speed limits and they were to review them in a 5-year period—actually they had a 2-year period of grace after that and in Kāpiti Coast District Council’s case we certainly know that that did not happen. But I would say as I have already said that there is a need I think for a degree of humility in these issues. We are dealing with legal arguments. They can go other ways but I do not think the Government or indeed this Parliament could leave it to hang on that when we had a body of clear views that said we would be putting public certainty and certainly public safety retrospectively and prospectively into jeopardy.I just want to deal briefly with the retrospective aspect of this legislation. I was not here for Russel Norman’s speech but I gather from other members’ contributions that he had some concern about retrospective legislation. I think we can all say whether we are legally trained or not that it is quite clear that retrospective legislation all things being equal is undesirable. Indeed it can be a breach of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act and we need to take those sorts of issues very seriously indeed.There are times though when retrospective legislation is necessary and where this Parliament rightly reserves the right to pass such laws and I think here we are not dealing with just one but with a number of reasons that make it very clear that retrospective legislation is on balance and having considered all of the alternatives the right thing to do. First and foremost is public safety and there is no question that we cannot have a position where there is some doubt—we have used the words “any doubt” in clause 3—that someone today can on Kāpiti coast go at a much faster rate than the speed limit we thought was the case. That would be unsafe. It would be putting lives at risk and it would be the wrong thing for us to do and that is a strong reason to be retrospective here—to clear that up for the past and for the future.I think that the other reason is also very clear in this. This is not a matter where anyone has acted in bad faith. This is a matter where very clearly—again if we take the Kāpiti Coast District Council—the signs meant that the police and the public of that area all thought the speed limits were a certain way. Everyone thought the law was that. Not only that but I would say most reasonable people throughout New Zealand thought that that is what the laws and the speed limits should be. So it is what they thought they were and it is what they thought they should be and that is what right-thinking people would think in that regard. So we are—and this is a clear area where retrospective legislation is appropriate—going back and fixing technically what might otherwise be not correct and unsafe but in a position of good faith.