Power Simon: New Zealand Council of Law Reporting Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Power Simon: New Zealand Council of Law Reporting Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:629;Page:1775] 
SIMON POWER (National—Rangitikei) 
: 
 It is with some regret that I was not a member of the Government Administration Committee when it considered the New Zealand Council of Law Reporting Amendment Bill because the contributions we have heard this evening indicate that members of that committee and those with a specific interest in the Council of Law Reporting have indeed taken the opportunity to converse on a range of issues that are significant to as my colleague Mr Finlayson said perhaps a limited number of people—including to himself as I believe he referred. 
But on some matters we simply require the House to pass legislation in order that the effectiveness of organisations such as the council can continue to add value to New Zealand’s lawmaking case law and common law. As any law student will tell us picking up for the first time one of the bound documents of the  
New Zealand Law Reports 
 strikes fear into the heart of those who are studying their first law subject. Grasping one of the  
New Zealand Law Reports 
 and working one’s way around the different parts to the reports is probably the first step in one’s legal career. Of course it is the committee’s view that the monopoly for the council to produce those reports is justified largely because as Mr Finlayson indicated a high-quality report has been produced for some time. It would be of little consequence or of little help if a range of different producers of reports were fighting over the same material. 
I do wonder though about the timing of the passing of the legislation. The Minister of Justice may be able to take another call and help me out here—or I should probably say the Minister for Courts because it was that Minister who actually made the first contribution. I wonder whether there is some particular time frame within which the legislation must be passed. I say that because when one looks at the Order Paper one finds a miserly 21 bills on it—in fact fewer than 21 now that several of them have passed through their third reading tonight. One has to ask the question of whatever happened to the Conservation (Protection of Trout as a Non-commercial Species) Amendment Bill and why it continues to languish at No. 20 on the Order Paper when I would have thought that had the trout been in need of real protection that particular bill would have moved up the Order Paper some considerable way. In fact I would have thought that the New Zealand Council of Law Reporting Amendment Bill could well make way for that particular legislation. 
Although not a Government bill I notice also that the Human Rights (Gender Identity) Amendment Bill has continued to slide into the abyss and now sits well below the line on members’ day. That is strange given that we have only three members’ orders of the day sitting above the line. That means that something must have occurred for that bill to be rendered below the line on the members’ list and it would seem that it is occupying a spot that could be used for another valuable members’ bill to be drawn and debated. 
So although as I said at the start of my speech I regret that I was not a member of the Government Administration Committee that considered the bill I am sure that Hone Harawira is ready now to make a contribution that will no doubt clarify some of the issues around the essential need for the bill to pass in such a timely fashion given the huge number of bills sitting underneath it that could have done with the House’s time as they concern equally important matters. It will be interesting to see where they move to. 
I conclude by saying that it is only right and proper that the new Supreme Court is able to publish its judgments in similar ways to other New Zealand courts although I do not imagine that the bound version of the  
New Zealand Law Reports 
 will grow by a huge size given that full judgments from the Supreme Court are not exactly pouring out at a rate of knots. It will be interesting to see exactly what impact that will have and whether in fact many people around New Zealand will have to have their shelving adjusted.