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Commitment 6 progress report: Sep – Nov 2017

 Open Government Partnership New Zealand National Action Plan 2016-2018

Date: September to November 2017

Commitment 6 progress report: September to November 2017

 

Commitment 6:  Improving access to legislation

Lead agency: Parliamentary Counsel office (PCO)

To improve access to legislation by publishing all secondary legislation, regardless of who drafts it, on the New Zealand Legislation (NZL) website.  The result will be a single, comprehensive, official, public source of all New Zealand’s legislation.

 

Milestones

Milestone 1

Consultation and engagement with all involved actors, including all government and regulatory agencies and Crown entities that produce secondary legislation End date: Ongoing through project

Progress: Underway

Milestone 2

Consideration for approval by Cabinet.

Progress: Completed

 

What have we been doing?

  • Completed legal research on current legislation (2100 Acts) to identify provisions that empower agencies to make secondary legislation.
  • Consultation on the findings of this research has been concluded with 4 of the 33 administering agencies, and is at an advanced stage with over 20 of the remaining agencies. All agencies remain very supportive and have shown a strong desire to ensure that a mutually agreed view is formed.
  • Drafting of the second Bill commenced in October 2017. This Bill will state which empowering provisions empower the making of secondary legislation.
  • The drafting template is being piloted by 3 agencies. Feedback from these agencies has been very positive.
  • We have commenced a quantitative (existing quantity and rate of production) and qualitative analysis of secondary legislation, which will inform the proposed service for delivery of future services.
  • We have engaged with agencies who deliver services both to other agencies and to New Zealanders to:
    • learn from their experience to reflect end-user needs in serving New Zealanders
    • explore areas of potential collaboration in how best to support agencies that make secondary legislation.

Links

List of agencies that can create regulations

Access to Subordinate Legislation Project news

What’s next?

  • Continue piloting the drafting template, which is helping to inform the final version of the template as well as providing an early view of any business impact on agencies.
  • Continue working with agencies to conclude the analysis of their empowering provisions, which then enables drafting of the relevant amendments for the second Bill.
  • Continue quantitative and qualitative analysis of secondary legislation.
  • Commence research on end-user needs for finding secondary legislation, which will inform the development of IT systems.
  • Decide the nature of information about existing secondary legislation to be migrated to the new system to ensure that agencies have enough time to prepare for fulfilling their obligations under the new Legislation Bill when it becomes law.