Regulation
We understand that you wish to improve the overall regulatory environment, with a particular focus on reforming the Resource Management Act to reduce unnecessary delays, uncertainties and costs.
Your economic management plan also signals the intention to undertake a regulatory review programme. Consistent with your objective of reducing business compliance costs and adverse economic impacts, Treasury recommends taking a systematic approach to assessing the flow of new regulation and reviewing the existing stock of regulation, in order to lift the overall quality of New Zealand's regulation. In particular we recommend:
- improving the quality of new regulation by strengthening the systems and processes that support good decision-making by Ministers, improving the quality of information that Ministers receive, and lifting the capability and incentives of officials to provide high quality policy advice
- improving the quality of existing regulation, by instituting a system for reviewing regulations that have pervasive economic impacts (by means such as undertaking one to two in-depth reviews of regulatory regimes per year, and using sector reviews or a sun-setting regime to identify significant regulatory issues), and strengthening ongoing departmental reviews
- improving regulatory advocacy and oversight, by establishing an expert taskforce to provide the Government with recommendations to improve current executive and parliamentary decision making and review processes, as recommended by the Commerce Select Committee in its report on the Regulatory Responsibility Bill. With the position of Minister of Regulatory Reform being established as a position outside of Cabinet, we also recommend providing dedicated senior Cabinet leadership on regulatory quality issues. Treasury has responsibility for oversight of the regulatory system, including the provision of advice on reviewing existing regulation and the Regulatory Impacts of new regulation to the Minister of Finance.
Two areas that you have specifically identified for review are the RMA and labour regulations. We set out below our high-level view and other factors you might like to consider.
| Policy proposals | Treasury comment | Recommendations/implementation advice |
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Reform RMA to
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We recommend a broad reform programme based on five high-level changes:
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Labour regulation changes:
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We also recommend undertaking an in-depth review of compliance costs associated with the Health and Safety in Employment Act, and leaving the level of the minimum wage unchanged at this time given weaker economic conditions. |
We also suggest that it is worth investigating the economic impact of the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act, with particular emphasis on its potentially detrimental effect on innovation. This could lead to a review of the Act, including the balance between environmental precaution and economic opportunities.
