Regulation and Compliance Costs
Over a number of years and under successive governments, there has been an across the board increase in regulation and associated compliance costs. While acknowledging that some legislation is necessary and useful, Federated Farmers considers, in many cases, the cost of regulation has exceeded the benefits.
New Zealand has 780 primary Acts and 3,365 statutory regulations. The rate of legislative change is bewildering with the Government each year creating and amending around 105 Acts and 40 regulations, representing between 6,000 and 9,000 pages of new legislation. This does not include the raft of local government plans, policies and bylaws, many of which
seem subject to constant change.
There is also a problem with quality. Businesses and farmers are concerned about the burden of regulation and the amount of change, and even officials concede that there are examples of legislation not meeting their intended objectives or having significant unintended consequences.
Past attempts by successive governments to improve the quality of regulation while well-intentioned have been modest and have not stemmed the tide. Federated Farmers successfully lobbied the Government to introduce a Regulatory Standards Bill (RSB). The RSB was developed with the intention of improving the quality of regulation by setting out principles for responsible regulation and increasing the transparency of regulation-making. New legislation will have to be assessed against the principles through a certification process and the Courts will be given a role of being able to declare legislation incompatible with the principles, although the Courts will not be able to strike down legislation.
Although the RSB will not initially apply to local government, we support work being done to extend its provisions to local government in due course.
Federated Farmers has supported the establishment of a New Zealand Productivity Commission (NZPC), styled on the Australian Productivity Commission which has a good track record for producing high quality objective analysis and recommendations to improve the quality of regulation and policy more generally. While it is starting small we want the NZPC to be adequately funded to enable it to undertake more inquiries.
Federated Farmers has also supported the appointment of a Minister for Regulatory Reform and initiatives such as the Government Statement on Regulation and the annual Regulatory Reform Bills, which have been a useful vehicle for repealing or amending minor legislation.The quality of regulatory impact analyses also appears to have improved in recent times.
Federated Farmers wants
- A change in the political culture away from knee-jerk reactions to real or perceived problems and miss-deeds
- The passage of the Regulatory Standards Bill
- Work to be done on extending the provisions of the Regulatory Standards Bill to local government
- Adequate funding for the New Zealand Productivity Commission
Protecting our property rights with compensation
It is important to Federated Farmers' members, whose assets form a significant part of their land, that any takings by government or councils is constrained by the requirement to provide full compensation. The Regulatory Standards Bill provides the compensation safeguards when property rights are taken.
Federated Farmers wants this bill to be passed with its compensation provisions intact.
To achieve this, the Federation is active a range of fronts. It has made submissions to the select committee, it has been working with other groups who share similar views and it is trying to build greater understanding within the general public of the need to protect property rights.
Quality Regulation Costs Farmers Less
The other important aspect of the Regulatory Standards Bill is its thrust to improve the quality of regulation. Well thought out policy and law, using rigorous analysis and process, is critical to reducing the cost of compliance and ensuring that New Zealand farmers remain competitive. There also needs to be a change in political culture away from knee jerk reactions to real or perceived problems and misdeeds.
Research papers
Support Federated Farmers to Lobby
To support Federated Farmers on these issues, or take part in lobby work get in touch with National Board spokesman on property rights, Bruce Wills: bwills@fedfarm.org.nz or the Federation's National Policy Manager Nick Clark at nclark@fedfarm.org.nz.
