Five Million Voices

Should Parliament confirm these 22 pieces of secondary legislation so they remain in force rather than being revoked?

The bill confirms 22 confirmable instruments made under 11 Acts between 1 July 2024 and 30 June 2025 so they continue in force rather than lapsing. Without confirmation, the affected secondary legislation would be revoked and certain collected levies would have to be refunded.

MPs’ arguments for and against the bill

Why support it
  • Supporters argued the bill must pass because failing to confirm the instruments would require refunding levies already collected from industries such as avocados, oysters, tomatoes, potatoes, and onions.
  • Supporters said the bill confirms 21 other instruments covering fees, levies, duties, and tax settings that members had no issue with, making its passage a necessary tidying-up exercise.
Why oppose it
  • Some members argued that one confirmed instrument—the 50 percent excise reduction on heated tobacco products—made an unusual use of a power that had only previously been used to index rates upward in line with the Consumers Price Index.
  • Some members said health and taxation policy changes of this kind should go through the usual legislative process with transparent parliamentary oversight, rather than being made at departmental level, and noted the committee had considered withholding confirmation of that order.

These are claims MPs made in Parliament’s debate — not verified facts.

Full bill summary & link to official bill page

Some regulations (“secondary legislation”) made under certain Acts — often things like levies, fees, charges, or price and quota settings — are written so they automatically lapse at a set date unless Parliament actively confirms them by passing an Act. A Secondary Legislation Confirmation Bill is the periodic housekeeping vehicle that bundles together such “confirmable instruments” and confirms them so they stay in force. It creates no new policy of its own; it simply preserves existing rules across a range of portfolios, affecting the agencies, businesses and sectors that rely on them.

These are routine government bills brought in periodically because the enabling Acts require confirmation; the “(No 3)” marks it as one of a recurring series. The argument for is democratic control: the executive cannot keep charges or controls in place indefinitely without MPs scrutinising and endorsing them. The argument against is that confirmation is often a near-automatic formality, and bundling many unrelated instruments together can limit genuine debate on any single one.

See the Parliament.nz ↗ site for the full bill.

Oppose (No) Support (Yes)

Secondary Legislation Confirmation Bill (No 3) · Third Reading, 17 Dec 2025
Parliament voted 102–21 — it passed.