This bill provides interim financial authority for government spending at the start of the 2024/25 financial year, bridging the period until the Appropriation (2024/25 Estimates) Bill becomes law.
Parliament advanced this bill under urgency (first reading, second reading, third reading) — moving it through faster than usual, with less time than normal for public submissions.
An Imprest Supply Bill gives the government temporary, interim legal authority to spend public money and incur capital expenditure at the start of a financial year, before Parliament has passed the detailed annual Appropriation (Budget) legislation that authorises spending line by line. This “first” bill for 2024/25 authorises spending from the beginning of that financial year until the main Budget appropriations are in force, so government services can keep running without a funding gap. It affects the whole of central-government spending and, indirectly, everyone who relies on public services.
Imprest supply is a standard, recurring part of New Zealand’s public-finance system under the Public Finance Act, used every year to bridge the timing gap between the start of the financial year and passage of the Budget. The argument for is practical necessity: without it the government would have no lawful authority to spend. The limitation cited against it is that it grants broad interim spending power against only high-level totals, rather than the detailed, itemised scrutiny the full appropriation process provides.
See the Parliament.nz ↗ site for the full bill.