Sitting date: 19 Aug 2025

REGULATORY SYSTEMS (TRANSPORT) AMENDMENT BILL

First Reading

Hon JAMES MEAGER (Associate Minister of Transport): I move, That the Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Transport and Infrastructure Committee to consider the bill.

Regulatory systems bills are funny old things. They kind of sit somewhere between the old statutes amendment bills, which are uncontroversial minor changes to legislation, to your more substantive individual bills, which are maybe somewhat more contested across the House. This one is a bill to update the regulatory systems in the transport space, and it combines a range of work across successive Governments to bring to the House under one omnibus bill.

The bill does have Business Committee agreement under Standing Order 267 for it to be an omnibus bill, and so I look forward to its support across the House. And of course, it does contain a range of changes proposed under the previous Government, and if members look at the regulatory impact statements, they may recognise the names of some of their colleagues across the House who have done work on this as far back as 2021.

These kinds of bills do include wide suites of amendments that don't warrant individual bills, and so it is a good use of the House's time to bring them together in one regulatory systems bill. Generally, this particular bill makes necessary changes across land transport, rail, and maritime legislation—as well as aviation maritime legislation—to make our transport regulatory system more effective and efficient. This will enable further economic growth by making our lives easier through a variety of important amendments. These amendments are designed to uphold good regulatory practice and ensure that the transport regulatory system is kept fit for purpose, while contributing to the Government's focus on boosting productivity.

There are a range of—I think—quite interesting amendments in this bill, and there are a range of others that some may consider dull but worthy, and I'll traverse a few of those over the next few minutes. One of the key things this bill does is it will keep our transport regulatory system modernised and relevant to a growing digital world. This will include things like amendments to transport legislation to pave the path for digital alternatives to physical licences, which I'll touch on soon enough. Finally, the bill also provide provides some other amendments around aviation to progress time-sensitive aviation amendments.

As I mentioned previously, the bill does enable a couple of key interesting things. The first one that the House will be interested in is that it enables the framework for digital driver licences to be introduced in New Zealand. Now, to be clear, the bill does not establish digital driver licences; it creates the framework for the ministry and officials to then go away and do the consultative work that we need to undertake to make sure that it is implemented in a proper and considered way. But I think it would interest many members to know that, actually, within our—I guess—legal framework, we already recognise digital driver licences from other States and other jurisdictions; we just don't have the ability to recognise our own. So this legislation will put in place the mechanism for implementing that, and, as we go through that process later on in the year, Cabinet will make further decisions about how that will roll out.

But I have met with a number of potential providers of these services, one including a meeting with Apple not too long ago, where they showed me prototypes of digital driver licences that other jurisdictions have put in place. It will help achieve the solution of what happens, you know, when we maybe forget our driver's licence on the way to a visit to the ports, because we're very interested in port security and we need our driver's licence to prove our ID; or maybe when we're going to the local wine bar in Christchurch central, and we have to provide our ID to the bouncer, and we pad our pockets and we've left our driver's license at home because we haven't driven to town because we're responsible drivers—we can bring up our digital driver's licence on our phone and show that to the bouncer. Now, it's important to note that this will be an option. Digital driver licences will not be mandatory. It provides the structure to put it in place, and manual driver licences or physical driver licences will always be available, because we are concerned and considerate of the access and technology issues that do arise.

Another thing that this bill does is that it allows us to shift from a paper-based warrant and registration system to a digital one. We all know the situation where you go and you renew your road-user charges or you renew your licence online—and then Rima Nakhle's got her Suzuki Swift and she's trying to put the little registration sticker right in the front of the dash and she's reaching over and it's hard, and it's just annoying and it's just a waste of time. So this bill will help modernise that system so that not only will we do away with a paper-based system of indicating whether your registration or your warrant is up to date, we will also be able to eliminate the requirement for notices and fees to be posted out.

It might surprise you to know that the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) spent nearly $17 million a year in March on printing and postage for about 14 million items. This will go a significant way to reducing that time and resource. Again, this will be an option, so it will be an option for you to receive those notices by electronic means. Those who still require it physically and by the post will be able to do so. Progressing these changes supports our Government's wider digital modernisation objective and delivers better user experiences.

Next, I want to just touch briefly on some of the civil aviation changes in the bill. The main thing it does is it corrects some drafting errors identified in civil aviation regulations which actually potentially prevent Auckland and Wellington airports from charging users to undertake aerodrome activities. Now, Mr Speaker, you'll know, as an experienced previous transport Minister, that one of the core functions of an airport is to allow aerodrome activities to be undertaken, and it seems sensible to allow airports to charge for that. So this will fix a drafting error—a numbering error—in the regulations that were put forward, and it will implement it retrospectively, so that it will be as though the error never existed in the first instance.

Next, another thing the bill does is that ensures that our regulators have effective tools to carry out their functions. For example, it will actually provide the Director of Land Transport powers to respond to emergency and time-critical events such as natural disasters in an appropriate way. Currently, the ability for the director to waive requirements under the Act is restricted, and we saw this under COVID, where there was limited ability for the director to extend the time for warrants or registrations to expire and it actually needed ministerial regulation to do so. So providing that ability for the director to have some flexibility in the system is important.

Another thing that bill does is that—members might not know this, but councils, currently, if they are looking to charge people for overstaying in time-limited car parks, they can only charge the maximum allowed; they have no flexibility to charge less than or underneath that maximum set by the Government. So this will actually allow councils to still make sure that they penalise people for overstaying the time, but be able to do so not charging the maximum—to set their own limits for this.

One more thing that this bill does is it provides powers for the New Zealand Transport Agency to proactively close State highways in times of emergency or where there are threats to life or safety. Currently, the NZTA relies on coordinating this with the New Zealand Police. Sometimes, in times of haste and urgency, this can be cumbersome and can create some legal difficulties down the road. So this will give the NZTA some more powers to close down highways when it's needed.

Finally, there are a range of other smaller, minor changes. For example, the bill will allow the Minister of Conservation to exercise functions, duties, and powers under Part 3A of the Maritime Transport Act 1994 in the Subantarctic and Kermadec Islands. What does that mean? That means that the conservation Minister can act as though they were the regional unitary authority in those areas.

Finally, the bill does some more work in and around rail to allow the relevant rail investigators to have sufficiently clear roles after a rail incident or accident. Currently, they are reliant on the cooperation of the people involved in the accident. This bill will give them some more powers to retain or secure the site of an incident so that they can undertake the appropriate investigations.

This is one of those worthy bills that will have support across the House off to first reading. I think it contains, as I've said, some dull but very worthy changes, and also some very interesting and exciting changes for what we can expect in the future of digitisation in this Government. So, with that, I commend the Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Bill to the House.

TANGI UTIKERE (Labour—Palmerston North): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Mālō e lelei. I rise on behalf of the Labour Party this afternoon to provide our support for the first reading of the Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Bill.

As the Minister himself has indicated, this is an omnibus bill, and I actually think the example that he has given, in particular the one about the Minister for Conservation exercising particular powers in relation to the Kermadecs and the subantarctic islands, is a good example of why this is an omnibus bill. We do support this bill as a form of technical but useful improvements to modernise our transportation system but, also, to look at reducing inefficiencies where that is able to be the case. While this is a bill that does tidy up some of those technical issues, in itself I don't think it will be as transformative as perhaps some would like; but I do hope that it will make a difference none the less.

The Minister has taken a pick-and-mix approach to selecting some of the aspects of this bill, and I'm going to do the same, actually. I'm going to take some of them that have been identified—and I think they really do indicate the suite of change that is going to be on the agenda, shall we say, of the Transport and Infrastructure Committee as well. The one that the Minister referred to is around the digitisation of drivers' licences, and while this won't provide for this to, effectively, come into effect, it does provide the framework under which it would exist. Of course, the police that we have out and about are very mobile as well, so this would go hand in hand with that opportunity. Of course, the Government needs to meet its own target, which it's not doing at the moment, around the number of police on the beat, to be able to make this transition.

I do hope, on the one hand, that while this might be an empowering form of legislation to make some of those changes, it does not let the Government off the hook when it comes to making sure that they deliver on their promises in that particular space. But the example that the Minister gives, around drivers' licences and, effectively, this bill being able to enable utilisation of digital drivers' licences, is a move in the right direction, particularly within the busyness of life. I think that, as an opportunity, will also make it easier for motorists and licence holders to go about their daily business. Not only does this bill provide for drivers' licences but other forms of documentation that traditionally is affixed to a motor vehicle in a more physical sense, things like warrants of fitness, certificates of fitness and the like, so I think that is a good move.

One of the additional changes is that it does allow for some forms of infringement notices to be issued electronically. We might think that actually some of them already are issued electronically, but not all of them are. I think it's important, as this bill progresses through select committee, that we make sure that the information that would be requested by a motorist, or someone who'd be subject to this requirement, is still able to be protected within the confines of privacy considerations. That's one thing that we will be taking a look at as we continue to look at this through select committee.

One of the interesting aspects is the inability, currently, of the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) to close State highways. But what this bill does is it gives a provision for the New Zealand Transport Agency to be able to do that, but only when it comes to safety considerations. Now, these are individuals who are well attuned to the way in which our State highway network is able to function and operate, so it makes sense that they are able to do so quickly and efficiently as well.

This is a bill that seeks to address some changes in seven pieces of legislation, and one—which I think actually is the oldest one that it's seeking to change, from 1989—is the Government Roading Powers Act 1989. That's the one that would seek to give the NZTA the powers that the Minister has explained. But it also would seek to clarify the role that pedestrians, or those who might be classified as pedestrians, are able to utilise in some of the spaces on the roading network. Because at the moment, and we might not know this, but there are some parts of the roading network that, actually, you're not able to, as a pedestrian who might be going about, maybe going to a bus stop that is located on a State highway network, actually utilise this.

In the Labour Party, we do support this bill. We think that it tidies-up a number of things, many of them, we were able to commence when we were in Government—and the Minister has acknowledged that this is the work of previous Governments. But I look forward to, alongside members of the Transport and Infrastructure Committee, receiving submissions on this and seeing where we go. But at this stage, I'm very pleased to commend this bill to the House.

Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green—Rongotai): Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. Tēnā koutou e te Whare. As the two previous speakers have outlined, this is not a world-changing bill here. This is a lot of tidy-up and modernisation, and for that reason the Green Party will be supporting it.

I did want to speak briefly in my speech to some focuses for the Green Party and respond to a bit of what the Associate Minister of Transport himself said. It is interesting, as my colleague Tangi Utikere just mentioned, about the amendments to the Government Roading Powers Act 1989 and how that Act actually specified that the use of motorways could be restricted. We often see those signs—no pedestrians, no bikes—on bits of the motorway. I think that did reflect that obsession in the second half of the 20th century with building infrastructure just for cars and not recognising other ways that people get around.

Luckily, we have had some time where we've had subsequent transport Ministers of different parties recognising that it's important to provide infrastructure that enables people to get around, across, and along areas where urban motorways have been built by foot and by bike. I was able to experience some of that excellent infrastructure, some of which was opened by the Rt Hon John Key, alongside the Grafton Gully Motorway when I and my colleague Chlöe Swarbrick went to visit the Port of Auckland on Friday. I was able to pick up an e-bike and go almost directly from our office on Cross Street, which is near Karangahape Road, all the way down to the port, almost entirely on separated cycleways—initiated, first, under a National-led Government, and then more have been developed under a Labour-led Government. I think that's really great because as long as I've been in this country, it's been the Greens leading on this issue, and I think it does show that the Greens have set the transport agenda in many ways and influenced the infrastructure that is being delivered.

Waka Kotahi is being given broader powers to close parts of the State highway network for safety reasons, and I absolutely support that. I would note, unfortunately, that they've had to close bits of the State highway for hours at a time because of dangerous road crashes. Last month, we saw at least four occasions in which people died on bits of the State highway where the speed limit had just been forced back up to 100 kilometres an hour, usually against the wishes of the local community. People in a very short period of time lost their lives when there had been no crashes, no fatalities, during the time when the speed limits had been lower.

Ironically, the Government claimed that raising the speed limits was about economic productivity. But obviously when there's more road crashes, more deaths, more serious injuries, and hours of the State highway being closed due to increased severity of crashes due to higher than safe speed limits for the quality of the road that is there, I think it demonstrates just how completely ridiculous that claim is.

The Minister claimed in his speech on this bill—and it's something that the Government of the day often claims—that every little thing they're doing is to support economic growth or productivity. I highly doubt the changes in this legislation are going to massively increase productivity, sadly. Like, it would be good. I mean, we all want things to be easier. We all want to be able to apply to renew driver's licences entirely online, from overseas. That was something I received a lot of correspondence about when I was an Associate Minister, and I think we did take some steps to make that possible.

In terms of the steps that are going to be taken in this bill, I'm sure it will be interesting to see at the select committee if enabling recognition of digital driver's licences does result in some convenience for both people working in the public sector and people who are accessing their driver's licence in that way, using their driver's licence in that way. However, I don't think it's going to be a world groundbreaking increase in productivity from these amendments, as enthusiastic as Minister Meager is to claim that they will be.

The other thing I found interesting is the changes around parking enforcement fees and making it possible for road controlling authorities to set the parking enforcement fees and that they don't have to be as high as the maximum. That's probably really important because another step needs to be taken to actually increase the maximum, because for many years, councils have not been able to recover their costs from parking and from towing when people are infringing various road rules on local roads. Probably one reason we haven't been able to increase the maximum is because automatically the maximum becomes the default.

CAMERON LUXTON (ACT): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on behalf of the ACT Party to endorse the Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Bill. As a member of the Transport and Infrastructure Committee, along with my colleagues who have just spoken, I welcomed this coming to the committee, because this is about, as the Minister has said, perhaps untying some red tape that's holding New Zealand back in a way. We've got economic growth and transformation on the tongue. We need to get the Government and its red tape out of the way so that New Zealanders can go about, in the same way this Minister has, in a workman like fashion, identifying issues and solving them for each other so that we can actually get our country moving in the way that needs to be done.

Speaking of moving, my colleague Simon Court and I have visited businesses across New Zealand, and in this case, I'm thinking of one in the Bay of Plenty that uses a defunct rail line. We heard some stories there about the regulatory burden that's been tied up in red tape, to be able to operate on that piece of rail line, and I think that having experiences like that shared with the committee so that we can get in there and untie this red tape that's holding back entrepreneurial-type Kiwis who are getting out there, trying to create value for each other—if we can untie some of that red tape—that's how we're going to get towards that economic growth and transformation that New Zealand seriously needs. I look forward to hearing from New Zealanders with their cases of regulatory reform that's needed in this space. I commend the bill to the House.

Dr DAVID WILSON (NZ First): The Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Bill is common sense and modernisation. Our transport system is huge, and small inconsistencies, gaps, or antiquated requirements can undermine efficiency and safety. As has been mentioned by the Minister and our member from across the aisle, it's wide ranging in its powers, namely from the Subantarctic Islands through to the Kermadecs. New Zealand First has been about safety, sovereignty, and sensible regulation all along. We're about removing unnecessary red tape while continuing to keep communities safe on the roads, on the sea, and in the air. The bill does both. It allows regulators to act quickly where there is a safety issue but simplifies things for good New Zealanders by removing unnecessary paperwork.

We support this bill because it improves safety, modernises our transport infrastructure, and ensures that regulators can enforce protection of life without red tape. This is the sort of practical, no-nonsense legislation that New Zealand First is happy to support. Thank you.

MARIAMENO KAPA-KINGI (Te Pāti Māori—Te Tai Tokerau): Mōrena. Thank you, Mr Speaker. From what we can tell, this bill aims to modernise Aotearoa's transport system, making it more efficient, effective, and less prone to failure. I did have a little time on the committee at one point when I first started my new job here, so it's good to see that things like this are happening and are making use well. It also manages to do so without necessarily disenfranchising any group, including Māori. By equipping regulations with better tools, reducing compliance costs, and enabling digital alternatives like electronic licences and notices, the system is set to function more smoothly and meet the needs of modern Aotearoa.

Key changes, such as giving the New Zealand Transport Agency more powers around road safety, strengthening enforcement of transport services licences, and enabling digital driving licence are initiatives that Te Pāti Māori can support—I can see my colleague smiling on the left; I know he's logged straight into this conversation.

These updates will help build a safer and more responsive system for all of our communities. This bill also enhances investigation powers in rail and maritime sectors, removes outdated rules, and increases fines to create more consistency across different transport modes. In aviation, it fixes longstanding legal errors and clarifies how airports can set charges for services.

Overall, it's a bit of a tidy-up legislation. It addresses gaps, and, as my colleague on the left said, it's more common sense, which isn't often so common around here at times, I find.

The only final thing I wanted to say about this is that, twice, I've heard "Kermadecs" mentioned. That's in my piece of the world, up in the very Far North. At any time in which that name is mentioned and there is something happening up there, then please talk to Te Aupōuri. We know what we're talking about. That's our piece of water and our piece of dirt. With all of this

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we support the bill. Thank you so much, Mr Speaker.

DAN BIDOIS (National—Northcote): There are times where you realise "This is why I came to Parliament." This is not really one of those times. It is dull but worthy, and that's the reality of our parliamentary democracy. Not everything changes lives dramatically, but they are incremental improvements that make a difference in small but impactful ways, as my colleague Rima Nakhle said.

So it's a pleasure to rise and support this bill as a member of the Transport and Infrastructure Committee—it's a great committee—and we will look forward to receiving submissions on this. I don't think there will be a huge amount of submissions. So with that, I just want to say that it's all about creating efficiency and improving things. I commend this bill to the House.

CAMILLA BELICH (Labour): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Well, there's a bit of enthusiasm from the other side of the House on this regulatory systems bill. Honestly, sometimes you do read these bills and you think that, well, they're a bit dry, but this one has something for everyone. There is the law of the sea in this bill, there is a prototype of holographic—possibly—drivers' licences, and there are changes to the Railways Act and to the Civil Aviation Act. This is actually a very interesting bill, and I think it was slightly undersold by Dan Bidois, the last speaker from the National Party.

In fact, there is something that should be very interesting to that member because of the changes that are put in place by the New Zealand Transport Agency allowing it to close various roads. He will know that in his electorate, he has a very significant piece of highway, which is the Auckland Harbour Bridge, which crosses over into his electorate, and one of the things that this bill does is it actually looks at when particular roads can have pedestrianised access. I'm sure there are many members of the public in his constituency that will be interested to know whether the Harbour Bridge, which is closed to pedestrians, will be able to be utilised—as it sometimes is—in the same fashion under this piece of legislation. So I would encourage him to have a closer look at this bill and see if there isn't something in there that he can get excited about.

Now, as my colleague Tangi Utikere has said, this is a bill that is supported by the Labour Party, and many regulatory systems bills are, in fact, done in good faith, really, across the House to make our legal system and our laws work better. In fact, this one, as the Associate Minister of Transport has said, corrects some errors that were in regulations, and it also makes a number of changes that not only make the law better but also, actually, probably allow it to be more futureproofed.

One of the main examples that the Minister looked at was digital drivers' licences. This is something that, allegedly, is used in other jurisdictions, though it's not something that I've seen before. I have lived in another country and have had the particular different piece of plastic that they had at that time, but I'm interested to know that that is the case and, in fact, what a prototype would be. I would have assumed that it was just a picture, perhaps, on your phone, a bit like your Air New Zealand boarding pass. But I look forward to finding out exactly what is meant by that, and, hopefully, that can mean that we carry fewer pieces of plastic around in our pockets. I would be interested to know if this is consistent with the rules around cellphone use, if that is the place that you are going to be carrying your digital driver's licence, because otherwise we'd be in a conundrum, wouldn't we, if we were stopped by the police and asked to show our digital driver's licence and it was carried on our phone, and, in fact, we're not, technically, allowed to utilise our phone when we are in charge of a motor vehicle.

Hopefully, those things can be worked out. I'm sure that the Transport and Infrastructure Committee, who will be looking at this bill, will make sure that these issues are ironed out so that there is absolute clarity for members of the public, because we also wouldn't want people to be looking at their phone and have a photo of them taken by the police, and then have them say, "Oh, I was just checking my driver's licence." I mean, that would also be a potentially unwanted pitfall of this legislation if it was not gone through with sufficient clarity.

There are other interesting things in this. As I said, there aren't many regulatory systems bills where you get to talk about the law of the sea, and there are some changes in here which, I think, we would say on this side of the House that we are very supportive of. That's in relation to the alignment of domestic maritime legislation with the Maritime Labour Convention, and we know that the good people at Maritime New Zealand do an absolutely tremendous job of ensuring our safety and security and of looking after our maritime safety. These are actually very, very good provisions that are being imported into this piece of legislation, so we're very, very supportive of that. Obviously, that's a really technical area that requires consideration, and I'm sure that the committee will look at that.

There are other things that I found of interest in this. There's, obviously, specific provisions in relation to Auckland and Wellington. For those of us in those areas, there are issues that have been corrected around the use of the airspace so that fees can be charged for that, as the Minister touched on, but also, I understand, there are other sections in this that also look at things like parking and specific provisions in relation to those particular airports.

So there really is something for everyone in this, and also really interesting changes that designate when a vehicle can be called a motor vehicle. These are rhetorical questions that we never thought we would ask ourselves, but these are, in fact, answered by this regulatory systems bill, which I commend to the House.

Dr CARLOS CHEUNG (National—Mt Roskill): I rise in support of the Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Bill—a critical step to us modernising and streamlining New Zealand's transport legislation. This bill makes critical, targeted updates to transport law. This bill involves a broad range of legislation, including the amendment of 12 Acts and the set of 29 regulations across our land, maritime, and aviation system. One of the key amendments is to enable the future use of the digital driving license, an important step toward modernising how we interact with transport services. These small but important changes help ensure our transport sector stay responsive and future-ready. I commend this bill to the House.

Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Oh, thank you, Mr Speaker. Very surprised that members of the National Party, who love their roads so much, aren't really getting into this, because it's an interesting piece of legislation. In fact, you know, they're skimming over the top, but there's actually quite a lot of work for the select committee to do here. So I'm just going to point to one very particular thing and then one more general thing, and hope that they'll address it.

The first is the service of notices, and it's something that I'm a little concerned about, because if we look at clause 29, which amends section 91B of the Land Transport Act, which is titled "Ways in which warning notice or driver's license stop order or details of related fines must be served", it says that it can now be served "by the chief executive of the Ministry of Justice sending an electronic notification to the defendant that states where the defendant can access the notice, order, or notice of details electronically"—it's a link, right; that's a link, for those who didn't work that out. "Electronic notification" doesn't actually say what that is. That just means a notification that's sent by electronic means. So that could be an email, a text message, or, if you're Chris Bishop, a Snapchat message, and that actually is worth looking into.

But it gets much more detailed than that, because if we go down to subclause (5) it tells you when service is deemed to have occurred. That's the thing: if I hand you a notice, a piece of paper, the moment of service is really clear—it's when you take it from me—but if it's electronic, it's actually much more complicated, because there is a period of time where neither you nor I have it. In fact, whilst it's rare, there are instances—plenty of instances—where an electronic notification can be sent by me and never received by you.

Camilla Belich: That's right—didn't have that problem with fax machines.

Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB: No, you didn't have that problem with fax machines—we're not going backwards, though, Camilla Belich. But new subsection (5) of the amended section will now provide that "the notice, order, [etc.] is served at the time the electronic communication containing the notification [etc.] first enters an information system outside of the control of the originator". Now, in fact, not everyone is aware of this, but when you send an email, it often will go through several information systems. It will leave the Parliament server—that's the system in our control—and it will then enter, often, one or more servers before it reaches the service or the computer system under the control of the recipient, and anything can go wrong in that chain. But this says that as long as you've sent it, it's sufficient to prove that the electronic communication containing the notification was properly addressed and sent.

So we've got a problem here, because this is infringement fines. In fact, it doesn't matter whether you've actually received the email or text message or not, as long as it was properly addressed and sent; you bear the risk of a failure of the information system. Can you have a look at that when you get there, Mr Utikere, in select committee? That would be good.

The other thing is this: what we don't realise is that particularly in the transport sector, there are quite a lot of powers of inspectors. You don't often think—[Bell rung] oh, is it that time already?—about railway inspectors. But if you look at clause 110, which inserts a whole lot of sections—72A, B, C, and so on—it gives quite sweeping powers of inspection, search, the power to take samples and other objects and things, the power to enter homes and marae. Now, they're largely consistent with the Search and Surveillance Act, but I would ask that the select committee do kind of run the ruler over those, because, obviously, transport accident investigation's important, but we just do need to make sure that there's no overstepping of the mark. I know the select committee will be diligent and will look at that, but I certainly would like them to look at that, and I know that there's similar provisions elsewhere in respect of other transport modes.

A good bill overall, but a couple of little gnarly things to look at. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

RIMA NAKHLE (National—Takanini): Thanks, Mr Speaker. It's a pleasure to join my colleagues in support of the Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Bill in this first reading. In a nutshell, in the interests of productivity and efficiency, which this Government is always aiming towards, this bill proposes sensible, practical changes which, essentially, streamline some day-to-day activities, particularly through digitisation. I look forward to us passing it in that final third reading, but for now, I commend the bill to the House.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a first time.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O'Connor): The question is, That the Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Bill be considered by the Transport and Infrastructure Committee.

Motion agreed to.

Bill referred to the Transport and Infrastructure Committee.

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