The COVID-19 pandemic has seen the normalisation of government practices that only a couple of years ago would have seemed fanciful.
Probably the most concerning from my point of view has been the significant increase in the far-reaching powers given to ministers and unelected government officials by Parliament, with little-to-no public consultation.
It must, of course, be acknowledged that COVID-19 has presented governments the world over with unique challenges, meaning business as usual just hasn’t been an option.
However, nearly two years into the pandemic, we should be in a much better position to deal with it using our existing legislative and bureaucratic processes.
Unfortunately, government ministers and their departments haven’t yet caught up with this “new normal” and still insist on rushing through emergency law changes that have unprecedented impacts on people’s lives with little debate, transparency, or public scrutiny.
In October, Transporting New Zealand made submissions on the COVID-19 Public Health Response Amendment Bill (No 2) and made the point that the expansion of state power included in that legislation lacked appropriate settings for transparency and accountability of ministers and officials.
We were concerned that this was the second time within a relatively short period that the Government had taken the approach of rushing through an expansion of ministerial powers as it grappled with its response to COVID-19.
Far-reaching powers such as these should be considered only appropriate or necessary in a true emergency, yet as I write this the Government is doing it again.
The new COVID Protection Framework, the traffic light system, involves significant and potentially long-term restrictions on personal freedoms, including vaccine and testing mandates, that require legislative approval.
Incredibly, though, the Government has waited again until the last possible moment before releasing the proposed legislation that enacts these powers.
What this means is another rushed rubber-stamp from Parliament that will mean little to no consultation with individuals, businesses, or industry.
The result will be some of the most invasive state powers ever imposed in this country.
The fact is, such state powers should be considered only in a true emergency.
The “state of emergency” that filled the early months of the pandemic response is well and truly over, as the country adjusts and plans for a return to some sort of normality.
I’m worried that the ad hoc policy making and rushed legislative processes that could be forgiven in the first few months of the pandemic have become standard operating procedure for this Government.
And that means there’s little meaningful effort being put in to consult with those affected.
The use of emergency legislation to give itself the power to implement the traffic light system is really an indictment of how poorly prepared the Government has been in responding to the transition from an elimination strategy to one where the country gets on and like the rest of the world, lives with COVID-19.
Nothing about Delta’s incursion in August 2021 should have been a surprise, considering it had spread around the world aggressively during the previous six months.
However, the slow roll-out of the vaccination programme, the lack of capacity building in the hospital system, and the panicked reaction to the outbreak felt as though the Government had been caught completely off guard.
No government should be in a position where it has to rely indefinitely on giving itself emergency powers to get things done, because ultimately where does it end?
COVID-19 and its impact on the health system are going to be with us for the foreseeable future and looking beyond COVID-19, there are other significant challenges facing both the country and this Government.
Housing, child poverty, homelessness, climate change, the provision of infrastructure, and the biodiversity crisis all demand urgent attention.
As Wellington and its technocratic class of politicians and public servants drift further and further out of touch with the rest of New Zealand, it’s not unforeseeable that the temptation to shortcut the proper parliamentary process becomes too hard to resist.
I hope I am wrong, but I fear that the precedent may now be set.
*Nick Leggett is CEO of Ia Ara Aotearoa Transporting New Zealand.
This column appeared in the December issue of TransportTalk – click here to download a free copy of the magazine.
