Rights Aotearoa Demands Urgent Re-evaluation Of Regulatory Standards Bill's Human Rights Impact
Press Release – Rights Aotearoa
Leading Human Rights NGO Calls Ministry of Justice Assessment 'Dangerously Superficial' and 'Constitutionally Incoherent'
WELLINGTON, 4 June 2025 – Rights Aotearoa, New Zealand's leading NGO devoted to promoting and defending universal human rights, today called on Attorney-General Judith Collins KC to urgently instruct the Ministry of Justice to comprehensively re-evaluate its advice on the Regulatory Standards Bill's consistency with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990.
The Ministry's advice concluded that the Bill 'appears to be consistent with the rights and freedoms affirmed in the Bill of Rights Act.' Rights Aotearoa has delivered a detailed letter to the Attorney-General demonstrating that this conclusion represents a grave failure of constitutional analysis that ignores the Bill's fundamental threat to human rights, democracy, and Te Tiriti o Waitangi.
'The Ministry of Justice has failed in its constitutional duty to assess this Bill's impact on human rights properly,' said Paul Thistoll, CEO of Rights Aotearoa. 'Their analysis acknowledges that the Bill departs from how rights and freedoms are expressed in the Bill of Rights Act, yet inexplicably concludes it has no impact on those rights. This is constitutionally incoherent.'
Rights Aotearoa's analysis identifies multiple critical failures in the Ministry's assessment. The Ministry examined only one right superficially—freedom of expression—while ignoring clear conflicts with electoral rights, freedom from discrimination, minority rights, and the right to life. The advice fails entirely to consider how the Bill's mechanisms will create 'regulatory chill,' deterring future governments from enacting essential protections.
Of particular concern is the Ministry's failure to analyse the Bill's complete exclusion of Te Tiriti o Waitangi, despite the Waitangi Tribunal's findings that the Crown breached Treaty principles through inadequate consultation with Māori and its recommendation for an 'immediate halt' to the Bill's progress.
The organisation highlighted how the Bill's emphasis on property rights and narrow economic efficiency will systematically undermine anti-discrimination protections. Essential measures like disability accommodations, pay equity legislation, and protections against discrimination could be challenged as 'impairing' property rights.
'This Bill creates a competing quasi-constitutional framework that elevates property rights above all other human rights,' the letter states. 'It attempts to lock in a narrow ideological worldview that will bind future Parliaments.'
Rights Aotearoa has committed to filing an action in the High Court, should the Bill pass in its current form, seeking a declaration that it is inconsistent with the Bill of Rights Act.
The organisation calls on the Attorney-General to instruct the Ministry of Justice to conduct a comprehensive re-evaluation that accurately analyses the Bill's downstream effects on all rights, considers its practical operation, examines the constitutional implications of creating a parallel rights framework, evaluates the exclusion of Te Tiriti, and assesses the impacts on anti-discrimination protections.
'At this critical constitutional moment, New Zealanders deserve rigorous, honest analysis of how this Bill will affect their fundamental rights,' said Thistoll. 'The current advice is not merely inadequate—it's dangerously misleading.'
About Rights Aotearoa
Rights Aotearoa is Aotearoa New Zealand's leading non-governmental organisation dedicated to promoting and defending universal human rights. Although we have a focus on transgender, non-binary and intersex rights, we work to ensure that all people in New Zealand enjoy the full range of human rights and fundamental freedoms recognised in domestic and international law.
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