was authorised by the member or by another member on their behalf. That aligns the practice for urgent debates with the practice for lodging questions or notices of motion.
URGENT DEBATES DECLINED
Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission Report—Mā Te Rongo Ake
SPEAKER: I have also received a letter from Matt Doocey, seeking to debate under Standing Order 399 the release of the initial Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission report, Mā Te Rongo Ake. This is a particular case of recent occurrence for which there is ministerial responsibility. The release of a report may warrant an urgent debate, but this must be exceptional, especially where working through a report’s recommendations will take some time. I refer the member to Speaker’s ruling 208/6. Now, the release of this initial report does not warrant the setting aside of the business of the House today. The application is declined.
COVID-19 ORDERS
Approval
Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister for COVID-19 Response): I move, That this House approve the following orders made under the COVID-19 Public Health Response Act 2020:
- COVID-19 Public Health Response (Air Border and Isolation and Quarantine) Amendment Order (No 2) 2020,
- COVID-19 Public Health Response (Maritime Border) Order (No 2) Amendment Order 2020,
- COVID-19 Public Health Response (Air Border and Isolation and Quarantine) Amendment Order (No 2) 2020 Amendment Order 2020,
- COVID-19 Public Health Response (Air Border) Order (No 2) Amendment Order 2021.
The motion that I have just mentioned confirms four orders that I have made under the COVID-19 Public Health Response Act 2020, a brief comment on the process that has led us to this point first, and then I’ll go through the specific orders. Under the rules set by the House, my ability to issue an order under the Act is subject to parliamentary scrutiny through the Regulations Review Committee. That is absolutely appropriate because the COVID-19 Public Health Response Act 2020 gives me, as the responsible Minister, quite considerable ability to issue orders, and there should be parliamentary scrutiny of those.
The Act recognises that we need to make decisions quickly and we often need to amend those decisions quickly as we deal with an unprecedented global pandemic. It is still important, however, that those speedy decisions are the subject of scrutiny by the House, and I want to thank the Regulations Review Committee for the work that it has done in fulfilling that function. Three of the orders that we are confirming now have been inspected by the committee and they found no matters that they wished to bring to the attention of the House. Those are the amendments that have been made to the COVID-19 Public Health Response (Air Border and Isolation and Quarantine) Amendment Order 2020—two lots of amendments there—and also to the COVID-19 Public Health Response (Maritime Border) Order (No 2) 2020. Those are relatively technical changes, reasonably straightforward, and have been well canvassed.
The order that the committee did want to raise an issue with, and I want to speak to the issues the committee raised, is the COVID-19 Public Health Response (Air Border) Order (No 2) 2020. This is the order that I signed off on in January 2021 that provides for the new pre-departure testing requirement. Nobody, I think, objected to the pre-departure
