June 05 Rural Bulletin - Legislation Notes

New Legal Aid Criteria
New ACC Treatment Injury Law
Oaths to be Modernised
Changes to Credit Union Rules

Legislation Notes

New Legal Aid Criteria

Legal aid eligibility income thresholds would be amended under a Legal Services Amendment Bill introduced to Parliament recently. The changes would increase the number of NZers who are potentially eligible for legal aid to 1.2 million, up from the current 765,000. The number of legal aid grants made is expected to increase to 85,000, up by 25,000. Income thresholds for civil cases would be based on gross income and adjusted according to family size.

New safeguards are also being built into the system. New merits tests would be introduced, for example, to ensure that in family court matters, regard is given to whether there has been previous proceedings in the matter, to see whether the applicant has been excessively litigious.

For criminal legal aid, a new test would be introduced that places emphasis on likelihood of imprisonment, the complexity of proceedings, whether proceedings involve a substantial question of law, and whether the individual is able to understand them without assistance.

A new repayment and debt management regime would be introduced. Under the new legislation, a higher proportion of recipients would be required to repay some or all or their grant. Those in this category would increase from 8000 currently to 22,000, with the value of repayments rising from $10.8 million to $24.6 million per year.

Criminal and civil legal aid recipients will now be treated the same for repayment purposes, which will result in more criminal legal aid recipients contributing to their legal costs. Costs will be able to be awarded against legal aid recipients, in particular where there has been deceit, misleading behaviour, or misconduct in the proceedings causing the other party to incur unnecessary costs.

New ACC Treatment Injury Law

ACC's medical misadventure rules are being replaced with new treatment injury provisions under the Injury Prevention, Rehabilitation, and Compensation Amendment Act (No 3). Under the new rules, ACC claimants do not have to demonstrate medical error or show that their condition is both rare and severe when they suffer an injury during treatment by a registered health provider. The new cover provisions provide that treatment injuries are simply ones that result from treatment.

While treatment injury cover under the new Act is broader than the old medical misadventure rules, not every adverse outcome will be covered. For instance, cover won't be available if the injury was a necessary part of the treatment, if it was caused wholly or partly by the underlying health of the claimant, or because the treatment did not produce the desired outcome. The Act comes into force on 1 July 2005 and applies only to claims lodged on or after that date.

Oaths to be Modernised

A Bill modernising oaths and affirmations taken by new citizens, public office holders and some state sector employees was introduced to Parliament recently. The major change to oaths and affirmations is that new citizens and parliamentarians will in future pledge loyalty to NZ, as well as the Queen, and will commit themselves to upholding NZ's values of democracy, and the rights and freedoms if its people. The oaths updated by this Bill cover Allegiance, Citizenship, Members of Parliament, the Judiciary, Executive Councillors, Parliamentary Under-Secretaries, members of the Armed Forces, Police, special constables, and the local government officials' declaration. The Bill provides a Maori version of each oath as an option.

Changes to Credit Union Rules

A first set of proposed changes to the legislation governing friendly societies and credit unions comprise:

allowing credit unions to decide their own common bond;
allowing charities and incorporated societies to join credit unions;
allowing credit unions to determine their own minimum deposit levels;
removing the requirement to specify charges in credit unions' rules; and
allowing credit unions to extend new services to their members.

It is proposed that these changes be made by way of legislation scheduled to be introduced later this year. Further changes, which will be included in the review of non-bank financial products and providers also announced recently (see elsewhere in this issue of Rural Bulletin), are likely to be in the areas of:

amendments to current restrictions to give credit unions more flexibility to borrow and to invest surplus funds, and allow them to hold land;
allowing credit unions to raise capital by issuing securities to members;
conferring legal status on credit unions; and
allowing credit unions to convert to limited liability companies.

For more information, visit www.med.govt.nz

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