New Zealand Constitution

A constitution establishes the major foundations of government – who runs the country and how the country is to be run.

This report will

* Firstly approach the legal and conventional elements of New Zealand’s constitutional arrangement. New Zealand’s Constitution will then be compared to a famous quote stated in 1982 by the Supreme Court of Canada, who said, “Constitutional conventions plus constitutional law equal the total constitution of the country.”

* The second section of the report will then address the changes to New Zealand’s Constitution in the past thirteen years, and its impact on various groups. Two major changes will be focused on:

* The first Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) election, and why New Zealand went from First Past the Post (FPP) to MPP, and

* The abolition of the right to appeal to the Privy Council due to the creation of the Supreme Court.

The processes that New Zealand has to adopt where changes of a constitutional kind are being proposed will also be discussed.

The legal aspect of New Zealand’s Constitution is made up of four main components which are:

* Statute law: New Zealand’s parliament is the country’s most influential law-making authority, and the laws it makes are called statute laws, which are superior to laws created by any other establishment. The Constitution Act (1986) is the most significant part of statute law because it combines the bases of our government’s practices, such as confirming the Sovereign as New Zealand’s Head of State and dealing with the executive part of government e.g. Ministers must also be MP’s

* Delegated legislation: These are regulations which are not directly made by Parliament, but by others – usually the Governor General or a Minister - , to which the Parliament has delegated the power to act under certain statutes. A key example of this can be seen by the Social Security Act (1964), where Ministers can change routine welfare benefits, allowances and...