New Zealand's coalition government has passed more legislation under urgency in a single term than any other Parliament since records began in 2008, according to data from the Parliamentary Library. Urgency is a parliamentary tool that lets the government speed bills through multiple stages at once, sometimes skipping the select committee stage where MPs and the public would normally examine a bill in detail. RNZ

The data, provided to RNZ and covering the first 940 days of the current Parliament through to 2 July, showed 17.4 percent of all bills sent for Royal Assent — the point at which a bill formally becomes law — passed through all stages at once, bypassing the select committee stage entirely. Over the same 940-day window, the previous Labour government passed 15.5 percent of its bills without select committee scrutiny. RNZ

The overall volume of legislation has not shifted much. Parliamentary Library data showed the total number of bills passed into law held steady at just under 200 across the past several terms. What has changed is how those bills are processed: the number of bill stages progressed under urgency has jumped sharply during the coalition's time in office. RNZ

Former Labour Prime Minister and Attorney-General Sir Geoffrey Palmer said the coalition's reliance on urgency was not a response to a heavy legislative workload but a way of sidestepping select committee scrutiny. The government has rejected that characterisation. RNZ

Palmer has been making versions of this argument for some time. In a December 2025 interview with RNZ's Nine to Noon programme, he said the government was increasingly pushing legislation through under urgency, which allowed it to skip parliamentary stages. RNZ

Speaking about the longer trend, Palmer said urgency had been normalised 'by degrees' until it became a tool of convenience rather than necessity. RNZ He has also previously warned, on behalf of the Law Society, that legislation often went wrong if it was rushed. RNZ

In a June 2026 report for Transparency International New Zealand titled 'Time to Raise the Bar: The Case for a Positive Test for Urgency in New Zealand', Palmer argued that Parliament's Standing Orders — the rulebook that governs how the House operates — should include clear criteria for deciding when urgency is justified. Transparency International NZ

Palmer also pointed to the strain on the select committee system, noting that overworked and under-resourced committees were a related concern. He cited the hundreds of thousands of submissions received on the Treaty Principles Bill as evidence of the pressure committees face. RNZ

The procedural mechanics around urgency are well established. According to the New Zealand Parliament's fact sheet, a Minister may move an urgency motion for specified business, particularly bills, and the motion may be moved without advance notice. New Zealand Parliament The Parliament's guide to the legislative process states that when a bill is passed under urgency without select committee consideration, the committee of the whole House is the only real opportunity for scrutiny. New Zealand Parliament

Recent House records show the practice in operation. On Thursday, 28 May 2026, the House agreed to accord urgency to business including the first reading of the Appropriation (2025/26 Supplementary Estimates) bill. New Zealand Parliament Two days earlier, on Tuesday, 26 May, the House agreed to extend its sitting from 9.00 am until 1.00 pm the following day. New Zealand Parliament On 30 June, the House accorded urgency to the remaining stages of the Antisocial Road Use Legislation Amendment Bill. New Zealand Parliament

Shadow Leader of the House Kieran McAnulty said National had criticised Labour's use of urgency during the pandemic but then quickly surpassed those figures once in government. He said Labour's use of urgency to move through more than a couple of stages of a bill at any one time was infrequent, and he noted that discomfort with the high use of urgency is reflected in submissions to Parliament's Standing Orders Committee. RNZ

Chris Finlayson, Attorney-General in the John Key government, said the data pointed to a need for Parliament to consider extending House sitting hours given the complexity and volume of legislation. RNZ

The broader context here is a structural tension in how the House manages its workload. Urgency is, by Parliament's own definition, a tool for dealing with specified business without notice. When the total legislative output stays steady but the proportion of bills bypassing select committee scrutiny rises sharply, the question Palmer, McAnulty and Finlayson are each approaching from different angles is whether the House has the capacity, sitting time, or procedural discipline to handle that workload through ordinary process. The Standing Orders Committee, which reviews parliamentary procedure, is the natural venue for any reform of urgency criteria. Victoria University of Wellington's academic publication on urgency in the legislative process has tracked the use of the tool across multiple parliaments, providing a baseline against which the current spike can be measured. Victoria University of Wellington

What remains unresolved is whether the Standing Orders will be amended to introduce a positive test for urgency, as Palmer has urged, or whether the current framework — which places the decision entirely in the hands of the government of the day via ministerial motion — will persist. The government's rejection of Palmer's central criticism indicates no immediate appetite for reform from the executive, leaving the matter to be worked through in the Standing Orders Committee's ongoing review.