We’re a central agency responsible for helping other government agencies to make their rules and regulations easier for New Zealanders to navigate.
The Ministry for Regulation is a small Government agency with a big job to do.
The Ministry was established on 1 March 2024, to strengthen New Zealand’s regulatory management system and to improve regulatory quality, including the experience that New Zealanders have of complying with regulation.
We are focused on lifting quality across all regulatory systems and supporting agencies with regulatory responsibilities to align with good practice. It is important New Zealand has sound regulatory settings to support a modern, open market economy.
The Ministry has four key functions:
- Ensure the quality of new regulation
- Improve the functioning of existing regulatory systems
- Raise the capability of those who design and operate regulatory systems
- Provide continuous and enduring improvements to the regulatory management system
Good regulation benefits us all – we all drive on the left side of the road, we can trust that our food is safe to eat, and our innovators can get legal protections for their ideas. But poorly designed and implemented regulation makes it difficult for businesses to innovate and grow and adds cost to our economy.
In recent years, we’ve seen more businesses reporting that government regulation is a barrier to innovation and growing their businesses.[1]
The Ministry works with regulators across government to improve the quality of what they do and how they do it – and in turn, support an improvement in outcomes and the lives of all New Zealanders.
We want rules and regulations to enable New Zealanders to do more - leading to more productive use of people’s time, and better outcomes for those who want to get things done. We want it to be easier for businesses to innovate, grow and comply – while still knowing that the benefits from regulation that we take for granted, won’t change.
The Ministry is one of four current central public service agencies, alongside the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Te Kawa Mataaho Public Service Commission and the Treasury. The Social Investment Agency will be the fifth central agency from 1 July 2024.
Central agencies guide the wider public service. For us, our responsibility is to help other government agencies with the rules and regulations that they create and use.
Existing functions
The Cabinet decision to establish the Ministry for Regulation in January 2024 included that two functions, one from the Treasury and one from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) would shift to the new Ministry. On 1 May 2024, 16 roles from these teams came over to become the first permanent staff members of the Ministry.
Regulatory reviews
Regulatory reviews are a new, core function of the Ministry for Regulation. Visit the webpage for more information: