Royal Commissions – famously unread

BY MICHAEL FIELD

When young John Banks was an opposition MP for Whangarei, he was exiled to a remote Parliamentary office nicknamed "Siberia".

There he would put royal commission reports to use as a door stop.

"It was a bit of fun when I was in Siberia. We used to have them there, it was a bit of a show off," he said.

This time it will be different, he expects.

The Labour Party established Royal Commission on Auckland Governance, handed over today to the Governor-General, is to be a call to action. Or as Mr Banks so apocalyptically puts it: "judgment day".

Royal commissions are a long established feature of New Zealand political life, a way in which difficult issues can be parked for some time, and then quietly forgotten.

The grand-daddy of the latter was the 1988 Royal Commission into Social Policy which produced five massive volumes. Most of them famously remained in their wrapping.

Encyclopaedia New Zealand says royal commissions are usually set up by government when it "wishes to investigate certain matters outside normal parliamentary or political agencies, usually for the purpose of obtaining as public, as accurate, and as impartial an investigation as possible."

With over a century of royal commissions, they have inevitably touched on every aspect of life – right from conception.

The 1977 Royal Commission on contraception, sterilisation and abortion saw anti-pornography nun Patricia Bartlett wave a Playboy centre foldout around. It was to show some evil but was mostly a joy to those covering it.

One of our most significant royal commissions was among our first – the 1890 inquiry into sweated labour which led to labour laws and the Arbitration Court.

Big events in our history had a royal commission, such as the 1947 Ballantyne fire in Christchurch which killed 41 people. The commission slammed the fire brigade, leading to a better fire service nationally.

The 1979 Air New Zealand Mount Erebus crash, in which 257 died, led to a one man Royal Commission, Peter Mahon. It produced one of the single most quoted lines from such processes when Mr Mahon talked of the "orchestrated litany of lies" behind the crash.

The 1984-86 Royal Commission into the Electoral System had a profound effect, leading to a switch from first past the post voting to the current MMP system.

The 1978 Royal Commission into Nuclear Power decided nuclear power was not necessary now – but said "a significant nuclear programme should be economically possible" in the early 21st Century.

A royal commission in 1947 cleaned up the horse racing and gambling industry and the liquor trade had a royal commission in 1946.

Royal Commissions have been held into "monetary and banking matters", "native Affairs", and the administration of Western Samoa. There was the famous 1887 Royal Commission into the rabbit problem and another examined, and said no, to the idea that New Zealand join Australia.

The 1958 commission in territorial local authority finance has been long forgotten, along with the 1979 Royal Commission into chiropractic practice.

A 1925 Royal Commission on Education had a major impact on the way universities are run.

The 1909 Royal Commission on Timber and Timber-building Industries worried about the destruction of native forests and a 1913 royal commission set up a state forestry scheme.

- © Fairfax NZ News