$30.7 million committed to enforce a law that does not exist

$30.7 million committed to enforce a law that does not exist

This morning the Children's Commissioner and a cross-sector coalition called on the Government to build an independent online-safety regulator. They are too late to ask. The Government is already building one, and it has not waited for a law.

Budget 2026 allocated $30.7 million to the Department of Internal Affairs over four years to "develop policy and possible regulatory options to improve children's online safety, subject to future policy and funding decisions." That is the language of scoping: options to be considered, decisions not yet made.

The Department is not scoping. It is building.

In April it advertised for a Programme Implementation Director to stand up what it called a "Phase One operational service model" for the under-16 social media restrictions. Not a review of options: an operational system, to be implemented, before a single line of legislation exists. When the Free Speech Union asked how the Department could implement a policy Parliament had not yet debated, the advertisement was quickly pulled and rewritten, with the Department claiming it had been published "in error".

"The Budget funds the Department to explore options. It is not exploring options. It has gone looking for someone to build and run the system, before there is a law to build it under," said Jillaine Heather, Chief Executive of the Free Speech Union.

The Free Speech Union also asked the Department, under the Official Information Act, for the advice behind the programme, the analysis of its risks, and any assessment that it is lawful. The reply, dated 28 May, withheld most of it. The emails it did release show departmental staff describing the role as implementing the policy, not scoping it.

Two of the answers were not redactions. They were admissions. 

There are no documents analysing the political or reputational risk of committing to this in advance of any legislation. 

There is no legal advice on whether it is consistent with the right to freedom of expression affirmed in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act.

"They are committing thirty million dollars to a system that decides who can speak online, and they have not asked their own lawyers whether it is lawful. When we asked to see that advice, they told us it does not exist," Heather said.

The Cabinet Manual is clear: the rights implications of a policy must be worked through as it is designed, not after the money is spent and the system is built.

The Free Speech Union is sceptical that online regulators work, and wary of how they have been used abroad. But the more immediate concern is the word being used this morning. The call is for an independent regulator. 

The Free Speech Union is absolutely clear - the Department of Internal Affairs is the opposite of independent.

"An agency that already runs the country's content blocklists, and already holds the passport records and photographs of millions of New Zealanders, cannot be the 'independent' regulator anyone is asking for. If 'independent' quietly comes to mean the Department of Internal Affairs, the word has stopped meaning anything," Heather said.

The Free Speech Union calls on the Government to halt the Department of Internal Affairs work programme until the legislation it is built to enforce has been drafted, debated, and passed by Parliament.

New Zealanders should not be made to pay for a system to police their speech before they have even seen the law that authorises it.

ENDS

Notes to editor:

The Official Information Act response is OIA2526-1145, dated 28 May 2026, responding to a request lodged on 24 April 2026.

The $30.7 million is appropriated to the Department of Internal Affairs to "develop policy and possible regulatory options to improve children's online safety, subject to future policy and funding decisions."

"Phase One operational service model for the under-16 social media restrictions" is the Department's own wording, from its advertisement for a Programme Implementation Director, since withdrawn.

The member's bill on under-16 social media access (the Social Media (Age-Restricted Users) Bill) has been paused while the Government develops a wider cross-agency programme. The $30.7 million funds that programme, for which no bill has been introduced.

The Department of Internal Affairs administers content regulation under the Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act, including internet blocklists and takedown notices. It is also the passport-issuing agency and operates the Identity Check facial recognition service.

On 2 June 2026 the Children's Commissioner, Dr Claire Achmad, described a blanket under-16 ban as too blunt an instrument and called for an independent online-safety regulator, alongside a cross-sector coalition.

The Cross Sector Call for Digital Accountability was launched 2 June 2026 by Amnesty International Aotearoa New Zealand and the Tāhono Trust as part of the “No Harmware” campaign. Signatories include the New Zealand Banking Association, Sky, Three, MediaWorks, the Post Primary Teachers Association, the National Council of Women, and academics from Massey, Auckland, Victoria, and Waikato universities. https://cdn.sanity.io/files/ysiap3nf/production/40d70f4a4cf8469929edf51144acae498ff207f9.pdf

Section 14 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 affirms the right to freedom of expression.