Legal System
The legal system takes the framework of a parliamentary representative democratic monarchy. In the absence of a single constitution, various legislative documents such as the Constitution Act 1986, Imperial Laws Application Act 1988 and New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 have been implemented to cover such areas. Human rights in New Zealand have never been protected by any single constitutional document or legislation, and no single institution has been primarily responsible for enforcement. Because New Zealand's human rights obligations are not entrenched and are simply part of common law, Parliament can simply ignore them if it chooses. The Human Rights Commission has identified this constitutional arrangement as an area in need of action to identify opportunities for giving greater effect to human rights protections.
The 2009 report by the U.S. Department of State noted that, "he law provides for an independent judiciary, and the government generally respected judicial independence in practice".
Read more about this topic: Human Rights In New Zealand
Famous quotes containing the words legal and/or system:
“The trouble with Eichmann was precisely that so many were like him, and that the many were neither perverted nor sadistic, that they were, and still are, terribly and terrifyingly normal. From the viewpoint of our legal institutions and of our moral standards of judgment, this normality was much more terrifying than all the atrocities put together.”
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“We now come to the grand law of the system in which we are placed, as it has been developed by the experience of our race, and that, in one word, is SACRIFICE!”
—Catherine E. Beecher (1800–1878)