You may have noticed that new legislation, the Contract and Commercial Law Act 2017 (CCLA), came into effect on 1 September 2017. It is the first revision Act introduced under the Legislation Act 2012 and as a consequence some acts, including the Electronic Transactions Act 2002 (ETA), are repealed.
The purpose of the new legislation is to re-enact in an up-to-date and accessible form, certain legislation relating to contracts, sale of goods, electronic transactions, the carriage of goods, and various other commercial matters. The Bill introduced in 2016 stated that the new Act, in accordance with the Legislation Act 2012, was not intended to change the effect of the law except for minor amendments to clarify Parliament’s intent or reconcile inconsistencies.
What has changed?
In practice, there are no actual changes to the purpose and principles of the former ETA replaced by Part 4 of the new CCLA. Schedule 3 of the CLLA provides a comparative table which shows the sections of the new Act alongside those which they replace.
The only minor amendment is for section 14(2)(e) of the ETA, replaced by Section 217(2)(e), as identified in Schedule 2 of the CCLA.
Section 229 is identical to section 25 of the ETA, which is the section the Authority to retain public records in electronic form only was issued under.
Impact on the digitisation guidance and digitisation activities?
There is no need for the digitisation guidance to be substantially changed. The only change that was required is, obviously, to update all references to the repealed Act or any specific provision of the repealed Act.
Both the Authority to retain public records in electronic form only (17/Sp7) and the Destruction of source information after digitisation (17/G13) have been updated to reference the new legislation, but remain in substance identical to the previous versions released earlier this year.
This means any digitisation programme undertaken currently by public offices may carry on as planned, and destruction of source information after digitisation may take place following our guidance as initially organised.
As usual, please use rkadvice@dia.govt.nz as your first point of contact if you would like further clarification.