Bridges loses showdown over legal advice

National Party leader Simon Bridges has lost a showdown over the Government’s legal advice behind the coronavirus lockdown, but the question of its lawfulness remains.

Last week, Bridges, as chairman of the epidemic response select committee, summonsed the Government’s top legal adviser, the solicitor-general, along with the director-general of health and the police commissioner, hoping to compel them to provide the Crown Law legal advice on the lockdown.

But legal advice is protected by confidentiality and is rarely made public. Attorney-General David

Parker, who received the advice from the solicitor-general, said the summons was a ‘‘constitutional outrage’’ and asked Speaker Trevor Mallard to refer the matter to Parliament’s privileges committee.

Both Parker’s request and the summons were denied on Tuesday. The stoush over the lockdown may now be resolved in the courts, after the Court of Appeal said there were ‘‘unresolved questions’’ about its lawfulness.

In a letter on Tuesday, Mallard told Parker the summons could not override legal privilege – where all legal advice is confidential – so the matter would not head to the committee to decide whether Parliament’s rules had been breached.

But this also means Parliament – or Bridges as chairman of the committee – does not have the power to require legal privilege to be broken, so the summons had failed.

Parker would not answer Stuff’s questions yesterday, but speaking in the House he said the Government had won the ‘‘skirmish’’, and his refusal to release the advice did not mean ‘‘there’s something bad in there’’.

Bridges, speaking to reporters yesterday, said the summons had not been complied with as Parker refused to waive privilege.

‘‘That leaves us in a situation where we don’t have the legal advice, and I say to the Government

and New Zealanders, actually, . . . treat us like adults. Trust us with the information. They know they don’t have solid, good, legal grounds for the lockdown ... The legality of the lockdown is important, we need rule of law, not rule of press conferences.’’

Bridges had written to Mallard saying Parker is also obligated to make public the advice under the Official Information Act, citing examples where this has happened due to high public interest.

But according to a ruling from the Ombudsman, the watchdog for the act, the attorney-general is not subject to the act — meaning such requests for him to hand over information are likely to fail.