New Zealand is changing the law TODAY
“The courts have interpreted the provisional approval in a way that doesn’t reflect the current practice. The Government intends to bring before Parliament very quickly some legislation to tidy up what is largely a technical issue rather than a substantive issue.”
Hitler, who grabbed absolute power by quasi-legal means, I am sure would have approved.
Statin might have thought it a bit weak.
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WHILST NZ’S HIGH COURT AGREED YESTERDAY THAT IT’S ‘ARGUABLE .. THE CROWN HAS ACTED UNLAWFULLY’ WITH THE VX ROLLOUT, THE CROWN WILL BE SORTING THAT TODAY BY TWEAKING THE LAW
For background info go here
“From Outdoors party press release: “It is arguable that the Crown has acted unlawfully”!
We won because we were right. We lost because the judge is going to let them do it anyway.
The press release says:
*“The High Court has just released its decision on the urgent challenge to the Pfizer vaccine approval and vaccination rollout plan, agreeing with the plaintiff that it was reasonably arguable that the Minister’s approval was unlawful. Her Honour Justice Ellis has agreed that everyone in New Zealand over 16 is not a limited number of patients, and so the decision is arguably ultra vires the requirements of s23 of the Medicines Act, and she has urged the government to reconsider the lawfulness of the provisional consent they granted for the Pfizer vaccine. Her Honour stopped short of ordering the vaccine rollout to stop, out of concern of undermining public confidence in the vaccine and wasting vaccine stock that is already in New Zealand.””
(Above comment by Amanda Vickers at facebook).
Legally, citing Lawyer, Sue Grey’s conclusions:
“..the judge urged the Crown to [re]consider the law carefully… That’s about all she can do due to a law passed in 2016”.
You can hear Sue’s commentary (pre govt’s subsequent announcements) here at this link.
However…. the Crown has now come up with a Plan B, saying they had been going to tweak the provisional law anyway!
“Health Minister Andrew Little says Section 23 has been used over 40 years by successive Governments to grant early access to approved therapeutic substances when it is in the public good.”
(Links to mainstream media’s coverage are below)
Sue comments regarding today’s emergency reform:
“The government has announced an emergency reform of the Medicines Act because they were copped acting unlawfully. But it’s not even on the listed Parliamentary business… They apparently have no respect for any rules, for truth or justice and accordingly no business representing us” (Sue Grey, Lawyer).
In conclusion:
Read at the mainstream sources below & decide for yourself. Those who wish to take this experimental injection, that is their personal right & choice. And those who do not, likewise. The point of this challenge in court was that the provisional approval was for a limited number of people only, not for all of NZ. However, as we can see here, the Crown will sort that no problem, by tweaking the paperwork. It has been clear from the media spin from way back that it is their intention to have everybody take the experimental injection anyway. After all they have purchased enough supplies to accommodate every Kiwi for two doses. As her Honour Judge Ellis has said yesterday … in spite of the aforementioned cautionary statements, they don’t want to waste that stock or undermine public confidence.
I note the ‘limited number’ concern seems to have now slipped into oblivion
Here is the media propaganda
Covid 19 coronavirus: Govt makes urgent law change after High Court ruling on legality of vaccine rollout
The Health Minister is making an urgent law change after a High Court judgment ruled it was “reasonably arguable” the Government’s provisional approval of the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine is “problematic”.
The case – Nga Kaitiaki Tuku Ihu Medical Action Society Incorporated v The Minister of Health – was in the High Court at Wellington last week.
In a decision released on Tuesday, Judge Rebecca Ellis said: “it is reasonably arguable that the decision to provisionally approve the vaccine for much wider use is problematic” and went beyond the powers of section 23 of the Medicines Act.
Doing so could undermine public confidence in the vaccine and waste vaccine stock that already in New Zealand.
What Ellis said could be problematic was the vaccine being granted for a limited number of New Zealanders – namely those aged over 16.
“While I acknowledge that this is a more “limited” class of persons than “all New Zealanders”, a class of that size seems well beyond what is contemplated by a straightforward, purposive, reading of the section,” she said.
However, Ellis declined to grant interim orders stopping the vaccine rollout – sought by the plaintiff – on the basis the repercussions “are too great, by some very considerable margin”.
In response, Health Minister Andrew Little said the Government was making an urgent “technical amendment to modernise the law”.
Little said section 23 had been used over 40 years by successive governments to grant early access to approved medicines when there was public good.
“The law has for some time now, lacked clarity over how it can be applied.
“We already knew the Medicines Act was out of date, which is why we were planning to replace it with a new Therapeutic Products Act.
“Treatments approved under Section 23 go through a rigorous Medsafe approvals process. There are occasions when the health needs of a population call for urgent access to a medicine, vaccine or treatment and we need to keep this option available for some circumstances.”
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There were six products currently in use under Section 23, including two types of contraceptives, two pandemic flu vaccines, the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine and an electrolyte solution used in hospitals, potentially affected by the decision.
“The Government will introduce a Bill tomorrow to make sure New Zealanders continue to have timely access to the medicines and treatments they need. The Medicines Amendment Bill is expected to be passed under urgency tomorrow in order to protect New Zealanders’ early access to medicines when needed,” Little said.
Legal challenge
Much of the case by applicant Nga Kaitiaki Tuku Ihu Inc had focused on whether the vaccine being rolled out to the majority of the country fitted within the provisional consent legislation in the Medicines Act that it had been granted under.
The vaccine, Pfizer-BioNTech Covid 19, has been formally tested on more than 40,000 people – half received the vaccine, the other half a placebo which consisted of slightly salty water. Since it started being used widely, tens of millions of people have now received it.
In a press release, the group said the judge had agreed that everyone in New Zealand over 16 is not a limited number of patients.
Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said that the court judgment showed “a weakness in the Medicines Act”.
“It affects the flu jab and a variety of other things that have been approved using the provisional approval in the Medicines Act.
“The courts have interpreted the provisional approval in a way that doesn’t reflect the current practice. The Government intends to bring before Parliament very quickly some legislation to tidy up what is largely a technical issue rather than a substantive issue.”
The vaccine was safe, he added.
Pfizer ‘confident’ of Covid-19 vaccine delivery schedules – Hipkins
Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins is still optimistic all New Zealand adults will be vaccinated against the coronavirus by the end of the year, despite a report suggesting otherwise.
Chris Hipkins. Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
A review by the Auditor-General has cast doubt on the government meeting its deadline, citing worries about vaccine supply, reaching remote areas, and the number of trained vaccinators.
However, Hipkins said many of those issues had already been addressed.
Yesterday, Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield acknowledged the programme was huge and ambitious, with the aim of nearly 8 million doses of vaccine to be given before the end of the year. He told Checkpoint the country was “ahead of our scheduled delivery at the moment”.
Hipkins today told Morning Report there was very little the government could do in the way of having a back-up plan, in the event the delivery of the vaccine is delayed.
“There are some risks the Auditor-General highlights that we will not completely be able to remediate … like an international supply chain disruption. If we were to not get the vaccines into the country which is a risk and it is a possibility, there is only a limited amount we could do in that circumstance to avoid a delay. The most likely outcome of that kind of situation is that the vaccine rollout would end up having to be delayed.”
If there was a delay with the Pfizer vaccines reaching New Zealand, the Johnson & Johnson Janssen Covid-19 vaccine would be the next best option he said, which would need approval by Medsafe.
And vaccinators would need to be retrained.
“All of the feedback that we’ve had from Pfizer is that they’re confident they can meet their delivery schedules.
“We have 5000 vaccinations approved, they have done their training so they are ready to go. We are working on extending the workforce to more than our regular vaccinator workforce.”
That would mean bringing back retired health professionals and tapping into that Kaiāwhina workforce.
“We’ll keep training as long as people keep coming forward.”
As for the IT systems being ready, he said: “The trials of the booking system are going well. The system around recording immunisation is already working and it has been working since the beginning of the programme. The system around logistics has been working very effectively. Those are the three most critical parts of the infrastructure that sits around this – two out of three are working, the other one is in the critical phase of trialling.”
At APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation) summit in November, he said the government would voice its view to lift tariffs on Covid-19 vaccines and medical equipment.
“Vaccine nationalism isn’t going to help. We’ve all got to recognise that the effectiveness of the vaccine for any one country relies on the vaccine being rolled out effectively in every other country.”
Australia has reportedly said it would support New Zealand on this.
