This project has two parts:
- Establishment of a community repository of New Zealand Government legislation and regulation as code, made publicly available, with four high value and impactful use cases that deliver immediate value to the general public, whilst also accelerating future opportunities. The initiative will grow the domestic rules as code community and capability through accelerating development in this space for all sectors. It will also create greater demand for explainable, equitable and appealable use of rules by government departments.
- Establish a service for anyone in New Zealand to anonymously learn what government services they are entitled and eligible for, as defined in legislation. Most eligibility criteria are prescriptive (age, income tests, relationship status, etc) but some benefits and services also have judgement-based rules.
Our hope is that the service will help more people get what they are entitled to, and will feel confident to ask “why not?” if they are turned away. After all, Section 23 of the OIA clearly requires departments to provide an explaination of decisions relating to that person, but most people don’t know that departments are legally required to provide an explanation of decisions relating to them. Our secondary hope is that all government systems would be traceable to law and their legal authorities, and would proactively provide these explanations of decisions/actions proactively to citizens.