Obligations · Rights · Options · Discussion 01
What power are you exercising?
Before arguing about whether an instruction is fair, reasonable or intimidating, establish something more basic: is the person asking you to do something, or legally requiring you to do it?
Those are not the same thing.
People exercising public functions can hold significant powers. Some powers allow a person to require conduct that would otherwise not be legally required. Some permit interference with rights that would otherwise be protected. But the existence of a statutory power does not mean it applies in every circumstance.
Start with four questions
1. What are you requiring?
Pin down the instruction. Stop? Move? Answer? Identify yourself? Hand something over? Permit entry? Submit to a search? Leave a place?
2. What is the legal authority?
If compliance is said to be compulsory, identify the Act, regulation, warrant, bylaw or other lawful source being relied upon.
3. What activates that power?
Many powers depend on thresholds: reasonable grounds, a warrant, a specified event, a particular location, a belief held on stated grounds, or another statutory condition.
4. What does the power actually permit?
Read the scope. A lawful power to do one thing is not automatically a lawful power to do everything connected with it.
The Judicial Review Procedure Act 2016 gives a useful definition of statutory power. It includes a power conferred by legislation to require a person to do or refrain from doing something they would not otherwise be legally required to do, and a power to do something that would otherwise breach another person's legal rights.
That definition exposes the central issue: coercive authority is exceptional because law is doing the work. The authority must therefore be traced back to its lawful source.
“Are you asking me to do that, or are you legally requiring me to do it? If you are requiring it, what statutory power are you exercising?”
That is not obstruction. It is a request to identify the legal basis of coercive authority.
The law can impose duties on the person exercising the power too
The public often hears about obligations placed on the person subject to authority. Less attention is paid to procedural obligations placed on the power-holder.
For example, section 131 of the Search and Surveillance Act 2012 contains identification and notice requirements for many searches. Depending on whether the search is under warrant or without warrant, the person exercising the power may have to announce the intention to search, identify themselves, and provide a warrant or identify the enactment and reason for the search, subject to the Act's qualifications and exceptions.
Rights still sit inside the encounter
The New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 applies to acts by the legislative, executive and judicial branches of government, and to persons or bodies performing public functions, powers or duties conferred by law.
It affirms rights including freedom of expression, peaceful assembly, security against unreasonable search or seizure, freedom from arbitrary arrest or detention, rights on arrest or detention, and natural justice. Those rights are not absolute: section 5 permits reasonable limits prescribed by law where they can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.
That is precisely why identifying the statutory basis matters. A lawful limitation has to come from law; it does not arise simply because an individual asserts authority.
Your immediate options
In many encounters, your safest useful options are procedural rather than confrontational:
Clarify. Ask whether the instruction is a request or a legal requirement.
Identify. Ask what power is being exercised and what enactment or instrument authorises it.
Listen. The answer may reveal the scope, grounds and conditions of the power.
Do not casually consent. If a person already claims compulsory authority, do not confuse compliance with consent. The distinction may matter later.
Do not physically obstruct merely because you dispute the power. An argument about legality can often be preserved without creating a separate issue about obstruction or resistance.
But do not turn that into a false rule that you must submit to unlawful or excessive physical force. That is a different legal question. Section 39 of the Crimes Act limits force used in making an arrest to force necessary to overcome resistance where the arrest cannot reasonably be made in a less violent manner. Section 48 separately provides for reasonable force in self-defence or defence of another, assessed in the circumstances as the person believes them to be.
Preserve the record. Note the words used, identifiers, times, witnesses, documents shown, reasons given and what you were required to do.
Escalate lawfully. Depending on the situation, later options can include legal advice, complaints, disclosure requests, judicial review or other remedies. If a person's liberty is actually restricted, additional rights and urgent remedies can arise.
What this discussion does not mean
It does not mean every instruction from a public official is optional. It does not mean a person can decide for themselves, in the heat of the moment, that a statutory power is invalid and safely ignore every consequence.
It means the analysis starts in the right place.
What is the power? What are its conditions? Have they been met? What does the law require of me — and what does it require of you?
Primary legislation
Judicial Review Procedure Act 2016, s 5 — meaning of statutory power ↗
New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990, s 3 — application ↗
New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 — ss 5, 14, 16, 21–23 and 27 ↗
Search and Surveillance Act 2012, s 131 — identification and notice requirements ↗
Crimes Act 1961, s 39 — force used in executing process or arrest ↗
Crimes Act 1961, s 48 — self-defence and defence of another ↗
Summary Offences Act 1981, s 23 — resisting or obstructing person acting in execution of duty ↗
Legislation checked against New Zealand Legislation on 31 August 2026. Particular statutory powers can contain exceptions, qualifications and procedural rules not reproduced here.