Parliament is considering the English Language Bill, a five-line piece of legislation that would formally recognise English as an official language alongside te reo Māori and New Zealand Sign Language.
The bill was introduced as part of New Zealand First's coalition agreement with National and ACT. New Zealand First leader Winston Peters described it as correcting an anomaly where English is spoken by more than 96% of New Zealanders but not formally recognised in legislation.
"The bill does not diminish the status of other official languages, te reo Māori and New Zealand Sign Language, but rather complements them, acknowledging the linguistic reality of our nation," Peters said.
Dr Sidney Wong, a post-doctoral researcher at Te Pūnaha Matatini and computational linguist at the University of Otago, said English already functions as the dominant language without legal recognition. "English is already the de facto language, it's already the dominant language," Wong said.
Wong said the bill did not clearly identify what issue it was attempting to solve, noting that countries such as Australia and the United Kingdom operate with English as a de facto national language without formally stating it in law.
Dr Vincent Olsen-Reeder, te reo Māori advocate and ReoPol managing director, told the select committee the legislation would have no legal effect. "It's empty legislation. So legally, it won't do anything," he said.
Te reo Māori was made an official language in 1987, with New Zealand Sign Language following in 2006.