As to the reserve powers, for the present purposes, there are four points worthy of consideration:
　　First, the reserve powers are certain legal powers, which are statutory or prerogative. The reserve powers are not any additional or exceptional powers, but the Governor-General’s ordinary legal powers set up by the Letters Patent 1983 and the Constitution Act 1986. What makes them different is that the reserve powers are exercised at the Governor-General’s personal discretion other than on the ministerial advice. That is against or without the ministerial advice. It is worth noting that the Court of Appeal of Grenada has held that the Governor-General is not only entitled to make full use of the Crown’s legal powers, but is also authorized by the doctrine of necessity to act outside of the law in order to protect the constitution and the nation in an emergency situation.[21]Put another way, in a few cases, the Governor-General may act unconstitutionally to avoid legal chaos from a vacuum arising within the constitutional order and to provide for the continuing orderly conduct of the state.[22]
　　Secondly, the reserve powers are certain legal powers of the sovereign or her representative, but in practice the sovereign is unlikely to exercise them as the reserve powers. Both the Letters Patent 1983 and the Constitution Act 1986 make it plain that all royal powers are exercisable in New Zealand either by the sovereign or the Governor-General as her representative and that the Governor-General shall hold office during her pleasure.[23] However, the lesson drawn by Professor Brookfield from the Queen’s handling of the Fiji crisis of 1987 is that no constitutional crisis in one of her realms outside the United Kingdom is likely to prompt any decisive royal intervention, whether it be to check constitutionally improper actions on her representative’s part or to support and maintain her representative in office against prime ministerial advice to dismiss.[24] Similarly, it seems clear that if the need arose to exercise the reserve powers, it would not be the sovereign but the Governor-General to exercise them. The sovereign is, after all, not likely to be visiting New Zealand at any time of crisis when it might be necessary to exercise the reserve powers. Thus the sovereign would leave the matter of reserve powers entirely in the Governor-General’s hands. A good example is the dismissal of the Whitlam ministry by the Australian Governor-General (Sir John Kerr) in 1975.
　　In that constitutional crisis, Mr. Whitlam was unable to get his budget measures through the Senate and the Governor-General exercised his reserve power to dismiss the ministry without warning Mr. Whitlam of what he would do if the budget was not passed. The Queen was requested by the Speaker of the House of Representatives of the dissolved Parliament to recommission Whitlam because of the majority he had retained in that House. She refused. The letter from the Queen’s private secretary to the Speaker said:
　　The only person competent to commission an Australian Prime Minister is the Governor-General, and The Queen has no part in the decisions which the Governor-General must take in accordance with the Constitution…it would not be proper for her to intervene in person in matters which are so clearly placed within the jurisdiction of the Governor-General by the Constitution Act.[25]
　　Obviously, with the localization of the Governor-General in New Zealand, all royal powers have been absorbed into the office of the local Governor-General, and the formal constitutional links with the Queen do not mean that she regards herself as necessarily retaining an “immediate” role in any constitutional crisis in New Zealand.[26]By contrast, all reserve powers may and will be exercised by the local Governor-General independently and exclusively of the sovereign. Even to those prerogative of appointing and dismissing a Governor-General, which she alone can exercise, the Queen is unlikely to exercise except as advised by her New Zealand Prime Minister.[27]
　　Thirdly, the reserve powers are certain legal powers, which are exercised in extraordinary circumstances. The long-standing constitutional convention is that the Governor-General acts on the advice of the Prime Minister who commands the confidence of the House of Representatives. But when may the Governor-General act without or against the Prime Minister’s advice? The answer is that the need to exercise the reserve powers is extremely rare. It was argued that the reserve powers might be exercised in two basic circumstances: the first was where there was some doubt as to who “commands confidence”; and the second was where the Governor-General was being asked to do something which she or he believed to be in violation of fundamental principles.[28]In my opinion, the reserve powers may be exercised in the second circumstance. As far as the first is concerned, the proper role to make the uncertain situation clear may be that of the political parties, not of the Governor-General.

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