SpeechDAN BIDOIS (National—Northcote): Well all I can say to that statement is that at least on this side of the House we don't tell Māori MPs to go back to Italy. So let's come to the bill that we are here on today. Can I just say at a time when businesses are going under at a time when the anxiety is at its highest point in the last 10 to 15 years at a time when our health workers are stretched what are the priorities of this Government? To make it easier for people in prison to vote. I just think that is a shocking sense of priorities and reflects the incompetence of this Government that we have here today.I've read the bill unlike the member opposite Willie Jackson and I understand the purpose of course. There is a sense that under the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act there is a limiting of freedoms to those that are prisoners there are apparently breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi that have been raised that have a disproportionate impact on our Māori prisoners and that it disenfranchises prisoners further. But what is not in this bill that I think is a key purpose of this proposed law is what isn't in there in the first place which is that this Government wants to make it easier for prisoners to vote at the next election. And it is for those political reasons and those alone that we are here today shoving away more important priorities whether it be COVID-19 or dealing with the effects of the economy.Now the purposes of prison are clear from where we sit. We suspend the rights of New Zealand citizens who commit a crime. They have broken the laws of our country and we suspend many rights not just prisoners' voting rights because we want to send a signal to them that it is not OK to break the law and that you are going to have your rights taken away from you to reflect on that to do the time as we refer to it because we believe that that is the way to redemption.We talk about redemption and rehabilitation and this side talks a lot about rehabilitation. Of course we want to see prisoners rehabilitate in prison. That is why our prison system offers things like release to work or education and training opportunities for prisoners to in fact build up their skills and rehabilitate their way towards a better life. And we would encourage that on the political system. Why not have classes for prisoners around the importance of voting and the political process that we operate in New Zealand? Therefore when they are released into the public they will be engaged citizens of this country.Another aspect of the debate that's raised is around how we can help Māori. Well how we can help Māori that are in our prison system is to teach them not to offend in the first place. We've got fantastic initiatives throughout the country. One of those is what my brother's involved with in South Auckland. It's called the Genesis Youth Trust and it takes at-risk kids before they've offended and tries to provide wraparound services to keep them out of our criminal system. That is what we need to do to keep them out of the prison system to begin with.We've got to keep these Māori in education training or employment to give them a sense of a better life a life without crime a life without breaking law and that is the way we will keep these people out of our prison systems. But this Government has a different approach an approach that says We're soft on crime." where they want to let people out of our prison systems even if they've done a crime and broken the law and where they have absolutely no other plan to reduce crime. So Madam Speaker we do not commend this bill to the House today."