SpeechDARROCH BALL (NZ First): Thank you Madam Speaker. What we just heard from Chris Bishop in the last 30 seconds—probably less—was he rattled off a few things that they agree with in the bill. The first five minutes of his speech literally were about one thing: obviously trying to convey to us why the National Party and he in particular doesn't support this bill. I listened to Nick Smith prior to that and couldn't figure out whether he supported or didn't support this bill. I'm glad that Chris Bishop actually said I don't support this bill." What Chris Bishop said in the first five minutes is that the main reason—obviously it's the main reason because it took half his speech—was that they weren't consulted that the Opposition wasn't consulted on a piece of legislation—"Therefore that's our main reason to oppose it." He spent more than five minutes of his 10-minute allocation complaining about not being consulted on a piece of legislation going through this House about electoral issues right?Then his second main point was that it's going to delay things by 10 days—it's going to delay things by 10 days—but in the same breath he said yes this will increase voter turnout. This will increase access to people to ensure that they can vote but it's going to delay it by another 10 days. That's the second reason why they're going to not support this bill and then like I said he used 30 seconds or so to list the majority of the bill that they agree with but they're voting against. The National Party can't have it both ways. They can't agree with the majority of the bill and the intent of the bill and then have two pathetic reasons why they're not going to support it and then vote no at the first reading.What I want to get on to is what Nick Smith said. There's one thing in particular he said that stood out for me. I was getting a glass of water over there on the floor and I almost dropped it. The main reason why he's not supporting this bill—he said "The Government is trying to win the next election by screwing it in the Government's favour. The Government's trying to screw the scrum" I think he said—"screw the scrum". So the Government is going to win the election going to screw it in our favour. Now what he's just said is that more people who vote the more people who have access to vote is going to make the Government win the election.Hon Clare Curran: Worked for the Republicans.DARROCH BALL: Is that what the member said?Hon Clare Curran: Yes.DARROCH BALL: Is the member going to deny that? I'm not sure that he actually understood what he said—I don't think he understood what he said. So what's the opposite to that? That National don't want more people to go out to vote that National don't want more people to have access to vote because that will mean that they'll have favour in the election. If people are empowered in this country like Nick Smith says they're going to vote for the sitting Government. That's what Nick Smith has just said and I hope people are watching because what he's just admitted—so there's three things for the public of this country to understand the three main reasons why the National Party is not supporting this bill to give more access and to get more people to vote: because the National Party think that it's going to make the Government win the election that they weren't consulted about it in the first place and it's going to delay things by 10 days. That's why the National Party is not going to support this bill.There's a couple of things that I'd like to mention. The first is that I had the tremendous honour actually as a parliamentarian to go over and have a look at and observe the recent Fijian election and the election in the Solomons as well. The—Hon Dr Nick Smith: Do they allow same-day enrolment?DARROCH BALL: See look at this—I mean this is pathetic. This is ridiculous—this is ridiculous.It was a tremendous honour for me to do that and one thing that I learnt is that we take for granted in this country our democratic process we take for granted the trust that we have in our system and Electoral Commission and we take for granted the access that we have to vote the access to our MPs and the ability for us to get out and vote. What ironically Dr Nick Smith was waxing lyrical about on the bill prior to this was all about the fairness of the electoral system. Well if he took just an ounce of his own advice then he would be voting for this bill and wouldn't be complaining that we are increasing the fairness with this bill of the electoral system by giving access by allowing more people to vote.But here's the more important thing and it was made clear by the Minister: that because of the advance voting that is allowed in this country it is estimated that approximately 65 percent of all people of all voters that will vote in the 2020 election will be doing it prior to the election day. What those 65 percent of all of those voters are able to do are to enrol and vote on the same day. When they decide to go and vote they can enrol on the same day. For the fairness of the electoral process we need to be able to do that on the election day itself. Otherwise we're going to have—and it was 19000 people last election that wanted to exercise their democratic right to vote but they were denied that ability to do that. Now if Nick Smith and his colleagues in the National Party are saying that's fair and they want to take an ounce of their own advice from their speeches on the previous bill about the importance of the fairness of the vote and the ability to vote then they will vote for this piece of legislation.What I want to do in the last couple of minutes is just outline the main aims and intent that the National Party are voting against in this bill. The first is to "improve the enrolment and voting processes to better enfranchise voters". The National Party are voting against that in the first reading. To "uphold the integrity of the electoral system by ensuring that elections are conducted efficiently and securely"—the National Party are voting against that intent and against that aim. They are also voting against giving "support [to] the effective conduct of future elections." They are voting against those aims and intents.New Zealand First will be supporting this bill. We would like to have this bill go through to select committee for its scrutiny that the select committee does. We have a few questions about the practicality of what we want to implement and what we agree with in regards to the intent of this bill—around the ability for supermarkets for example to hold voting booths. We agree with the fact that as written in the legislation and as the Minister outlined venues such as supermarkets and sports clubs etc. should have the ability to be able to hold voting booths and ensure that people can vote there because they are where people go to as hubs and they do that on election days and why would we not give them the ability to vote at the same time. But we'd like to see the practicalities in regards to that as well as any issues that fall out in regards to possibility of electioneering issues within supermarkets as well.But I think that there's one point I'd like to make. In a robust democracy there's responsibility on both Parliament and on the public to ensure that we both play parts in maintaining the robustness of democracy and our democratic process. The Government needs to ensure there's access to that system that the maximum number of people are out there and voting and also that the information is out there for them to make informed votes. But the people need to go there too need to understand they have a responsibility and obligation to vote first and foremost but also to make an informed vote and to make the effort to vote. So we've got that expectation as well in the people of this country. We look forward to the committee stage where we will see more detail about how this will be implemented but we'll be supporting it through this first reading."