Prasad Rajen: Shop Trading Hours Act 1990 Repeal (Easter Sunday Local Choice) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Prasad Rajen: Shop Trading Hours Act 1990 Repeal (Easter Sunday Local Choice) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
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Dr RAJEN PRASAD (Labour) 
: 
 I congratulate Todd McClay on his first private bill the Shop Trading Hours Act 1990 Repeal (Easter Sunday Local Choice) Amendment Bill. I know we sit at the back and poke fun at each other but he has had the luck of the draw. This is also my first speech on a conscience issue and I want to take it seriously and talk about the reasons why I will not support this bill. 
I remember very well bringing up my children in a community in New Zealand where we had the time to spend at least one and a half days a week with our children to go to the beach. We could rush around for 4 hours in the morning and buy whatever we wanted but we could spend the rest of the weekend with our children taking them to the beach and having barbecues. We could provide the best environment that we could in order to ensure that our children were the best that they could be. They could grow up with their parents around them. Those were great times. I have spoken to many people around the country who ask why we went as far as we did to open up the weekends for one reason only which was for trade. They ask why we did not balance the interests of our families and our children with the interests of commerce and the interests of our community. Unfortunately my conscience will not allow me to vote for this bill because there is no balance in this measure. It does not take care of the interests of very young people. 
We can go further and contemplate for a while and ask ourselves why it is that day in and day out when this House is sitting and when we are elsewhere—in our electorates and in the communities that we visit—we are told about the difficulties that our families are experiencing. People tell us about the level of violence in our community. Young people tell us how disconnected they feel from their parents their elders and their communities. They say the level of abuse is very high. 
Simon Bridges 
: They blame Labour. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: The member might like to follow up on that because it is a serious issue. This bill is quite an anti-family measure and my conscience will not allow me—with the greatest of respect to Mr McClay—to support it. 
When we ask parents and when we look at all of the research what do we find? The member has not read the research findings clearly because the one thing that families tell us time and time again and that we find in research report after research report is that families require more time. Family members say they require more time to spend with each other doing the kinds of things that give our children the best start in life and forming relationships that are enduring yet members come here and complain about the breakdown of relationships and about parents being disconnected from their children. Well I will not vote for a measure that would jeopardise the interests of families. Our children and our families feel disconnected and our youth are disconnected. If we really wanted to address their needs then we would look at some of the drivers of that. Members opposite often speak about the drivers of disconnection and one of the major drivers is a lack of time. Yet we want to take away the one Sunday—the one that is left; the one little bit that is left—that gives at least some families the time to have a longer period in which to bond and do the kinds of things that they need to do. 
This bill takes that time away from our children from our families and from our communities. It does all that in the name of choice of commerce and of sales. Mr McClay bases his argument on freedom of choice and he also bases it on Rotorua. His bill does not make a case for Rotorua only; his bill would actually take away from all of our families those things—[ 
Interruption 
] The member might like to think about that because the bill is not all about selling in Queenstown or Rotorua. If the member wants to have an exemption for Rotorua then let him try it out. Let the member put forward an option that says we should have a referendum in Rotorua and put a 70 percent threshold on it. Let us do that if that member agrees. But no the chambers of commerce and business interests are to decide. I am not prepared to support a measure that takes time away from our families and our children. Thank you.