SpeechANDREW FALLOON (National—Rangitata): Thank you Mr Speaker. I rise to speak on the Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill—Chlöe Swarbrick: Come on Falloon. ANDREW FALLOON: —I'll get to you Chlöe Swarbrick—and I do so noting that this bill was last debated on 18 March. Now some months have passed since that time but for those who don't recall that was of course at a time when New Zealand was in the early stages of the grips of COVID-19 and so what we had was the Government seeking to ram through—[Interruption] SPEAKER: Order! Order! Could I ask members—members are having conversations over there that are sitting four or five benches apart. Stop it. ANDREW FALLOON: So what we had was this Government seeking to pass through this Parliament not measures that would assist in the public health response not measures that would ensure that we come out of COVID-19 in a good economic situation and not measures that would assist in job creation but instead a bill that would give prisoners the vote. That carried through actually throughout select committee. It was a truncated process. The select committee was held during lockdown where submitters had to be heard via a Zoom call rather than in person and for those reasons alone this bill represents an affront to the democratic ideals that we hold in this Parliament. Tens of thousands of Kiwis are losing their jobs. Businesses are struggling many are closing and yet this Government is making it a priority—SPEAKER: Order! Order! I'm going to warn this member early. There are a certain set of lines that I've now heard probably about 10 times because members are going back to them. They're to stop and we are to focus on the bill. Hon Michael Woodhouse: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. A couple of times you have mentioned repetition in debate and that is true when it comes from the same member. But is it your ruling now that a member who has not at this stage participated in the debate is prevented from raising the issues that are important to that member just because it has been raised—SPEAKER: I'm happy to deal with it. There have been many rulings in the past that repetition goes across a debate not just within a speech. I was getting in an early warning for this member. Hon Michael Woodhouse: Can you reference that? Could you provide the reference—SPEAKER: Yes there's a very good ruling from Assistant Speaker Mallard at one stage—I can't remember the debate—but it was at a time when the Hon Phil Goff was in the House. I think it was the fifth time a particular set of lines had been used and in that particular case it was because he was the fifth member to read the explanatory note. ANDREW FALLOON: Yet this Government are making a priority out of passing legislation to give prisoners the vote. This is an extremely confused piece of legislation. When people are sentenced for a crime they give up certain rights in our society. Some of those have been touched on this morning. They are the rights of freedom of association freedom of movement and of course this Parliament has determined several times—for at least a portion of prisoners—also the right to vote. This is where this bill is confused because it doesn't actually give all prisoners the right to vote; it limits it to only those who are sentenced to a term of imprisonment of less than three years. I've been sitting here for some time during this debate and I read through the debate on the first reading speeches and nowhere has any MP opposite actually put forward the reason for why it should be restricted to three years. I can completely appreciate Chlöe Swarbrick's point of view that all prisoners should be allowed the vote and that's a valid point of view to have. But nowhere has any MP opposite put forward why three years should be the case. The best we have heard came from Clare Curran in the first reading speeches where she said the threshold of a three-year jail sentence means that those prisoners will be able to vote on the Government that will be in power when they are released. Now that defies logic because the same could be said for any prisoner who's given any length of sentence if they are to be released in the three years prior to an election—that they should be able to vote in an election when they are going to be released within the three years subsequent to that. An example would be that if someone was sentenced 20 years ago to prison and they're due for release next year the logic behind Clare Curran's statement would be that that person should be able to vote in the upcoming election in September. In an earlier debate Chlöe Swarbrick in one of the reasons for her support of this bill said that prisoners are treated differently depending on the sentence that they're given. She identified I think home detention as one of those. But I just want her to reflect on the fact that this bill does exactly what she doesn't want. This bill does determine that voting rights will be given to people depending on their sentence. If someone's given 37 months in prison they won't be able to vote but if someone's given 35 months in prison for the same crime they will be able to vote. Chlöe Swarbrick: It's better to have something than nothing. ANDREW FALLOON: So it's better to have something she says. Well actually what Ms Swarbrick is doing is voting against the very ideals that she claims are the reasons that she's voting for this bill. This bill does exactly what she doesn't want—it treats prisoners differently depending on their sentence. The Government have failed to answer the logical questions of why this bill is needed. They've failed to answer the logical questions of why three years is the line that's drawn. It's a confused bill made a priority by this Government at a time when this Parliament should be devoting its attention to far more important matters.