Logie JanJAN LOGIE (Green): It is a great pleasure to rise and speak on behalf of the Green Party in support of Joanne Hayes' member's bill the Marriage (Court Consent to Marriage of Minors) Amendment Bill. I would just like to acknowledge her for having the luck that managed to get this pulled from the ballot. I would also like to acknowledge the advocacy work that she has been doing up to this point to gain support for and understanding of this issue which is work that was initially started by Dr Jackie Blue the Equal Employment Opportunities Commissioner who drafted this bill initially in 2012.It is slightly confusing to me when there is unanimous support across this House for this bill that this has come to the House through a member's bill 5 years on from when it was first written. I think there was a petition in support of this signed by 82 members of this House a couple of years ago and every woman in every party is from my understanding on the record as supporting this. It does seem a bit strange that it has taken a member's bill—though at the same time there is a tiny bit where it is nice actually to acknowledge the personal work that has gone into it and a member's bill enables us to do that. So thank you.For me I think this is about getting to the point where forced child marriage is—we are talking about slavery; that is what it is. If you are forced into a relationship for life or for years where you have no control and it is against your will and where you are in a relationship of subservience that is a form of slavery. That has no place in our society. We know that in these relationships if it is against the child's will then there is going to be in all likelihood a relationship filled with sexual violence because it is against that child's will. So it is critically important for us as a society to say: Actually this has no place. We do not want this in our society. We want all of our children"—and this is mostly about girls—"to be able to be free to make their own decisions and to have the bodily integrity and opportunities in life."Therefore this bill gives us a sense of protection because we know that that is not the case at the moment. There are girls mostly and potentially from looking at some of the numbers some boys as well who may be living those lives. We have heard from advocates in Shakti who have been in touch with some of these young women who have been forced into these lives of slavery and who because of the way our laws exist at the moment really have very very little protection. So to build in a step where if there is going to be a marriage before the age of 18 a judge has oversight of that; where the applicant both parties has the opportunity to be heard; where as far as reasonably practical we also hear from the parents as well in that process; where there would be able to be lawyers involved in that discussion; and where this is to be a private process that happens in the court not under the eye of the media—because I do think there is a potential for these discussions and for the situation while it is very significant and severe to be sensationalised and to become an issue that could feed racism and could actually make it harder for some women in some situations to come forward and get help when they need it. I do also on that note want to echo the call from my colleague Poto Williams for the need to fund Shakti. That is the organisation that has the most ability to work effectively with women from the communities most likely affected and we need to make sure they are properly resourced to do this work.But this is a great bill. It is about time. We need to make a stand as a country against the exploitation of women and girls."