Dalziel Lianne: General Debate 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Dalziel Lianne: General Debate 
[Sitting date: 19 September 2012. Volume:684;Page:5385. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 Women’s Suffrage Day celebrates women’s right to vote. As we have heard a number of speakers say New Zealand was the first country in the world to allow that to occur. This is a day that we should be able to celebrate. This is a day where we should all be able to join together and celebrate the wonderfulness of having been that first country that acknowledged the role of women in our country’s democracy. 
I think the other place that we should be really thinking of today is Christchurch because of course Christchurch was home to Kate Sheppard and those other suffragists who really led the way. We memorialised them in a wonderful memorial in Christchurch which unfortunately is not in a location that we can access due to the earthquakes. 
But not everyone in Christchurch is actually feeling like celebrating today because democracy is something that has been challenged. People are feeling demoralised. People are feeling powerless to act in the face of what they see as an erosion of democracy. When we look at what has happened in Christchurch—our city our schools and our environment—all of the democratic institutions around those three fundamentals of where I come from have all been challenged. The democratic voice of the people has been stilled by the Government. 
I want to remind the House that democracy is more than the right to vote. It means a lot more than that. Sure we have the expression of democracy—representative democracy—when we cast our vote and we come to this place to represent those who send us here. But it is about guaranteeing basic human rights. It is about the separation of powers it is about freedom of expression and it is about good governance. That is what a democratic country looks like. 
I am afraid that every single one of those features of a democracy that I have spoken of has been threatened in Christchurch today. These were all things that the suffragists actually stood for when they petitioned Parliament for the right to vote. I want to remind the House that nearly a quarter of all adult voting-age women in this country signed that petition at that time. It was extraordinary. Over 30000 women signed the petition for the right to vote. What we are challenging the Government to do today is to trust the people. Go back those 119 years to when this Parliament trusted the people. It trusted every single one of its citizens of voting age with the right to vote. Let us see that we can trust the people today as we hopefully restore democracy to Environment Canterbury restore democracy to the Christchurch City Council and restore democracy to our schools. 
At 5.30 p.m. tonight at the Bridge of Remembrance in Christchurch there will be a gathering where there will be a new rebuilding suffrage petition launched. That petition is designed to restore democracy to our city to our schools and to our environment. The purpose of the petition is to renew the great democratic legacy of Christchurch for our children. That is whom the petition aims to support. Vote Canterbury Kids speaks to our proud history of universal suffrage in New Zealand it speaks to the loss of democracy that we have suffered in Christchurch today and it speaks to the future for our children. That is what the petition is all about. 
It is wonderful that Christchurch sees the launch of this modern suffrage petition with its call for democracy. I want the Government to listen to the people. Many Christchurch residents are hurting. They are bewildered. They are struck by bombshell announcements around their land their homes the Earthquake Commission insurance and now school closures. Nobody is saying that these are not hard decisions but they are impacting on people through the way they are being presented to them as final decisions with the people not being empowered to have a say about their future. 
At the school meeting I attended the other night one person said that the announcement had done what 10000 aftershocks had not done. If that school closes his family leaves. I do not want anyone to leave Christchurch because they have not had a say in rebuilding its future.