Swarbrick ChlöeParts 1 and 2 and clauses 1 and 2CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Green): Mr Chair thank you very much. This is an exciting day to be sitting in the chair for the first time having taken this member's bill through with the support of all of the parties in this Chamber. So I want to thank all of my colleagues in all parties for their support thus far.Just to give those who are listening and/or watching the debate—the pleasure of watching the debate—this morning the background as to what this bill does this Election Access Fund Bill was first drafted by Mojo Mathers who is a former Green Party MP and the first profoundly deaf member of our Parliament. We took it through quite a rigorous select committee process and I want to thank the Governance and Administration Committee for their entertaining me on their select committee pretty much every single session that they considered this Election Access Fund Bill. I also want to thank the Minister of Justice for allowing his justice officials to be available for consideration of this bill.There are a number of changes that have come through the select committee process but all pertain to the general intention of the Election Access Fund Bill—that being to establish a fund administered by the Electoral Commission that would facilitate the participation of disabled persons in political life particularly allowing disabled persons the ability to engage in general elections. The changes that we got and worked through actually acknowledging and considering a number of the concerns that were raised from a number of different parties throughout the first reading in particular of the Election Access Fund Bill can be broadly summarised in three thematic areas.The first is that we have narrowed the scope and deepened the focus. By-elections of general electorates are now to be included; however unfortunately because of the narrow scope of a member's bill this couldn't extend to cover local government elections. Parties and NGOs who in the first form of the bill as originally drafted—will no longer be able to access funding but instead the funding will be available for candidates from the time that they declare their intention per the definition in the Electoral Act 1993.We have also made some changes to the definition of disabled persons". That is to align this legislation with other law in this area and also to streamline delivery of this fund particularly around eligibility. It's also the case that payments are not to be considered election expenses or donations. This is really fundamental actually in making sure that the whole reason that we are administering this fund is to remove those barriers that other candidates—candidates without disabilities—simply don't face. This is fundamentally about barrier-free elections.Thirdly and finally the part of review: the select committee considered that already built into the bill as drafted. The Minister is required to review the Election Access Fund Bill and its operation within a few years; however they have decided to move ahead with also adding in consideration of the Electoral Commission which is something that absolutely we as the Greens and myself as the sponsor of this bill can agree with and I'd like to thank again all of the parties in this House even those which we often find ourselves on the politically opposite side to in coming together to support a bill which I think is going to be a massive step towards a more fundamentally equitable and inclusive democracy and therefore—hopefully—society. Kia ora."