Logie JanJAN LOGIE (Green): Thank you Madam Assistant Speaker. It's a great pleasure to rise and add the Green Party's voice of support to this the second reading of the Marriage (Court Consent to Marriage of Minors) Amendment Bill as it is named right at this moment. Firstly I too would like to congratulate the member Joanne Hayes on shepherding the bill through the House to get it to this point and on keeping all of us on board and engaged and happy through that process. That is clearly no mean feat.I also want to acknowledge Dr Jackie Blue for the work that she did with Shakti: for picking up on their concern which—and it has been acknowledged by others—is an issue that they have been raising for a very long time because of their experience with working with young women coming into their safe house and contacting them who have been forced into these relationships against their will. They have not felt as though those young women have adequate protections in our laws. So it is well overdue in fact that we as a Parliament create a protection for those young women to save them from those lives of forced servitude and as I think was described by Minister Tracey Martin basically socially legally sanctioned rape.I wanted to just touch on the work of the Justice Committee. The Green Party don't have a seat on the Justice Committee so I really want to acknowledge the committee for the work that they've done; it's substantive and really does seem to have addressed some quite tricky issues—where the bill was initially responding to marriages that it is for 16- and 17-year-olds who wish to marry. This will now be extended to civil unions and de facto relationships. I can imagine that that issue of working through how you create the system for de facto relationships in law where we don't normally have an engagement with the court at all for these young women must have taken a degree of consideration.I absolutely support the point that the committee got to of actually having this process for all relationships. So it is marriage civil unions cultural marriages and de facto relationships. The point was made in the commentary from the committee that that seemed to be consistent with the Human Rights Act and the provision to not discriminate against anyone on the basis of marital status. So all of our young women and girls should have the same protection from being forced into relationships and I think that's great. And to reflect that there is sensibly the recommendation to change the title of the bill to the Minors (Court Consent to Relationships) Legislation Bill" as opposed to "(Court Consent to Marriage of Minors)".For anyone who is listening I'll just briefly reiterate the process that this sets up. If a 16- or a 17-year-old wishes to get married then they will need to make an application to the court and a judge will then consider their application and the select committee has added a bit more guidance for the judge around how to consider that application. In the first instance the judge must be satisfied that the applicant has made the application voluntarily—free of undue influence or coercion—and that the applicant understands the consequences of the application and indeed wants the judge to consent. So that's the first consideration for the judge which is quite a significant number of issues for that judge to work through. And if they are actually assured of the free will of the young woman concerned then they need to do an objective assessment to assess whether the marriage will be in the best interests of that girl taking into account the person's age and maturity the person's views any views held by the parents or guardians and any other information available.Considering the severity of the consequences—typically it is a girl being forced into a relationship against her will—I absolutely think it is appropriate that the court works through a very very thorough process to make sure that they understand the consequences and that it is of their freewill to enter into that relationship. And the select committee also made the recommendation that the judge should be able to access a cultural report to be able to aid their consideration of that assessment. Again I think that is appropriate and I have certainly been hearing from judges over time about how they would appreciate more access to cultural reports in a whole range of situations because actually it is really an essential piece of information to understand the context when you're dealing with people and particularly if there is violence involved.Also finally legal representation should also be available if the judge considers that necessary or helpful for the applicant. So this is a really important step today in terms of making sure that our commitment to end family and sexual violence works for everyone in our society—for our children and for people of all cultures. It is with huge pleasure that I offer the Green Party's support at this second reading."