Bishop Chris; Tisch LindsayCHRIS BISHOP (National): Well it is slightly strange that David Clendon criticised my colleague Paul Foster-Bell for making what he described as terrible arguments in the second National speech on the bill while the member who has just resumed his seat finished his speech by talking about how we should introduce alternative vote into the New Zealand political and electoral system. Given even he cannot bring himself to make any arguments in favour of the bill I think that says quite a lot about the merits of the particular proposal we are talking about.The critical issue with this bill is what the purpose is of an electoral roll. Why do we have the electoral roll? I would put it to the House that there are three very good reasons why we have an electoral roll. First it is to allow political parties and third parties to furnish members of the public who are enrolled on the roll with information and content that is relevant to them about the upcoming election about the things that the party stands for and about the things that individual candidates stand for. That is very important. Secondly it is to enable the Electoral Commission to furnish voters with information to send out the EasyVote cards to tell them where the polling places are to tell them when the election day actually is and to do all of the things that the Electoral Commission very rightly does. Thirdly—and this is important as well—we have a roll so that we know that people who are entitled to vote do vote and that people who are not entitled to vote cannot vote. That is actually really important otherwise we would just let anyone turn up with ID and say I'm over 18 and I'm entitled to vote." You know we have a roll for a reason because we have restrictions around who can vote in New Zealand and who cannot vote. Given we have the roll the question is: should we get people on to the roll so that we can fulfil all of those important functions? Should we get as many people on to the roll as we can so that parties can communicate with them so that the Electoral Commission can communicate with them and so that interested observers and people who are interested in the credibility of our electoral process can scrutinise the roll? The answer is absolutely yes. And what does this bill do? Well it completely diminishes the utility and the importance of getting on the roll because what it says is that you can rock up on election day itself and you can simultaneously or at least contemporaneously vote and enrol yourself at the same time. It absolutely diminishes the incentive for anyone during the non-political campaign period to enrol themselves and to get that information and to make sure that they receive information during the 3-year parliamentary term.It is not just in the campaign period when political parties and candidates want to communicate with voters; it is during the 3-year period that Parliament is sitting. It is what MPs do with parliamentary funding to communicate with voters. It is what every MP—or at least I hope every MP—does in this House. So we have to make sure and we have to send the message to people: get on the roll. It is really important for scrutiny for communication purposes and for the reasons I have just outlined. What this bill does is send the message that you do not need to do that—that basically it is OK just to turn up at any old time on election day and enrol. You have got 364 days of the year to enrol. We now let you do it during the advance voting period and actually there are arguments I think to be fair about whether or not that is a wise thing to do because for a lot of first-time voters the evidence tends to suggest—for a lot of first-time enrollers and first-time voters—that they are waiting till the advance vote period opens to enrol and then vote. And actually that means that for the other 2 years and 9 months when the parliamentary process is ongoing they are not on the roll and they cannot be communicated with because of political parties. So there is I think a legitimate question around whether or not that was a good idea but that is the way the law works now. The question really for this House is whether we should extend that step even further and say that not only can you enrol during the advance voting period but you can enrol on election day itself. My view—my personal view and the view of the National Party actually—is that that would be a retrograde step for the reasons I have just outlined and also because of the complications it would introduce on voting day. Voting day is for people to turn up and vote. It is not for people to rock up and enrol at the same time. In fact the Electoral Commission staff are not competent or qualified to deal with both things at the same time. I do not mean competent in an intellectual sense; I mean institutionally competent to deal with it. It would introduce extraordinary complications. There are 364 days to enrol; people should do it on those days not on—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! The member's time has expired."