Mitchell MarkHon MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney): Thank you Madam Speaker. I just want to follow up on some comments that were made by the previous speaker the Hon Dr Nick Smith—the Minister of Justice responded to some of the comments that he was making; I'm not sure if the viewers at home could hear or anyone else in the House could hear—and they were around the fact that when it comes to electoral legislation like this there has been a convention in this Parliament and that is that parties do work together because we don't have a constitution. And it has been observed it has always been observed and this actually is a major departure from that. The Minister called out when the Hon Dr Nick Smith was making that point. He called out and he referred to a piece of legislation that was brought to this House I think in the first term of the National Government and it was a member's bill that was brought here and it took away the right of prisoners to vote. And he's correct. That's right. But it was a bill that affected only a very small part of our population. It affected—Hon Andrew Little: Oh so that's OK then?Hon MARK MITCHELL: Well yeah. Most Kiwis actually feel it is OK. It affected a very small part of our population. And it was a member's bill. So what the Minister just did is that when he was challenged by the Hon Dr Nick Smith about the convention that we've had in this House in a country without a constitution that we work across party when it comes to the important issues around our electoral system and the integrity of it the only example that the Minister could actually put forward—the only example that the Minister could put forward was the example of a member's bill that removed the right of prisoners to vote. That's something that we still in the National Party on this side of the House—we still firmly support that. We still support that. We feel that if we have people in our society that offend against the laws that we pass in this House if they offend against our communities and the offending is so serious and so bad that it means that they get a custodial sentence—it's very hard to get a custodial sentence in New Zealand to actually go to prison—we feel that there's some rights that you give up that you forfeit. You'll get those rights back when you return to the community—hopefully rehabilitated and ready to integrate and to make a proper and genuine contribution back in society. But one of those rights is the right to vote and it was brought to this House as a member's bill.The House had the opportunity to debate it. It did go through a full select committee process and there was a majority in the House that voted for that bill. If that is the only example the Minister can give—if that's the only example that the Minister can give of a departure from what has been a convention that's been recognised in this Parliament for decades then it's a very weak and a very poor example to actually put up and shows just how weak the argument the Minister actually has in terms of what has been a massive departure in convention. And that is fundamentally one of the main reasons why we couldn't support this bill. It is that combined with issues like—Hon Andrew Little: That is bollocks—total bollocks. Hon MARK MITCHELL: —same-day enrolment which again the previous speaker highlighted. Well the Minister said total bollocks". But you know I'm not too sure if that's a nuanced argument or adding much to the debate—DEPUTY SPEAKER: It's not very parliamentary.Hon MARK MITCHELL: No actually it's not Minister. The other point that I want to make very quickly before I finish my contribution is the fact that he hasn't really thought through same-day enrolment other than the fact it means that on election day he can jump in the van and he can rush around and grab a whole lot of people that haven't enrolled that haven't engaged because I believe—I do believe—yes our right to vote our ability to vote is a right. I do believe that. It is a right that we've had because we've had generations of Kiwis that have gone offshore to defend and fight for that.Hon Andrew Little: So you want to take it off criminals and you want to take it off the innocent right.Hon MARK MITCHELL: But it's also a privilege—but it's also a privilege. They fought hard to give us that right but it's also a privilege. And actually if you want to take it seriously if you want to take that vote seriously make the effort to actually get up and enrol. Make the effort the physical effort to actually enrol and go out and vote. And what the Minister's saying is "If you haven't really given it much thought if you're not really thinking too much about if you haven't made that effort to enrol don't worry. We'll rush around on election day"—Hon Andrew Little: How many of the 19000 were those people? Hon MARK MITCHELL: —"and we'll pick you up and we'll rush you down to the polling booth so that you can enrol and you can vote." Hon Andrew Little: So here's the prejudice.Hon MARK MITCHELL: And the issue that the Electoral Commission put up is: is that going to actually diminish—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Can I just ask the Minister who has had his 10-minute contribution to just taihoa.Hon MARK MITCHELL: Well I would actually like to hear what he was saying. I'm not sure it's adding much to the debate but thank you Madam Speaker. So the reality is—and the Electoral Commission highlighted it—we should be proud of our democracy in New Zealand. We should be very proud of ourselves as a nation. We lead everyone in terms of transparency and lack of corruption and we take a great pride in what we do. But I can tell you now that if you start making little incremental changes like this that start to erode the system people slowly start to lose confidence in our democracy then we start to move towards in my mind a very bad place. And I think that's why some of the decisions that have been made and some of the things that appear very self-serving by this Government and are being pushed through this bill are not good for us as a nation. Thank you very much."