O'Connor SimonROYAL NEW ZEALAND FOUNDATION OF THE BLIND ACT REPEAL BILLThird ReadingSIMON O'CONNOR (National—Tāmaki) on behalf of Hon Nicky Wagner (National—Christchurch Central): I move That the Royal New Zealand Foundation of the Blind Act Repeal Bill be now read a third time. I am very pleased to take a call. If I might before I begin I want to acknowledge the role of the Governor-General. We celebrated his service to the Realm of New Zealand today at a State luncheon and I just want to put on the record to him and to Lady Janine my gratefulness for what they have done. Amongst many things I think they have been very good on accessibility to Parliament in terms of their work as a viceregal office. Moving to the bill itself it is clear that I am not the Hon Nicky Wagner. She is unable to be able to speak at this exact moment in time as she has ministerial duties and she has asked me as the chair of the Health Committee to speak on her behalf. She has strongly and proudly spoken on this bill through all other parts and here we are now at the third reading. This bill as has often been mentioned is relatively simple but it is relatively significant as well for the Royal Foundation of the Blind. Fundamentally what this bill seeks to do is basically remove the foundation now known as the Blind Foundation from the statute book. It has basically been constituted for many years under statute. That has served it very well but in recent years—in fact I think back on 10 January 2012—the foundation registered itself as an incorporated society. It was felt—not that I can speak on behalf of the foundation but only from what we heard at the committee—that becoming an incorporated society was a better fit for its purposes so that it could be fit for purpose in this modern environment and ultimately that has made the current Act defunct unnecessary. In order to make those changes it has had to come to our select committee which it has. It was a relatively easy process. The bill was only a few clauses ultimately and so it is going to seek that the foundation be removed from the statute book and it will be able to govern itself accordingly. I was there recently actually at the Blind Foundation in Parnell. Most people know of the foundation and the work it does but most people in Auckland will know of the Jubilee Building. Although that building has now been handed over to the council the buildings around it are run by the Blind Foundation for about 12000 New Zealanders—not all in Parnell but that is the main office. I think it would be easy to fall into the trap of thinking that the Blind Foundation is only for those who are blind. Actually it is also for those with low visual impairment and the services it provides really are quite remarkable and broad-reaching. I suppose I want to put on the record—and I know this is from the Minister as well—our grateful thanks for the service it provides to fellow Kiwis. My own visit to the foundation was a really good learning curve in terms of its particular needs. I was there in my capacity as chair of the Health Committee and it wanted me to talk it through how the political process works which I was happy to do. I mean what politician is not happy to get up and talk. But at the same time it was a valuable opportunity for me—[Interruption] Oh the humility coming from the other side. It is quite striking. The opportunity was also there for me to hear what its various needs were. One of them was—and I think it is important to put it on the record today—around greater accessibility. I am not going to take too much of the House's time explaining that other than to encourage people to go back to the Youth Parliament debates because of one of the bills that was before the House and our youth parliamentarians. I am proud to say that the Youth MP for Tāmaki Aaron Dahmen gave one of the speeches strongly in support of the need for greater accessibility particularly for those with visual impairment of some sort. So again I encourage the House to understand that this bill is only an organisational change. The organisation itself would be encouraging us as a Parliament as representatives of the people of New Zealand to look at other ways to better engage and assist those Kiwis with visual learning difficulties. Important too—and the Minister was keen that I draw out this particular effectively semantic issue—is that the Blind Foundation moved from being the Foundation for the Blind to the Foundation of the Blind. It is probably no surprise to this House that I believe words are important and fundamentally that change—going from for" to "of"—is a little bit like the bill. It is quite simple but also quite meaningful: the foundation is now "of the Blind". This is self-empowerment. This is the community itself—the blind and visually impaired community—being able to lead its own efforts provide care within the community and ask society to support it. This is no longer a passive "for" if you will. This is not a community that needs everybody else to come in and help it. I think too that it is an important signal of how we approach disability issues in this country. I want to begin wrapping up and say thank you to everyone involved. Again it was a relatively simple process including through the select committee but any bill as members will know has a number of people involved. Thanks to them and particular thanks to the Blind Foundation for seeking to continue to be a modern group servicing the needs of its people as they require it today.On a personal note I would certainly encourage the foundation to keep up its royal patronage. I think that is in keeping with what we heard from the Governor-General and Lady Janine today—not about them in particular but the value of royal patronage.I also want to wish the foundation a happy 126th birthday. It is 126 amazing years of service. Long may it continue and now through the passing I trust of this repeal bill it will be able to do that as an incorporated society. I commend this bill to the House."