Hughes GarethGARETH HUGHES (Green): Kia ora Madam Assistant Speaker. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. I feel like I might be the only one in this debate who hasn't been in local government but it sounds like a pretty great place and a great way to make a difference for your community. Given we've got a school group I believe or a sports group in the House I think it is important to note the importance of local government to our community. This is where rates are paid but what we as citizens get in return of course are roads and parks and plumbing and water. When it comes to our regional councils they deal with where a factory can be built or what happens with the state of our environment or pollution in our rivers. So it's a really important part of our community and our country. It's different of course from where we are today which is central government in Parliament where laws are made and central government deals with tax and police and education. So I hope you're having a great time here at Parliament.Now it's really important that we see more people participate in Government and I mean both central here in Parliament but also local. At the last election what we saw nationally was around 80 percent participation of enrolled voters cast a vote on election day. Compare that though with local government which was 43 percent in 2016. That's down from 57 percent in 1989. So what we've seen is a steady decline in the amount of people voting for those key important issues from roads to parks to forests to rivers.Online voting has been presented as a potential solution. Now I don't think anyone in this House has suggested or is suggesting that it's a silver bullet but what we have seen overseas is that trials have been successful in increasing participation. Now what people know is of course we trialled postal voting—instead of voting on election day like we do for Parliament voting over a period through the postal system. That was effective as a short-term bump up but it hasn't been effective in the long term obviously with those declining participation rates.This bill establishes a regime which allows trials of online voting for local government to occur. It also helps make it possible through allowing date of birth information to be provided and also analysis of that information in age bands or age cohorts. So we welcome the bill. We think it's an important thing to trial. I think it's incredibly rich of the last speaker Denise Lee to be criticising this bill as too modest when in fact it was her Government and her colleague the Hon Louise Upston who stopped the trial back in 2016 which was a great opportunity to see if it could work across the country for those councils who chose it—terrible shame that it didn't go ahead. So it's incredibly unfair and deeply rich to be criticised by that member for a more modest bill when their Government actually stopped it.So look I've been a big supporter of online voting in my career in Parliament. I've seen it work overseas. I've always noted the concerns though. Now I know Hillary Clinton's been in the country recently and she'd be quite a prominent advocate of the ability of Governments to influence elections being a critical issue that democracies and Parliaments and Governments need to face. What we must have is the integrity of our voting system. We can't have certain individuals or certain foreign Governments influence elections through unfair means by essentially hacking the system. Other members such as Ron Mark have talked about the ability currently through using a postal system to have serious integrity questions raised.So we support the trial. We want to make sure that it is secure. It appears that age or date of birth information is a critical requirement. We're not like many European countries which have a unique citizen identifier. I don't think that's something which is in line with New Zealand's values or that many Governments would ever want to see here so the security requirements are more difficult. We see potential solutions—for example RealMe being adopted by the Government—so I'm really interested in hearing further from the Privacy Commissioner who I note has raised serious concerns with this legislation in the select committee. What we want is something that works but also most importantly is something which is safe and secure so all New Zealanders have confidence in their voting system.Now when we talk about online voting no member has raised it as a silver bullet. It's something which hopefully will encourage it. It isn't a panacea for the problems. Now what I would suggest and agree with some of the debate on is there probably are potentially more significant issues we as politicians we as a country and as a democracy could be raising to encourage democratic engagement. The engagement of you as New Zealanders in our country making those critical decisions—not you Madam Assistant Speaker.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Thank you.GARETH HUGHES: I meant the future generations of New Zealanders. What we heard in fact in my select committee this morning was from the Children's Commissioner who was talking about the role of children's advocacy in policy development in New Zealand. He told us what he had heard from New Zealand kids: that if it's just consultation it's in fact not a true representation of children's voices in the policy development. He said If it's something about us that's not with us it's done to us." That was a strong message we heard. "If it's just consulting it's insulting." was a phrase we heard from some of the kids.What we need to make sure of I think within local government and central government is that when we are consulting there is a genuine development process. I've sadly seen it in this Parliament where literally 99 percent of submissions including thousands of submissions have been ignored by the majority on select committees. I've seen submitters disrespectfully treated in committee. What this House and what local government should be encouraging is genuine participation; respecting those voices. We want more people engaged in the political system not just on election day or during the election week; across the whole system. We want to make sure that we're taking advantage of new technology. In this case it's online voting but in this House of Parliament we could be taking advantage of new technology to stream our select committees for example which is some work that the Office of the Clerk has been leading on and I support that going further. We want more people being able to participate and see the work of this Parliament.A constant criticism I hear from the public and many young people in New Zealand is that when they come to Parliament or when they watch it on telly they see politicians fighting butting heads and trying to score petty political points rather than talking about the substantive issues. Now what I often say is that it's sad that people only see this side of the parliamentary or the legislative process. They don't see us working around the select committee table—where MPs actually agree where MPs try to find consensus and where MPs collaborate. That's why I'm a big supporter of live streaming—or one reason why: because people actually see us working together coming up with the solutions which is what I think they expect from their lawmakers; not just scoring points and acting the theatre of Parliament.I guess one serious point I'd like to raise to all MPs is a challenge to us to also take responsibility for declining participation in New Zealand. It's our behaviour the way that we interact with the media and the way that politics and our democracy is covered. We have a responsibility. We can't just blame youth for example which I've heard often in this House for being somewhat apathetic and for not being involved in their civic duty. We have a responsibility to act with integrity to encourage those voices and people to participate.Likewise with the way Government runs. I note that this Government has a goal of being the most open and transparent Government in our country's history. I believe we could aim to reimagine the way that Governments Parliaments and lawmaking works. I was proud many years ago to be the first member to crowdsource a member's bill which related to internet rights and freedoms. This is a tool I think Governments could be taking more advantage of actively involving a wide diversity of voices earlier on and I think actually what we will get is better laws as a result.So I look forward to hearing from the Privacy Commissioner local government officials and representatives and all New Zealanders in the select committee. It's a really important debate to have: how we can achieve a trial of online voting while ensuring its integrity and the security of our democratic voice. It's a step forward in our democracy that this bill is going through I believe unanimously tonight. I look forward to more Kiwis playing a role in their local government so that we get more playgrounds in our towns and cities—eh? Kia ora kids."