SpeechBRETT HUDSON (National): Thank you Madam Chair. It's a pleasure to take a call in Part 2 of this debate and if I might just briefly mention in Part 1 I raised that I had three concerns that I entered this debate with back in the last election campaign and have carried through to this stage of this bill's traversing through the House. The first was that the conditions initially were far too broad and would involve the court far too much in people's lives. Not only do I feel that our lives are best served by as little Government involvement as possible; I also feel they are best served by as little court involvement as possible as well. The member's Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 259 which I will also talk about in this part addressed that to a great degree. The member in responding to my comments then said he hoped that he would achieve three out of three of my concerns and let me just say this is not going to be a pot-belly thriller—and I say that without the hint of irony at all. He has met all three of my concerns. The two that are addressed in this part relate to coercion and particularly elder abuse and the third being conscientious objection. I'd like to deal with both of those in turn and I'll deal with conscientious objection first of the two simply because it's most easily contained.If we look at new clause 5A on conscientious objection the part that concerned me and that I felt didn't get a lot of debate prior to the bill entering the House was if we're all about protecting the choices of people to choose how their life might end then how do we respect the wishes of medical practitioners who do not wish to be a part of that? It was deeply concerning to me that the bill and what we might enact would respect those that do not wish to be a part of that. The member's SOP I think addresses this very well. I know and I thank him for making not only himself but other advisers accessible to members of Parliament to question this. In reality what this clause will mean is that if a practitioner does not wish to participate not only are they able to not but their wishes are respected so that they have to only give the most minimal level of information to the requester to help to point them where else they can go. The medical practitioner does not have to give so much information that they feel that their own objection is either disrespected or called into question. I think the member has done very well in addressing that particular part. Those that do object will not be drawn into the process in any meaningful way.The second one which is of the greater importance is around coercion and particularly elder abuse. We get roughly between 2000 and 2500 cases of elder abuse reported in New Zealand each year and we could quite reasonably think that that is merely the tip of some sort of an iceberg. So it's important that if we are going to consider passing legislation like this there are sufficient elements in it which give us confidence that we can mitigate the possibilities of such coercion taking place. I want to be very clear here. Some members I've heard talk in terms of absolutes and not only is that not possible in this bill but I'd caution all members that quite frankly that's not possible in any piece of legislation this House has ever passed or will ever pass. But what we can do is ensure that we take very sensible and practical steps to mitigate risks as we do in all other legislation that we consider. I thank again the member for making not only himself but others available to talk through this. When I look through this—and I have studied the provisions here in this Part around the process of requesting through to receiving the medicine for assisted dying or the treatment for assisted dying—there are very clear provisions about ensuring that not only is the mental condition of the patient assessed repeatedly but that anyone having concern or suspecting that there might be undue external influence can and must put a halt to proceedings to investigate that further. I will stand here and say that none of us can be absolutely sure that these provisions will result in no one ever being coerced but we can have confidence—[Time expired]