Bishop ChrisCHRIS BISHOP (National—Hutt South): Thank very much Mr Assistant Speaker. Can I start by congratulating Jo Hayes. Jo has been a stalwart supporter of this bill but I know that she comes from a lineage of strong wāhine toa supporting the bill from both sides of the House including Jacqui Dean and I know Louisa Wall paid tribute to some of the members who have supported this. It has genuinely been a collegial cross-party approach and Parliament working at its best; so congrats Jo. I know what it's like to have a member's bill pass and it looks like this one will soon pass into law.In my brief remarks I just want to canvass the difficulty the committee had—because I was a member of the Justice Committee that dealt with this bill—in working our way through the submissions. What I mean by that is they did actually conflict. I actually went into this thinking there would be essentially unanimous support for the bill that 95 percent of the submissions would be in favour and we'd just kind of essentially tweak it a few times and we'd carry on through. But it wasn't quite like that. The National Council of Women of New Zealand came and they said We support the intent but the bill should say that only 18-year-olds should be able to get married." so no 16- and 17-year-old marriage at all. That would get rid of parental consent but also get rid of what this bill actually proposes which is the ability to go to the Family Court and seek an order that that marriage be allowed. They said "No that should be a blanket for 18-year-olds and above only."; so that was quite interesting.Then we had the Human Rights Commission and they said exactly the same thing. All committees particularly the Justice Committee pay attention to what the Human Rights Commission says particularly when it comes to issues around age and consent and things like that. They said "No there should be no exceptions. It should be 18 only and to do otherwise would be a breach of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW)."—which New Zealand is a signatory to of course through the United Nations—"We actually need to go further to implement our CEDAW obligations." So I thought that was quite interesting.Then of course we had the Office of the Children's Commissioner come along and they took the exact opposite view. I thought that was very interesting because we get these sort of august rights-protecting bodies and rights-protecting institutions and they're opposed to the bill. I found that very interesting. They came along and said "No we actually don't support the bill because it breaches the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child because 16-year-olds are children." Actually because 16-year-olds are children their parents have rights over them and to take away the ability of parents to consent to marriage would be a breach of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child; so they essentially said the status quo should remain. I've got to say I actually found that very hard to accept. I found it very hard to comprehend because although 16-year-olds are children in the strictest sense of the word I think the proposition that we should therefore allow parents to make decisions around their marriage choices which flies in the face of a lot of the evidence that the committee heard from respected organisations like Shakti is quite a difficult proposition to take.So basically what the committee had to do was work through this area and protect the human right of association and freedom of association and the right of people to fall in love with people of the same sex or different sexes or genders and to fall in love and get married but also make sure that Parliament was protecting the vulnerable from abuse. It had to allow autonomy and the autonomy that all humans are inalienably born with and the ability to associate or to marry and to love but also walk that fine line between allowing that but protecting the vulnerable from possible abuse and possible coercion. It sounds like quite a slight change to the law to move it from the parents consenting to moving it into the Family Court which is that authority but I actually think it will make a big difference.I think there is a debate to be had out there frankly about whether or not the actual age of marriage should be lifted to 18. Eighteen is when you can vote it's when you can drink—well at least buy a drink—and it's when you can serve in the army. You know I think there is actually a genuine debate to be had out there about whether or not 18 is the appropriate age. That is basically when you become an adult. And marriage is a pretty big responsibility.So look I think there's a debate to be had out there. Maybe that's a bill for down the line but I think it's good that the Parliament's going to agree that this is a step forward in protecting young people from coercion and abuse. Let's face it; it is primarily women we're talking about young girls—because they are girls—and I think it's a great thing that the Parliament's working together. I commend the bill to the House. Kia ora."