SpeechSIMON O'CONNOR (National—Tāmaki): Thank you very much Madam Speaker. One of the striking things is if this is such a brave amazing moment in time for the Government why they are taking such short calls? I would have thought that such passion would've required a much deeper explanation but it doesn't. I'll come back to one of the reasons why I think that's the case. But I do want to echo what others have said. As I move about the electorate of Tāmaki as I doorknock or do my coffee meetings about to do street corner meetings over the coming weekend—people are not talking to me about a voting age. Some do some of my younger constituents—if I push the issue—will raise and discuss it with me. That's exceptionally welcome. People are much more worried about the gun crime the breaking into their premises and just the general cost of living. Why that's important as we consider this bill tonight is: why with all the issues which this country faces is the Government focused on this?I want to be really clear particularly to young people: it's not that this is not an important issue. I think it's one that's welcome to be discussed and debated. But we have less than two days left in this Parliament. Of all the things as I say that we could be discussing—crime cost of living our relationship with other countries around the world agriculture you name it—we're not; instead we're discussing this. Something was actually pointed out by my honourable colleague Vanushi Walters: this is something of constitutional import. Normally when we're dealing with electoral changes there's comity or agreement across the House but there's not because this has been rammed through. I want to drive home that point. We have less than two days of this Parliament and we have—what I would describe as—a very pyrrhic dynamic coming through from this Government. Not only will this not actually pass through; it'll pass tonight I'm sure but it's only first reading—this actually isn't going to make a notable difference. Secondly they're not taking proper and full calls to actually—I would suggest—respect those who've spent a lot of time putting in their submissions and so forth.Turning to the court's decision. The court's allowed to make its decisions. Personally I think it's—and I've done this once before in Parliament—to remind the court and the courts of this land that Parliament is sovereign. I acknowledge that they see that this is something about discrimination—well that's perfectly fine as well. Of course one doesn't need to be a genius to say that the courts themselves are continuing discrimination by making it 16. The Make it 15 crowd are probably feeling a bit upset at the moment. Without being too flippant this is one of those things that always drives me mad. A lot of people talk about human rights. I'm all for human rights. I think they're really important. But the hint about human rights is in those two words: the rights are for humans all humans. Again I'm being slightly flippant to illustrate the point but where are the rights of three- five- 10- 12- and 15-year-olds in this decree?So if people are going to start including the judges throwing around the words like discrimination" they better have good rather than arbitrary reasons to set the line at where they see fit. Because quite rightly as other colleagues in the House have pointed out there are massive inconsistencies around where the age of consent purchasing property voting driving joining the military getting married—all of these things are all over the place. Going to a casino—I think you have to be 20. It's all over the place. This doesn't solve that; it just further makes it arbitrary and I just think that that's unhelpful. So obviously I'm not supportive of dropping it down for those reasons. The other two—and I pointed it out when I had some wonderful debates with younger ones in my electorate—is of course 16- and 17-year-olds are treated differently in the criminal justice space. Now I don't want to get into a long discussion into that per se but if we're going to be—as some are—arguing for the rights to vote because it's a human right well there's also a human right to justice. That one's you know a bit of a humdinger really. Justice is a human right; it's one of the most fundamental human rights. Perhaps the court and others might want to consider that that should be applied to all humans without discrimination. The last thing I want to point out as some others have done as well is that there are many ways that people can express their voices to this Parliament. I said to a group of young people recently—not around age—that you don't have to be an MP to actually effect change in this country. It's probably on that note that I want to end. There are so many ways to lobby to change to cajole to contribute to this great realm and to this great democracy."