Brown SimeonTUESDAY 17 MARCH 2020(continued on Wednesday 18 March 2020)ABORTION LEGISLATION BILLIn CommitteeDebate resumed.Clauses 1 and 2SIMEON BROWN (National—Pakuranga): Thank you Madam Chair. As I was saying last night we're debating the title and commencement and in particular we're dealing with a Supplementary Order Paper from Darroch Ball which I call the cop-out clause" which is being applied to this bill whereby the New Zealand First Party is trying to once again cop out from taking responsibility and actually coming to this House and coming to this Parliament and actually making a serious decision on whether they support this bill or not. What they've decided is they would prefer to go to the public and say "We're going to have a referendum." and then hide behind that rather than actually being clear as to where they stand on what Ron Mark called a "serious issue of conscience". Well if it's a "serious issue of conscience" I'd like to know what their conscience actually says or whether they've actually got one.The second message I'd like to say to members in this committee is that there is going to be a lot of inconsistency on display this morning as we debate this amendment. Only a few months ago this Parliament was dealing with the End of Life Choice Bill and we had people stand up in this House saying how much they hated the idea of referendums: "We shouldn't be sending big decisions like this to referendums. The Parliament's the one who should be making this decision but in this instance if I don't vote for a referendum this bill won't go through Parliament. So in this instance whilst I don't agree with referendums I'll be voting for a referendum on that bill." That was what we saw on the End of Life Choice Bill but today those same members of Parliament are going to re-find their principles and they're going to stand up in this House and say "No no no. I don't agree with referendums and I won't be voting for Darroch Ball's Supplementary Order Paper." There is going to be inconsistency on display in this Chamber—unprincipled decision-making by members on this issue. But I say to Darroch Ball this is the "cop-out clause" and something which I will not be voting for for the same reasons I didn't vote on the End of Life Choice Bill for the Supplementary Order Paper on that bill.I'd like to come to the title and I will be seeking another call because I will be moving an amendment to the title to the bill. The bill has been entitled the "Abortion Legislation Bill". And it's been titled in such a way where the Minister in the chair Andrew Little seeks to try and portray that this bill is some sort of just tidying up of the provisions—just bringing the language into the 21st century just sort of modernising things and a bit of a tidy up. So by naming it the Abortion Legislation Bill the Minister's trying to sanitise the language of what's actually happening through this piece of legislation.But I'd like to propose that this bill actually be renamed the "Abortion (Liberalisation post - 20 weeks) Legislation Bill" because that is the key issue that we in Parliament are actually voting on. There are arguments around what the Minister's put forward around the parameters pre - 20 weeks—and I know many members of Parliament don't see a problem with changing the parameters there—but the key issue that this bill is making a change to is what is happening for abortion post - 20 weeks. I've stood alongside members of Parliament like Greg O'Connor and Agnes Loheni and said "OK why don't we change this bill so that the same provisions apply to abortions post - 20 weeks as they currently stand?" That would be a much more honest way in terms of how this legislation should be put forward. That would make it an "Abortion Legislation Bill" because that would simply be and in many ways keeping the criteria the same particularly for post - 20 week abortions.We've seen a lot of concern in the community—whether that's around sex-selective abortion abortion on the grounds of disability and essentially what this legislation does is introduce under clause 7 new section 11 criteria which is vague undefined unclear and does not provide the protections which the current legislation does around post - 20 week abortions. I want to just acknowledge Greg O'Connor for bringing his Supplementary Order Paper. It was voted down but that would have been a Supplementary Order Paper which would have made it very clear that the grounds for post - 20 week abortions would stay exactly the same as they are now.There has not been a convincing argument put forward by Andrew Little put forward by the Minister in the chair as to why the law post - 20 weeks needs to change. There has not been a convincing argument. He's simply used language where he's tried to say "Well we need to"—Darroch Ball: Get back to clause 1.SIMEON BROWN: Pardon?Darroch Ball: Get back to clause 1.SIMEON BROWN: I'm talking about clause 1.CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Thank you thank you. I'm quite capable—Darroch Ball: You're talking about the bill very generally.CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Excuse me. Darroch Ball do not ignore me. This is a pattern of behaviour. I'm well capable and I've already signalled to the member. Thank you.SIMEON BROWN: And I'm talking about the title and the argument that I'm making here is that the title is not reflective of what the bill actually holds in it. So my tabled amendment which I'll be tabling after I have finished speaking is to replace the title "Abortion Legislation Bill 2019" with "Abortion (Liberalisation post - 20 weeks) Legislation Bill" because the criteria—and that's why talking about Greg O'Connor's Supplementary Order Paper and talking about clause 11 is so important—have been loosened the language has been weakened and as we have talked about in this House that will lead to the criteria being more liberal.I ask the Minister in the chair to please give an assurance to this committee because I don't think he can. Can he give an assurance to this committee that we aren't going to see an increase in the number of abortions post - 20 weeks? Because there's no data collection in this bill; the data collection only goes for another 18 months. So there is a need—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Come back to clauses 1 and 2 please.SIMEON BROWN: Yes so there is a need. All of these reasons are why the bill title is not reflective of what actually is happening in this legislation so I will be tabling this amendment. This bill does liberalise abortion post - 20 weeks. It does change the criteria. It does put in language which is incredibly vague like "In considering whether the abortion is clinically appropriate"—language which is not defined. If the Parliament didn't want to liberalise abortion post - 20 weeks the Parliament should have voted for language which is defined which is clear such as what was put forward in the Supplementary Order Papers earlier in the committee.So I ask the Minister in the chair to please take a call and explain how this is not liberalising abortion post - 20 weeks because I don't think he'll be able to answer that question. He'll come up with a whole lot of reasons as to what he thinks will or won't happen but at the end of the day he won't be able to provide an assurance to the House that it won't happen. Thank you Madam Chair."