Pugh Maureen; Tolley AnneMAUREEN PUGH (National): Thank you Madam Deputy Speaker. What a great day to be a woman parliamentarian here in New Zealand. I am No. 131 and at a breakfast celebration this morning we were very honoured to have the guests Dame Ann Hercus and Dame Jenny Shipley. It was a time for us to recall all those amazing women who against a backdrop of huge resistance against physical and emotional hardship kept moving towards their goal and eventually won their right and our ongoing right to vote.Our women were the first in a self-governing country to be granted the right to vote in those parliamentary elections back in 1893—that's 125 years ago today. It's a timely reminder of our responsibility to those brave women and those who suffered along the way to fight for us and our rights not to take it for granted but to get involved in our democracy and vote. One of our guests this morning Dame Ann Hercus talked to us about the barriers—the glass ceilings—and she suggested that they're weren't in fact actually made of glass. She suggested they were made up of thick layers of men because men don't want to share top jobs or positions of authority. Well personally I've never found that to be the case but perhaps I've been fortunate because I've had opportunities where perhaps I did break through a glass ceiling or that thick layer of men. Maybe it was easy for me; I'm not sure. But the reality was that I could have just simply snuck through because I was totally unaware that such a thing existed and so I never paid it any mind. But I've been surrounded my whole life with very strong hard-working women with very strong personalities and morals who have always looked forward with their rose-tinted spectacles on. So whenever I wanted to get involved in anything I just simply went out and did it. For me the glass ceiling analogy did almost ring true in local government but not because I couldn't break through because I did. After six years of being on a council I became the first female mayor to be elected on the West Coast and it is quite a blokey place so that's quite an achievement. Now the challenge of the glass ceiling actually came during one term where I was in fact around a table with a group of 10 men leading them as the only female. It wasn't so much a glass ceiling but I think it was more the jolly green giant because one or two of them felt that they were uncomfortable being led by a woman and their tone and their behaviour I believe left more to say about them being gentlemen than about me as a woman. My experience in local government opened up opportunities for me. It was soon after being appointed to the board of Local Government New Zealand that I was invited to represent New Zealand at a women's congress in Mexico and we were invited to send a speaker because of the historic event we're celebrating here today. The women in Mexico got the vote some 60 years after us here but their system was fraught with challenges and I certainly do hope that since 2011 when I was there things have improved. For instance a woman could campaign to be elected and win her position but her position was then transferable. So in a country like Mexico where there is quite a lot of male dominance that transfer was not always willingly given. Sometimes it was under severe duress or duress threatened upon a woman's family and so some of these women actually lost their positions through that process. But here in New Zealand it took us another 26 years before women could stand for Parliament and then another 14 years of trying before this country finally elected its first woman MP. I'm very proud of the fact that here today the National Party consists of 40 percent women. But I'd also like us to remember today Elizabeth Yates from Onehunga. She became the first female mayor elected in the whole of the British Empire. She succeeded her husband who retired due to ill health—DEPUTY SPEAKER: I'm sorry but the member's time has expired.