Bayly AndrewANDREW BAYLY (National—Hunua): Thank you Mr Chair. I am most grateful to you. I think that sometimes you realise what an absolute privilege it is to be an MP. Mostly we concern ourselves with prosaic matters like tax law international treaties and social benefit payments—all of which are important—but I think that having a discussion around a bill of this nature is something that sometimes has filled many of us with some trepidation. However I don't hold that view. I think that this Parliament has seen many momentous occasions in its history. We've just recently—well actually next Tuesday we celebrate the centenary of the signing of the suffragettes' bill. We've also had the same sex bill go through in April 2013. And I think this end of life bill is of the same magnitude. I think we should be celebrating that we are having and can have a debate in New Zealand because only civilised countries in the world can justifiably and legitimately have debates of this sort. So I commend Mr David Seymour for bringing this bill to the House and pursuing it through over a number of years even if it is a rather uncomfortable debate for some of us. Of course all of us here represent constituencies because we've been voted here into Parliament and we all represent a wide range of views. In my case I represent the good people of Hunua. I have talked to a lot of them and engaged with them on this topic and my personal view taking into account what I've listened to is that my electorate is pretty evenly split down the middle of this rather vexed issue of whether or not we should support this bill. But I've asked myself: what is my role here as a member of Parliament? I believe the main role I am here for when I come to Wellington as opposed to what I do in my electorate is to pass good laws in this House. So essentially I and I believe all of us are here as legislators and that requires us to put aside our personal views and act in the best interests of all the people of New Zealand and to pass the best laws that we think are possible at the time that we make them.I applaud all those people and all those members who have stood in this House in this debate; unfortunately I haven't had much opportunity. But I do applaud them for what they've said and for the views that they hold—many with very strong convictions. But I think that we as MPs have listened to the debate as it's ebbed and flowed over the course of some months in this House. Of course I wasn't on the Justice Committee but we've all been very conscious of what's been going on. So I think it's a bit of a cop-out to say that having listened to the debate in detail we're now at a point where we might consider passing the baton to our constituents to decide on this complicated bill. It is a complicated issue. The bill is extensive—27 or 28 clauses—and the concepts and the issues in it difficult to comprehend. We've all heard and been witness to the many many—I think over a hundred—Supplementary Order Papers that have been introduced. So I think that to say Let's pass it on to the electorate to make that view" is wrong. I also have other issues with Supplementary Order Paper 287 in the name of Jenny Marcroft. I think that as soon as you contemplate having a referendum—the thing about referenda is that the high principle about should you be doing something or not is an easy concept to agree on or disagree with. But a bill of this nature is far more than that. So the question is: who will do the wording of the referendum? Who determines that? How do we make sure that all our constituents have sufficient information to be able to make a good call on it? How do we finely balance the judgments pro and against this referendum? I think it's wrong to pass that baton and I think I'm standing up as an MP to do the right thing."