Williams Poto; Tisch LindsayPOTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): Meitaki ma'ata Mr Assistant Speaker. Kia orana kotou katoatoa na roto I te aroa ma'ata o Te Atua. I have the privilege of being a New Zealand Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians (CWP) representative on the Pacific Region Steering Committee. I currently hold the honour of chairing that committee and working alongside many of the women who are present in the gallery today. We are committed in CWP to increasing representation of women across the parliaments of the Pacific. It may interest you to know that in the Pacific unfortunately our rates of representation in the Houses of Parliament are some of the lowest in the world. Our male counterparts have been instrumental in supporting our drive to increase the number of women in our parliaments. I would like to thank Mr Speaker for his efforts in support of the CWP mentoring programme which has enabled women MPs from this Parliament to support Pacific women MPs to be mentored and supported in their roles. Further I would like to thank Mr Speaker for furthering the discussion with regard to Parliamentary Service secondments as we learn first-hand how best to support the parliaments across the Pacific.There is much to be done. With regard to the challenges that face us—building infrastructure connectivity overfishing transportation and who has the right to resources should the sea level rise and force us off our home Islands—these issues are not necessarily of our making. In this increasingly diverse political world we must meet these challenges head-on but we must do this together—men and women sharing the burden. I look to the inspiration of Samoa and its temporary special measures which have been enacted to bring a quota of women MPs into its House. I acknowledge and I celebrate along with every Pacific woman across Aotearoa New Zealand that we have been able to secure a woman as Deputy Prime Minister of Samoa Fiame Naomi Mata'afa. There are many things that we can do to increase our numbers in parliaments where there are no or few women. To the male MPs across the Pacific I send out a challenge: I send out the challenge to you to become the champions of change to actively seek out and support women into your parliaments and in your succession plans to take an affirmative action approach to ensure that you bring women into Parliament. I also send out the challenge for you to encourage your parliamentary services to employ women in prominent positions—to create workplaces that support women not only as leaders but also as employees.To the women members of Parliament who have had to climb mountains to become MPs do not let these efforts go wasted. Yes it is hard and as women we have had to endure much. But we have made it and others look to us to help them and encourage them and lead the way. We need your support to make it happen and we need to send out the message to our women in our constituencies to vote for women. Do not be afraid that our women will suffer the same kinds of political abuse that we have had to endure. We are stronger than that. We are the equal of any man; in fact we are the better of many in our Houses of Representatives. The argument of merit is spurious and I encourage all of us to support women to encourage women and to vote for women.In the few seconds I have left I want to say one thing about climate change and its impact on the economic empowerment of women. Unless we do something to ensure that the sea level does not rise and the salination of our groundwater does not happen our women will not be able to grow their crops to be able to provide for their families and grow the crafts that they need to ensure that they have the ability to feed their families and have an income. The time has passed for talk. It is time for action. Above all I urge you to become the leaders of change in your nations.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I call David Shearer—5 minutes.