Ghahraman GolrizGOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN (Green): Thank you Mr Speaker. I would like to open by acknowledging the team that's in the public gallery this afternoon—including Deputy Commissioner Mike Clement who I understand after a long and fruitful service is retiring in a week—and thank them for the work that they've done in terms of bringing through and shepherding a quite significant improvement in our gun laws and gun regulations. I want to acknowledge also that as a nation and globally we've been having some really difficult conversations about firearms use and the police force and that it is actually a sign of strength and the strength of this nation's values that our police force have stood at certain points this one included for better regulation of firearms and also last week having announced that they are abandoning the armed patrol trials. So we as a nation stand for non-violence and we stand for what works in terms of keeping our communities safe and we know that that comes with properly regulating firearms and getting as much of that as possible off the street and out of the hands of those who would not use them safely. I also want to acknowledge as others have that we stand here in this Chamber just barely a year after one of the worst most devastating acts of terror in our nation's recent or living memory on 15 March last year when 51 innocent people lost their lives to a hate crime committed by gun violence and of course dozens more were harmed were injured irreparably in body and spirit with scars that they'll bear for ever. We all remember that tragedy. We all remember the victims. We remember the small children that reminded us of the children in our own lives the elders that remind us of our grandparents. We remember those who tried to fight back to protect their loved ones. And none of us wants to see anything like that happen in New Zealand again. We also remember and I think that this bill really does represent all that love that poured out across our beautiful nation as New Zealand came out wrapped our arms around the victims the victim communities across our nation. I think that the legacy of that love of the strength that our nation showed must be real change. We have to have those hard conversations in his House. We are responsible for the wellbeing of New Zealand and we must make change; we must identify the shortfalls in our system and that is what this bill represents.I also want to acknowledge that apart from that heinous act of terror apart from the far outliers in terms of violence that we see we also are here as representatives of a nation with epidemic levels of family violence that we're tackling in this House. We know that victims of family violence are made far more unsafe if firearms are involved. It's the difference between injury that victims can overcome and become survivors of or death. We also sit here in this Chamber as representatives of a nation with epidemic levels of mental illness and suicide especially among our young people and we know that firearms if they are widely available if they are available in conditions where we don't know where they are where the licensing where the registering system is unclear untransparent it makes it much much more unsafe for those with serious mental illness. Those are issues that we have to solve in different ways but this is a small step towards making all the communities affected by mental illness by family violence by gun violence and by crime more safe.So the Green Party has a longstanding kaupapa of standing for gun regulation and one of those policies has always been to establish a proper gun registry. It boggles the mind that we don't have a gun registry that's available electronically that tells law enforcement who has guns what are the terms of their licences and where they are. That's what this bill will introduce. So it's not about punishing those who lawfully hold guns; it's about making it easier for law enforcement to actually enforce the law. We have better licensing terms we have clearer licensing terms both for dealers and for those who hold licences in terms of the terms of use and who can and will be allowed to continue to hold firearms licences.The fit and proper persons criteria: those who have been convicted of serious crimes—that's violent criminal offences—who have a history showing symptoms of mental illness that might be deemed by the New Zealand Medical Association as being a concern. Importantly I think in the context of the Christchurch terror attack one of the criteria for the fit and proper persons test being introduced here is that those who have patterns of behaviour relating to hatred and extremism will be identified and excluded—or at least that will be taken into account. And we know that in terms of the Christchurch terrorist there were reports about extremism about communications that were concerning made by members of the community who'd been to his gun club. So this will make it easier for law enforcement to record those things and to look at whether or not someone should hold a gun licence.Offences and penalties—and we've heard this a couple of times: it turns out that in our law some fishing offences against our fishing laws hold higher penalties than firearms offences. So some of what we're introducing here will be offences including failing to provide information to the registry; the sale supply or ownership of ammunitions and parts without a licence; the failure to permit inspection of firearms; the illegal manufacture or trafficking of firearms. These are terrifying offences and the lack of an ability to effectively enforce them must be terrifying for our police force. So we are acknowledging that offences against firearms law are serious that they need to be described in our law clearly that enforcement must be provided for and that we need transparency around who can and can't hold a licence around who does hold a licence where they are what the terms of their licence are. These are just breathtakingly sensible changes and I think I do want to acknowledge again that actually it's been the law enforcement agencies that have been calling for some of these changes for decades.So as a Government we are taking responsibility and taking action. It has been the apathy of successive Governments that has allowed for these changes to sit on the shelves and not be implemented. But as a Government we must also look at what else makes our communities safe. So we're taking action on gun control but we're going to look at things like housing; like accessible inclusive education; and mental healthcare addiction treatment—all of the things that mean firearms use isn't on the rise in our communities that crime isn't on the rise that communities are safe and inclusive and as we have said many times in this Government that a compassionate approach is taken to making us well safe but also more of a community. So I do commend this bill to the House. It stands for peace and non-violence—Green values—and I commend the Government for finally bringing them with decisive action.