Belich CamillaCAMILLA BELICH (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. It's a pleasure to be here back from a long time in Auckland under lockdown. Hon Member: Welcome back.CAMILLA BELICH: Thank you. I just want to acknowledge for anyone who might be watching from Auckland—to thank them for their hard work. Hopefully they see now that there is light at the end of the tunnel and their hard work is paying off. So I rise now to speak on the second reading of the Harmful Digital Communications (Unauthorised Posting of Intimate Visual Recording) Amendment Bill. This is a member's bill as we know in the name of my colleague Louisa Wall. And before I get into the substance of this bill which it is very heartening to see has universal support around this House I want to pay tribute to her. Not only is she a former double international in netball and rugby having won a Rugby World Cup for New Zealand in 1998 and a silver medal in the Netball World Cup; not satisfied with what I can probably be confident in saying are unparalleled achievements in this House she has again and again and again brought important considered members' bills to this House including notably same-sex marriage and also the next bill on the Order Paper which is the abortion safe zones bill which I also strongly support to provide women safe access to the medical procedure of abortion. Ngā mihi nui ki a koe e te tuahine mō tō mahi o konei.[Thank you my sister for your work here.]But for now we will not be talking about that next bill; we'll be focusing on this bill about harmful digital communications. I agree with my colleague from the Green Party Jan Logie when she said that it's a bill whose time has come. I also agree with my colleague on the other side of the House Karen Chhour when she said this bill is one of the reasons that we came to this place: to make a real difference for New Zealanders to protect people from harm. I had actually noted that down before she said that just like I had noted down what Jan Logie had said: that it's a bill whose time has come. I think it is really amazing to see that shared strength of feeling around this important piece of proposed legislation.Throughout the last two years in 2020 and now in 2021 we can all acknowledge that more of our lives are spent online. We have Zooms we have online school online shopping and social media that all play a role in our daily lives. It is therefore so important that abuse when it happens if it's through an online platform is also considered serious abuse that deserves the careful consideration of this House. In plain English this is a bill that makes clear that posting an intimate video recording online without consent is sexual abuse or image-based sexual abuse and it should in my view be treated as so. As we've heard from other speakers this type of image-based sexual abuse is unfortunately increasing in New Zealand and I think another colleague Sarah Pallett mentioned that 5 percent of New Zealanders have experienced this image-based sexual abuse. That is a huge number of people and it is not acceptable from my perspective. The reason why this is really important is that research has shown that the impact of image-based sexual assault is likely to be similar to the impact of sexual assault that may happen in the real world. This is still assault it's still harmful and it still creates lasting damage on the people it affects. Research has also shown that the victims or survivors of this type of abuse are more often than not likely to be young people women or people in our rainbow community. And according to Women's Refuge image-based sexual assault is often used as a form of gender-based violence by partners or ex-partners as a form of control used to degrade their partner or former partner. This is why we need to take this type of abuse so seriously. However our current law is not fit for purpose in relation to this. Our current law requires intent from the perpetrator of this type of image-based sexual abuse. This bill brought by Louisa Wall would get rid of the mens rea or intention element of this offence because it is implicit that in the sharing of an intimate image without consent that is an act of abuse. Some may argue that there is some implicit form in the existing offence; however as those who have practised in criminal law will understand when you prosecute an offence you have to prosecute each limb of the offence and proving the mens rea of an offence is a barrier which prosecutors need to overcome in order to have a successful prosecution of an offence. That is why removing that barrier when so clearly an offence has been committed improves the law and also improves access to justice for the victims or survivors of that particular offence. So I think that it is significant and it will improve the law as it stands.In the past some may have argued that they posted an image online—an intimate image of someone else without their consent—and they may have used excuses that quite frankly I think most people in New Zealand and in this House would find absolutely abhorrent. They may have successfully used an excuse to say that they didn't post it online to harm the individual; they posted it for their own gratification or as a joke rather than to cause harm. These are abhorrent defences that could possibly be used in New Zealand in the law as it currently stands and this is why it is so important that we change this law to make sure it is fairer and make sure that the perpetrators of these types of offence are more likely to be brought to justice. I also want to acknowledge another colleague in the House Nicola Willis when she characterised these actions as weaponising intimate moments. I agree that when people do these types of action they are weaponising intimate moments. And I think the fact that it happens to so many—largely women but also some men and some other people from other communities like our rainbow communities in New Zealand—is absolutely terrible and it is incumbent on this House on us to change this law in order to make sure that this doesn't continue to happen. Now I don't sit on the Justice Committee. I'm not a permanent member of the Justice Committee although I have recently subbed on to it on a few occasions but not in relation to this bill. I know that they're an incredibly hard-working committee and it was really heartening to hear the chair of that committee Ginny Andersen talk about how collegially the Justice Committee worked together on this bill in order to produce the version that we see today for the second reading. So thank you very much to the members of the Justice Committee for their work in this area. I understand there were a number of submissions about 70 submissions and 60 were in favour also a number of oral submissions—around 22. I just want to take a moment here to commend the people who were brave enough to come forward and give those oral submissions. It's a really difficult thing to do—most people in New Zealand don't do it—and especially when it's on something as personal as this type of legislation which talks about intimate recordings. To come forward and talk about the damage that that has done to you under the law as it currently stands is an incredibly brave thing to do and I want to pay tribute to those people. Hearing some of the extracts of those submissions as read out by my colleague Ginny Andersen it was actually sickening to think that that type of treatment could go unpunished in this country or at least would face significant barriers if one was to be prosecuted. And I do understand that currently when you do try and prosecute these types of offences it can be a very long process it can be a process that needs to be initiated by the victim and it can take many many years. So I think that the improvements that the select committee has suggested will go a long way to improving that. I just want to note a couple of those before I run out of time. So one thing that I just wanted to highlight was the use of interim orders which would allow material to be taken down quicker. Interim orders or those types of orders that can happen quickly prior to the conclusion of the substantive matter are incredibly important in legal cases and I will commend the committee for suggesting this change to the bill.Just in conclusion to my comments on the second reading of this member's bill of my colleague Louisa Wall again I would say it is a bill whose time has come. The bill makes clear that posting intimate video recordings without consent is sexual abuse and there can be serious mental health consequences of the offending in this way. This is why we need to treat this offending in a serious way in this House and why I am honoured to commend this bill to the House.