Davidson MaramaMARAMA DAVIDSON (Co-Leader—Green): I actually can't see my notes. I'm crying before I even say anything. It is appropriate that every single member in this House is feeling an incredible weight on our shoulders to get up and speak to this bill and it is an absolute privilege to get up and speak to this bill on behalf of all of the Green Party MPs. We are supporting this second reading of the End of Life Choice Bill. We are supporting this because our members worked hard and vigorously among ourselves among our movement to come up with a policy after assessing and debating views from all along the entire continuum of this debate with discussions among our activists our members our disabled members and our community networks including at our MP level. And we decided that we support people with a terminal illness to be able to dictate the circumstances of their passing to allow for that dignity at the seen end of their life.This policy as it is currently drafted goes beyond what we and I believe we stand for which limits end of life choice to people with a terminal illness. We are supporting the second reading to go through because we think this debate is a deserved one for all New Zealanders. We want to see it go through the stages and we want to see safer and better protections put in place and indeed to see a draft bill that ends up aligning with the scope of our Green Party member-fought-for position. We think that is worthy enough of putting this through passage to continue to see the debate on strengthening protections against coercion on ensuring that this bill does not extend end of life choice beyond people with a terminal illness. We believe that that is how we can best honour the rigorous and long-held robust and informed discussion of our members.I also want to acknowledge as a Māori woman that there are diverse ranges of opinions held among our Māori community—that there simply is not one particular clear view from a tikanga Māori perspective on what is a right decision here. I acknowledge that any decision that I could be standing up for tonight to support would solicit criticism from any number of my own friends and family and that all that is left is to stand and speak to what I think is the right thing to do. I acknowledge that in Te Ao Māori no decisions can be seen as individuals making decisions in isolation of whānau and community and that we have a preciously held understanding of the importance of relationships and connections when we make decisions about our own person—that they are never about our own person that all of our individual decisions impact and ripple out to our whānau our hapū our iwi and our community.I acknowledge also the people who have come to all of us directly with passion and pleading who sit along the entire spectrum of experience with fear and anxiety for all the different opinions and insights that they hold—that I have heard directly and passionately from people who need to have this decision.Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.MARAMA DAVIDSON: Before the dinner break I stood to clarify that the Greens will be supporting the second reading of the End of Life Choice Bill dependent on good changes to be made further down the track to ensure that we limit the scope to those with a terminal illness to also ensure that we have got good supports in place to reduce coercion to not allow for ongoing stigma that disability groups came to us to address directly and that focusing on terminal illness will be part of the solution to ensure that we not only focus on death with dignity but that we do all we can to focus on quality of life and for people to ensure—for us here in this House to ensure—that we understand the related environmental factors that we have to be responsible for to allow people to live their lives to the fullest and healthiest extent that they possibly can to understand that that means that we cannot look at death with dignity in isolation of ensuring that people have access to good systems for good lives.I want to acknowledge Matt Vickers whom I was privileged to speak to over the dinner break and Lecretia Seales and her leading advocacy for wanting people to be able to have that choice when all is said and done at the end of their lives as the last piece of power and dignity that is available to them as long as we have made sure that we have wrapped supports around people to live good lives and they have been at the forefront in a very public way sharing a very intimate story of their fight for this piece of legislation.The whānau focus that I spoke about before dinner goes further and I want to at this point acknowledge that this bill is very clear on the conscientious objection for physicians to be able to opt out and not have to be part of the process of a terminally ill person making this decision. And the Greens absolutely support that protection for their morality for their conscientious objection as well.It has been said over the dinner break by other MPs that tonight the House is full of human emotion and that is absolutely as it should be. I was saying before the dinner break that the Greens have had—I think most MPs most of the members in this House will have had—representations from across the board including from people who desperately want to be able to have this choice; including from people who are validly fearful of what stigma this will create for them living their lives perhaps with a disability and having fears around the message that will be sent about the value that they give to their communities; including from people who are concerned about our definition of quality of life"—people who are actually living lives and need to be valued as worthy contributors simply for being who they are and that that may not be up to current standards of living life with dignity according to the narrative that is dominant at the moment that we need to understand there are many different ways to live with dignity and that any legislation needs to not add further stigma to a narrative to deny people the different ways of living.So I add and end again that the Greens are very clear that a focus on allowing this choice for people with a terminal illness will help to address a lot of those valid fears and anxieties that I as an individual MP with my conscientious choice do support the mana motuhake the sovereignty also of people to be able to make that choice—that that level of mana motuhake as a person is also a valid well celebrated aspect of Te Ao Māori as well that our stories are full of individual achievement celebrations and success and examples of mana motuhake but that that does not ever have to separate how that impacts on the wider inclusion of whānau and community in being able to be an informed part of these decisions that we make.It has been an absolute honour and deep anxiety to speak on this bill tonight. Again I think this debate deserves to go forward. I think we absolutely want to see stronger supports put in place. That is what the Greens' ongoing support is dependent on. I think that New Zealanders deserve to have this properly informed and robust debate. Thank you Mr Speaker."