Mooney Joseph; O'Connor GregJOSEPH MOONEY (National—Southland): Thank you very much Mr Speaker. I rise to speak on behalf of the National Party in regards to the Electoral (Māori Electoral Option) Legislation Bill. This bill is going to be supported by the National Party. Following the select committee process the Government has agreed in principle to include an amendment requested by the National Party to preclude the Māori option exercise in the three-month period prior to the general election or a local body election in the event that a vacancy triggering a by-election is gazetted—so those three options. Just hearing from my colleague from Northland it's a very good example of why that's a good thing and I acknowledge the point about strategy and the importance of strategy. To be fair a point had been raised earlier that in the initial version put forward if a vacancy was triggered by a by-election that it could not be exercised in the I think it was three months prior to that. The reason for that was to preclude the risk of tactical vote switching. In fact it's good that this is now brought into line to have that same time period prior to a general election or a local body election to ensure that risk of tactical vote switching is precluded.So with that the National Party is pleased to support this bill which aims to support Māori participation in parliamentary and local authority elections by reducing those restrictions. It is a fair point that it's too long for electors of Māori descent to only be able to change between the Māori and general electoral rolls in a four-month period which occurs every five to six years following a census which is certainly a long period of time.I should just touch briefly in the brief time available I have in this House to speak on this bill to just go through a little bit of the background to this. The electoral franchise was established under the New Zealand Constitution Act 1852 which theoretically gave everyone the right to vote but only if someone had individual title issued by the Crown—i.e. freehold title. That means if someone didn't own land freehold in an individual title they could not vote in elections. It became clear over time during the 19th century that that meant it precluded a lot of Māori who owned land communally. In 1867 the Māori Representation Act was passed by Parliament which set up four electorates for Māori; three in the North Island and one covering the entirety of the South Island. That meant that all Māori men over 21 years of age were eligible to vote and to stand for Parliament who did not own individual title issued by the Crown which actually meant that they had a right that wasn't available to other ethnicities at that time in New Zealand who could only stand or vote if they had individual title issued by the Crown. So it was quite a progressive step by this Parliament to ensure that there was representation for Māori in Parliament who did not fit the rules which weren't appropriate at that time. I would say it was quite progressive of the parliamentarians of that time to recognise that issue and provide space for it.Fast forward to 1893: the Electoral Act then gave all New Zealand women the vote including all Māori meaning all adults in New Zealand were then able to vote from that point forward. So as a result New Zealand has one of the oldest continuous democracies in the world now and I think we can be very proud of that. We do need to be very careful when changing any electoral system to uphold the integrity of that history that we have developed over a long period of time and to ensure that we do have appropriate representation in this House but also that we do ensure that we uphold that principle of one person one vote which has stood this country in very good stead.So this is a good little bill. I do remember seeing actually in the Māori Affairs Committee possibly about a year ago some data which actually indicated that quite a few had shifted from the Māori option on to the general roll over a period of time. The good thing about this is that it gives people the opportunity to switch from either the Māori roll or to the electoral roll in a principled fashion and by that I mean that it's done with that time period to protect the integrity of the system—prior to a general election a local body election or a by-election—but that it enables them to vote in the election in the way that they feel most appropriate. So with that I commend this bill to the House. DEPUTY SPEAKER: Debbie Ngarewa-Packer—a five-minute call.