Andersen GinnyGINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much Mr Speaker for the opportunity to speak on this member's bill in the name of Louisa Wall. The full name of the bill Harmful Digital Communications (Unauthorised Posting of Intimate Visual Recording) Amendment Bill is better known as revenge porn—when you have postings either on social media or online of images which can be harmful. One of the challenges that we face is a continually evolving space of technology and a continuing evolving space of society and how we as lawmakers keep pace with the challenges that that continual change provides. It is opportunities like members' bills—and I congratulate Louisa Wall for being very vigilant in this space particularly in the rights of women—that allow us to make sure that the law reflects and protects those who need it.I'd just like to quickly reflect on some of the findings from NetSafe in relation to image-based sexual abuse and that's to look at the types of abuse that happen online so that we're aware of the nature of the problem that Louisa Wall's bill proposes to address.Overall 5 percent of adult New Zealanders said they have personally experienced image-based sexual abuse and it is far more common in terms of those aged under 30. In general men and women were equally as likely to experience image-based sexual abuse and about 4 percent had someone threaten to share their intimate pictures or videos online and this was more common among those under 30 years old.They're interesting statistics which I think we need to focus on and keep remembering that these are challenges that the next generation are grappling with. As good lawmakers it is our duty to make sure that the law reflects those challenges that young people—men and women—are having to deal with.Of those questioned under the NetSafe survey 3 percent said that the intimate content had actually been shared online. This was far higher amongst 18- to 29-year-olds and those who did not identify as heterosexual. Also those who identify as Asian were the ones that came through in that report.How is this bill responding to the issue of revenge porn or posting intimate images online without consent? This bill makes it an offence for a person to post an intimate visual recording of another person—and quite rightly so. For the commission of the offence the person posting the digital communication must either have known that the victim had not expressly consented to the posting or had been reckless as to whether the victim had done so.This goes right to the heart of the question of consent and it takes it into an online forum. It's incredibly important that we have an ability for young people to know that it is not acceptable for someone you know who has an intimate recording of you to put that online without your consent. So if anything can be communicated through this bill it's the importance for people to know that the law is there to protect those and to protect your rights and your privacy as well.This bill increases the current penalty for imprisonment from a term not exceeding two years to a term not exceeding three years to rectify the severity of this form of sexual abuse. It's important to acknowledge too how much it's important to our persona our job prospects our ability to make friends—you name it. All of those things follow you in terms of your online persona and so we need to go to lengths to make sure that privacy and their personal integrity is protected as we increase in a growing digital age.I'd like to conclude by saying that revenge porn is currently covered by the broad offences of posting harmful digital communications but what we need to do is increase the strength of that existing law and bring it up to speed. We know as a fact this Government has placed a real focus on breaking the cycle of family violence and sexual violence while better supporting survivors. We've done a lot in that space and I like to think that Louisa Wall's bill is yet another element of increasing that overall response to family harm. Thank you.