At Parliament the main event (at least in duration) is the debate on the Prime Minister’s Statement. A 13 hour long to-and-fro on the state of the nation speech that begins each year. But each sitting day, after a few hours of arguing that toss, the MPs leave that debate on the side-plate and get down to chewing on the actual bills that might become law.
Labour MP and Minister in charge of the Bill, Kris Faafoi speaks in the first reading debate on Conversion Practices during 2021 Photo: VNP / Phil Smith
The line up this week is an interesting one. There are bills at the top of the agenda dealing with drug driving, a carrot-and-stick approach to cleaner vehicles, with firearms prohibition orders.
But the very first bill up was one aimed at stopping the harm caused by trying to ‘un-gay’ people - or otherwise attempt to ‘convert them’ to being more hetero.
The Conversion Practices Prohibition Legislation Bill was debated on Tuesday, and on Wednesday it was back up to complete its penultimate stage - the Committee stage. It now only awaits a third reading, which the Government has indicated will happen next week.
Tuesday’s second reading debate was particularly interesting. Second readings are when Parliament debates whether to agree to the new version of a bill nutted out by the Select Committee after hearing public submissions and expert advice.
A deluge of submissions
The Justice Committee had heard a lot of submissions. Committee Chair Ginny Andersen outlined the details:
“We received a record-breaking 107,000 written submissions on this bill,... approximately 61,000 of those written submissions came from form submissions …and we worked with Opposition members in agreement that we would not have oral submissions from those that were simply a straightforward pro-forma submission. So we unanimously agreed on going ahead and analysing the 38,900 submissions.
Under a submission tsunami Photo: VNP / Phil Smith
“And of those 38,900, 69 percent supported the bill and 30 percent opposed. So there's approximately a 70-percent support for this legislation going ahead. Of all of those submissions, the committee heard in person around 800, which took a significant amount of time—I think approximately 18 sessions of sitting for full days.”
That total was a new record for Parliament - more than doubling the record set by the End of Life Choice Act just a couple of years ago. Like that bill the hearings were sometimes intense listening.
“At times, it was incredibly hard-going to hear those submissions from both sides of the debate. At times, I was brought to near tears and, at other times, I felt quite intense anger.” - Ginny Andersen. (Labour)
“But what we couldn't have planned for was the volume of human experience that flooded into the room as we heard stories from people who had been subject to conversion therapy themselves; from friends who had supported their friends for years, from family members who'd done the same; and from a multitude of people who had been and continued to be discriminated against. “ - Vanushi Walters (Labour)
Changes to the Bill
After all those hearings the Justice Committee rewrote some language in the Bill, and Shanan Halbert outlined some of those changes.
“The definition of ‘conversion practice’ has been amended to cover practices, sustained efforts, and treatment, so that both one-off and cumulative practices are captured. Examples of what conversion practices look like have been added to, for the avoidance of any doubt… These include: ‘using shame or coercion intending to give an individual an aversion to same-sex attractions or to encourage gender-conforming behaviour: encouraging an individual to believe that their sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression needs changing because it is a defect or a disorder:’, and ‘carrying out a prayer-based practice, a deliverance practice, or an exorcism intending to change or suppress an individual's sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression’. "
National MP Michael Woodhouse Photo: ©VNP / Phil Smith
Arguments raised
Despite those changes a few MPs were still not convinced. The issues, they argued, were parental rights and freedom of speech.
“My primary concerns are about maintaining freedom of thought and opinion, but also about respecting the role of parents, particularly in the complex area of children struggling with their gender identity, and wanting to make life-changing decisions around medical interventions that may have lifelong consequences.” - Michael Woodhouse (National).
“The irony of this bill is it's not actually about dialogue; it's trying to limit speech. It's actually stopping dialogue. The explicit intention of this bill is to stop dialogue. It's to deter. That's probably the underlying reason why I have concerns about this bill. It's firmly in the area of free speech.” - Simon O’Connor (National)
“We would like to ensure that conversations between parents and children—just the conversations—are exempt. That will give clarity to the parents and to those in their homes that it's OK to continue to have these discussions… and alleviate the fears that parents have of the intrusion in their homes. But at this stage, we will support [the Bill], because we believe that everybody has the right to have the freedom to choose about who they are and how they conduct themselves.”
The balance of rights
Labour MP Vanushi Walters tackled the free speech argument with a discussion of the balancing of rights. It was a useful primer on the difficult balancing act MPs have to keep in mind.
“There is a myth perpetuated by some that free speech is under attack. This is politics. I understand the ‘why’, but it's too easy to frame it this way and to do so ignores the physiology and the character of what a right is. Free speech has never been absolute. It's always been bound by Mill's harm principle and, in this case, serious harm...
Vanushi Walters debates while Rachel Boyack enjoys a joke Photo: ©VNP / Phil Smith
“Boundaries placed around this and other rights interwoven into so many aspects of our legislative framework are a part of what our legislative system is — defamation, perjury, false advertising, obscenity, profanity, solicitation of a crime. The boundaries are explicitly stated in the Harmful Digital Communications Act — which the Opposition party will be very familiar with — the Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act, and other legislation.
“They are boundaried as a matter of the very process of developing legislation by the task that section 5 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act asks of us, which foresees and expects an exercise of ‘justified limitations’.
“Legislative leadership doesn't mean declaring that rights should be unboundaried. It requires us to actively consider harm. It requires us to be coherent, not just to place reasonable limitations on a right to protect something like reputation, but also to do so where exercise of a right creates serious and long-term psychological harm.”
A split vote
At the second reading the Bill passed by 113 votes to 7. All of those seven opposing votes came from National Party MPs (Simon Bridges, Simeon Brown, Melissa Lee, Simon O'Connor, Shane Reti, Louise Upston, Michael Woodhouse).
This also meant that the National Whip had to deliver a rather unusual split party vote (26 for and 7 against).
The vast majority of National Party MPs voted for the legislation at the second reading. This outcome was possibly unexpected after the first reading when the party was whipped to vote as a block against the legislation (which caused a few internal ructions).
In his second reading speech, National’s Senior Whip Matt Doocey quoted at length from the Young Nats (of which he is a patron). The National Party’s youth wing had publicly expressed their disappointment at the National Party’s vote during the first reading.
