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Kia ora mai no tatou, I'm the MP for Manurewa, and I'm here in this amazing Rainbow Room, uh, in the New Zealand Parliament. Uh, and this room is incredibly special and important to me because it signifies the history of Rainbow members of Parliament, uh, and it also signifies our legislative history. The work that we've done as a collective, uh, of individuals. Some of us LGBTI, some of us allies, but all of us fighting [00:00:30] for the same cause, which is to ensure that LGBT peoples initially weren't criminals. So it did really start with homosexual law reform. And then as we've progressed through the years, we've had civil unions, we've had marriage equality, but we've also had pioneers and leaders within our LGB community. Uh, that are here on the walls of this special room. Uh, and for me it really is about legacy. So, it was my pleasure to, uh, as [00:01:00] a backbench MP, propose, uh, a marriage equality legislation here in Aotearoa New Zealand. So it was a very simple amendment to our Marriage Act. Uh, and essentially all it did was insert a definition of marriage to say that marriage is between two people regardless of their sex. sexual orientation and gender identity. That definition, therefore, meant that the state had to provide a marriage license to any two [00:01:30] consenting adults so that they could get married. Really simple, actually. And, to be quite honest, that ended up being the entire debate from my perspective. Uh, we managed to highlight that the state had been discriminating and it really started because of two women, uh, Jules Jocelyn and Jenny Rowan, who in 1996, and this was 10 years past homosexual law reform, uh, with two other lesbian couples tried to get a license.[00:02:00] They were denied the right to get a licence because they were two women. The fact that our Marriage Act had never explicitly said that marriage was only between a man and a woman was deemed throughout courts to be incongruent with the legislation because of the time and the interpretation up to that point. We were asked as Parliament to address the issue and so my proposition and my leadership of the marriage [00:02:30] equality legislation really came because of the New Zealand Government in our courts, But actually went to international jurisdictions to say that fundamentally their human rights were being breached. So passing the marriage equality legislation, uh, was incredibly special because one of the first things we did was establish a cross party working group. And this gives me an opportunity to acknowledge Kevin Haig, [00:03:00] uh, who was then a member of the Green Party, a very active member of our LGBT community. And also, uh, Tau Henare, who at that time, uh, was in his last term of Parliament. And Tau had actually led, uh, the IP group, uh, IPU group that year. So the Inter Parliamentary Union, uh, is, uh, a union of parliamentarians who meet all around the world every six months. And, uh, I, uh, was chosen, uh, with Jan Logie to [00:03:30] go with Tau Henare. To Uganda, they sent us to Uganda A because I was promoting, uh, marriage equality, but b uh, in Uganda at the same time. They had a bill, it was colloquially called Kill the Gays. It essentially wanted to, uh, enhance the penalties for being L G B T in their country. From seven years in prison to death. So my caucus explicitly [00:04:00] sent me to send a message. And so Tau then became part of a group that also included other LGBT members of parliament, Marion Street, Grant Robertson, Charles Chevelle, Jan Logie, but it also included allies, people like Nikki Kaye, and also at that time, Jamie Lee Ross. And so I really want to acknowledge, uh, all of Parliament who came together at that time with, uh, [00:04:30] external allies. We also had others, uh, those based in Wellington and Hamilton and Auckland, throughout the country who established marriage equality, uh, committees in each of those, uh, cities. And then we had towns who were actively engaged. I remember doing debates in Masterton. Uh, and having debates in Cambridge, uh, at the school organized by one of the students. So, it was a very special time, uh, because it enabled young people to engage in a debate. that was relevant [00:05:00] to them. And I think for me, uh, when I looked historically at our context, when our 33 years post homosexual law reform, uh, at that time we were just getting ready to celebrate 30 years. And so for older New Zealanders, they'd grown up thinking that LGBT people were criminals, uh, because we were prosecuted, our, our gay men, and they were sent to prison. And so from their perspective, uh, allowing these criminals to marry was something that, uh, They couldn't comprehend, uh, [00:05:30] but young people, uh, who talked to their grandparents, to talk to older people about the relevance of marriage to them, and the fact that they wanted one day to find somebody, uh, that they loved, uh, and that they wanted to join a marriage with, I think helped shift, uh, the whole debate, uh, because what it then became, uh, about was. Uh, how important marriage is, uh, when two people want to solidify their love, uh, their ability to create a family, uh, and from our collective [00:06:00] perspectives, I think we all would agree that families actually are the heart, uh, of every society. And so extending that right to all New Zealanders, uh, consenting adults who want to engage, uh, in the marriage process, uh, I think for us has been a beautiful thing. Experiences I'd like to share, uh, as an out, uh, LGBT member of the New Zealand Parliament. Uh, from my perspective of our Parliament, our Parliament is incredibly inclusive. Uh, I can [00:06:30] say, uh, that I feel respected, uh, that I feel valued, uh, that I have never experienced anything Uh, that I would classify as homophobic. Uh, where I've been explicitly excluded because, um, I'm a lesbian. Takatāpui. Uh, internationally, uh, because I've had experiences in Uganda, I've been to Quito again, uh, which is in Ecuador as part of the inter parliamentary union. I can say that I have experienced.. immense [00:07:00] hostility. We proposed an emergency item in Quito. We wanted to discuss LGBT rights. I think the fact that New Zealand even took that agenda item to the conference and I was able to speak on it. caused outrage. It was transferred to the Democracy and Human Rights Committee. And I have to say that the African nations, the Arab nations were so incensed that security had to be called. So I can hand on heart say I've experienced [00:07:30] hostility and the fact that people came up to me afterwards and said, why are you advocating for them? Those people that evil, they shouldn't exist. And I was thinking, do they not know they're talking about me? Um, so I have, uh, experienced that hatred, that homophobia, uh, that permeates some of our religions, uh, some of, uh, different cultures and societies around the world. Uh, and so I feel incredibly blessed to [00:08:00] live in a country now, uh, where we can fly our rainbow fags, uh, not only in this room, but also, uh, on our parliament forecourt. And I never take for granted, uh, the fact that I live in a country, uh, that I believe, uh, does practice human rights. And it practices human rights by, uh, ensuring that all of us are able to be who we are. Uh, and that's the tenet of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We are all born free and equal in dignity and rights. I think the [00:08:30] shift that we've seen in terms of legislative reform, obviously it started with homosexual law reform, with civil unions, with relationship recognition, with marriage equality, we still have challenges, don't get me wrong, in terms of our trans and intersex and non binary Gender identity is a big issue at the moment and the ability of people to self define and to change birth certificates. But this [00:09:00] year, I have been to two LGBT events in rural New Zealand. I've been to Tauranga and I've been to Whanganui. Their first ever rainbow events. And the one in Tauranga, particularly, just struck a chord. It was beautiful. The community came together. And these were LGBT people who decided they wanted to put something on. But the young people who came, the families who came, the fact that it meant so much to them, the mayor was there, one of the councillors was there. [00:09:30] I think a lot of people weren't sure how it was going to be. Who was going to come? Would there be any animosity? But it was one of the most beautiful events I've ever been to. And for me, the symbolism of our rural communities engaging in pride events and celebrating the LGBT community is something that we all should be incredibly proud of. Because we have come from a history where people have had to hide. No, they've had to hide the fact that they love another human being, but that human being was of the same sex, so there was something wrong with them.[00:10:00] Um, now we live in an open, tolerant, uh, embracing community. I mean, we still have issues. We have behaviours that we have to change. Uh, we still have people who will remember and have experienced criminalisation. But I think, uh, by doing that, what we're doing is eradicating homophobia, transphobia, uh, racism. All these issues that actually, I believe, uh, need to be eradicated. Uh, because if we don't, it allows people.. [00:10:30] Uh, to hate others and to preach that hate and so I agree the best form, uh, of engagement in that situation is visibility and being proud, uh, and enabling our community to come together at Pride events. Oh, look, I'm incredibly grateful that, uh, we've had, um, an upgrading of the room. I do want to acknowledge that the origins of this room. come from Tim Barnett and also Speaker Margaret Wilson. It was the two of them that [00:11:00] dedicated this room to our rainbow community, so I think it's incredibly important, uh, to acknowledge that legacy. Uh, but also, uh, people like Winton Holmes and the team here at Parliament who undertook themselves to upgrade our room, uh, and make it shine and be bright and be a place where people will come and enjoy the space and also a place where we can tell our stories. Our stories are incredibly important and so I feel incredibly humbled to [00:11:30] add my voice of welcome to our New Zealand Parliament's Rainbow Room.
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