Jacinda Ardern Labour MP Jacinda Ardern is expressing disappointment at the Green Party’s decision not to support her adoption bill because of the route it would take - getting the Law Commission to rewrite the law. The bill is doomed to fail its first reading due to a lack of support from MPs from other parties. The Green Party is among those who will vote against it, despite sorting out adoption laws being a party policy. This is because Green MP Kevin Hague has entered a comprehensive bill of his own into the ballot, which has been three years in the making, and would completely overhaul the outdated adoption laws itself, without the Law Commission. He says of Ardern’s bill: “With the best will in the world, that process will take at least two or three years to arrive at the point we have already reached, and will use valuable Law Commission money and time to bring us to where we already stand.” Hague says Labour withdrew from a long-running cross-party process on adoption in order to “I told Jacinda at the time, and then said publicly, repeatedly, that we opposed her move, because what we really need is an approach that will actually takes us forward, not a bill that won’t pass and is instead a distraction from the goal of having adoption law that actually works for families.” Ardern says her bill takes a route that will ensure comprehensive reform, and accepts that may take a little longer, “but we have waited so long it’s important that we get it right,” she says. “I also believe that we should use every opportunity presented to us, and primarily because we share the same goal on this one and that is adoption reform.” She says a member’s bill can sit in the ballot for years and not be drawn out and go before Parliament. “We have a fantastic opportunity here and I haven’t given up hope that we can still make the most of it.”
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Thursday, 18th October 2012 - 1:18pm