Homosexual Law Reform Bill - Instruction to Committee

GRAEME LEE (Hauraki): I move, That it be an instruction to the Committee of the whole House on the Homosexual Law Reform Bill that it may consider the Bill part by part.

FRAN WILDE (Wellington Central): The member for Hauraki and I have consulted on this matter and have reached an agreement that it would be a rational way of debating the Committee stage of the Bill.

DON MCKINNON (Rodney): This is a debatable motion, is it not, Mr Speaker? Whilst I know that there has been an arrangement between the member for Wellington Central, who stands on one side of the issue, and the member for Hauraki, who stands on the other side, several members in the Chamber are looking bewildered about how many parts are in the Bill. I made a decision some time ago that I would not even speak on the Bill, and I have little desire to speak on it, but as a member who has some responsibility on the side of Opposition members I think it is necessary to say that they should in the next couple of minutes have a chance to look at the Bill, as they have to do as individuals. It is not a party matter; it is a conscience matter. Each member may have a different position on whether the Bill should be debated part by part. Only a few minutes would be required to do that, and we would be in a better position to vote on the motion. I am told that there are three parts.

FRAN WILDE: There is the short title and two parts—Part I and Part II.

DON MCKINNON: So it is the intention of those moving the motion that the short title be separate?

FRAN WILDE: Yes.

Mr SPEAKER: I realise there is something in the contention raised by the member for Rodney. Although I must not involve myself in the debate it is my duty to look after the interests of all members, and I suggest that it would serve the interests of all members if one or two drew attention to what is involved in each of the parts and made some suggestions to the House as to how they think the debate should be conducted. I am not doing this in the hope of prolonging the debate-in fact, I hope to avoid a prolonged debate about a procedural matter. However, the House does need to know exactly what is involved and why the procedure is seen to be advantageous by those concerned.

DON MCKINNON (Rodney): Those who promoted the idea might give some consideration to allowing the debate to begin on the short title. They have signalled in advance that they want to debate the Bill part by part, so after the debate on the short title it could then be moved that the balance be handled part by part. However, that would not affect the short title debate as a stand-alone debate.

Hon. GEOFFREY PALMER (Leader of the House): This is not a matter in which I have taken any direct interest, but I should say something about the procedure that the House might want to adopt. If the Committee is to consider the Bill part by part it is necessary for the House to give that instruction to the Committee before the House goes into Committee. Therefore it is not practical to adopt the course the member for Rodney has suggested. The second point is that the structure of the Bill seems to lend itself to the kind of motion that is being suggested, because in the debate on the short title each member will be entitled to a total of three 5-minute calls on clause 1 if no other members are seeking the call. That ought to give any member ample opportunity to say a great deal. That deals with the nuts and bolts of the Bill. It is the most general debate that the Committee of the whole House will have. The second part of the Bill deals with the Crimes Act. As far as I can see, all of Part I deals with amendments to the Crimes Act and the criminality with which the substance of the debate has always been concerned. If that part is dealt with, each member will again be entitled to three 5-minute calls on that part. Members would be able to move all the amendments they wanted to, and to have them considered. There is no difficulty with that.

DON MCKINNON: Is the sequence of those amendments changed by dealing with parts as opposed to dealing with clauses?

Hon. GEOFFREY PALMER: I do not think the sequence of the amendments would be changed, because the Committee would vote on the amendments at the end and would vote on them in the order in which they amend the clauses of the part. If that were so, no logical difficulty should be involved. When the Committee had dealt with that part it would then move to Part II of the Bill, the amendments to the Human Rights Commission Act. That part comprises two clauses and is a discrete matter quite separate from the criminal provisions dealt with in Part II. That leaves the schedule, which would probably have to be dealt with separately.

Hon. VENN YOUNG (Waitotara): Before I support or reject the proposal I need a clearer reason to restrict discussion on the clauses of the Bill, because members know quite well that taking Government Bills part by part does facilitate the passage of such measures. The Bill does not have many clauses, whereas other Bills for which the House has considered such a resolution have been large and the House has needed to make some progress on them; the Government's intention has been known. In this case, however, not only is the Bill smaller, and as the Leader of the House said, it has two separate parts, but it does divide into two separate Bills, because two Acts will be amended if both parts are passed. In the circumstances, and in the knowledge that there is widespread interest in the manner in which Parliament will deal with the Bill, we may be pushing Parliament unnecessarily in the consideration of the Committee stage of the Bill. In particular, there are several amendments to clause 5, and members will need to be very clear in their minds during the Committee stage which ones they propose to support and which they propose to reject. There is a proposal for a new clause 5A. All of the amendments deserve separate consideration by the House. Perhaps the most difficult issues members have to deal with when there are several amendments on a private member's Bill that is a conscience issue are the different stances taken by individuals or groups. Although I know that the House wants to proceed with the Bill, members do not want the Committee stage to take another 3 weeks. We want to make decisions. It seems that there would be some danger of short-circuiting the rights of members to speak to individual clauses if we followed the suggested course.

Hon. GEORGE GAIR (North Shore): I have considered how best we might proceed with this stage of the Bill, and have had discussion with one or two people about it. It seems to me that the proposal before us does make good sense, but to win the support of the House the proposer needs to explain how the sequence of amendments would come before the Committee. In particular, I am thinking of the changes to the age of consent. Unless we adopt a process of elimination on the matter of age we could get into all kinds of trouble. May I give an example? There is a proposal in the Bill for an age of consent of 16. In Supplementary Order Paper 70 I have proposed an age of 18. There is a proposal for an age of 20, and yet another different proposal in a proposed clause 5A for an age of 20. As the age of 16 is stated in the Bill, the amendments will clearly have to be put before the substantive clause in the Bill. By a process of elimination we should work from a higher age, by amendments, down to the substantive proposal in the Bill. In that way we would learn the mood of the House. In terms of the sequence in which the supplementary order papers were lodged, however, we could

FRAN WILDE: The proposal makes no difference to that.

Hon. GEORGE GAIR: I realise that, but the concern of members, some of whom may not have considered the proposal now before the House, is partly about the right to speak and partly about how they will have the right to make their choice when the amendments come before them. If members can be clear and agree that the order of choice is made available to members according to a descending order of age, those amendments would be taken in series on the completion of the debate at the end of Part I. The consequential amendments through the clauses of Part I would follow, and that may be the best solution in the circumstances.

WINSTON PETERS (Tauranga): I make a plea for normalcy and convention in the matter. I believe that the Bill should be debated clause by clause. For example, I would like to have a debate on the short title and a debate on the subject of indecency with a boy aged between 12 and 16 years of age. There should be a debate on an indecent assault on a boy by a man. There should be a debate on keeping a place of resort for homosexual acts. Those matters are all covered in Part I. I understand the wish of my colleagues for a part by part debate, but that is in the hands of the proponents of the Bill. If some of the clauses are out of place and should be rearranged for the convenience of debate, let the proponents propose a rearrangement. That is in the hands of the member for Wellington Central and the Government, but it is not for them to ask us to abandon the conventions of the House that cover nearly every Bill that passes through the House merely because they may subscribe to a certain approach for the Bill. Concerning Part II, I should like to know whether there will be a debate on the Human Rights Commission Act and on discrimination on the ground of sexual orientation being unlawful, as in clause 9 and the schedule. Those are separate matters, but I come back to the point that if there are clauses that create difficulty for chronological debate because of their placement in the Bill it is for the member for Wellington Central to redesign it now, rather than to ask members of the House and you, Mr Speaker, to abandon the convention and tradition of discussing Bills in Committee.

GRAEME LEE (Hauraki): I am opposed to the Bill, and my motive in moving the motion was to recognise the difficulties the House would get into, and the regrettable confusion that might follow, by not realising that substantial amendments apply to clause 5. Although the changes to clause 5 must be addressed in chronological order, as far as I know clauses 3 and 4, which refer to the age of 16, below which offences can occur, will not draw any amendments. There may be one small technical amendment. With the understanding of that point, clause 5 will therefore be the important benchmark clause. It was my attempt to facilitate the Chair that led me to suggest that those matters could be taken together. The matter could be dealt with in other ways. My colleague the member for Tauranga suggests that the clauses could be rearranged. So be it! Taking clauses 3, 4, and 5 together would also make it possible. The point raised by the member for North Shore-about taking the amendments with the age benchmarks in the order of decreasing age-would be automatic, so it can be set aside. That is the reason behind the motion, which simply means that clauses up to clause 7 come within the motion. It would not preclude any discussion—in fact, in my understanding it would allow the best result. I repeat that I oppose the whole of the Bill.

The House divided on the question, That it be an instruction to the Committee of the whole House on the Homosexual Law Reform Bill that it may consider the Bill part by part.

Ayes 55 Anderton; Angus; Austin, M. E.; Bassett; Batchelor; Braybrooke; Burdon; Burke; Butcher, Caygill; Clark; Cox; Cullen; Dillon; Dunne; Elder; Fraser, Gair; Gerard; Gerbic; Goff; Graham; Gregory; Hunt; Jeffries; Keall; King; McKinnon; McLean; Mallard; Marshall, C. R.; Marshall, D. W. A.; Matthewson; Maxwell, R. K.; Moore; Neilson; O'Flynn; Palmer, Prebble; Rodger, Scott; Shields; Shirley; Storey; Sutton, W. D.; Talbot; Tapsell; Terris; Tirikatene-Sullivan; Tizard; Wetere; Woollaston; Young, T. J. Tellers: Lee; Wilde. Noes 21 Austin, H. N.; Austin, W. R.; Banks; Birch; Bolger; Friedlander, Jones; Kidd; Knapp; Luxton; McClay; McTigue; Maxwell, R. F. H.; Morrison; Muldoon; Richardson; Smith; Wellington; Young, V. S. Tellers: East; Peters. Majority for: 34 Motion agreed to.