Minister Uses Valedictory Speech to Call for Debate Sexual Violence

Hon Minister Simon Power challenged Politicians to be bold in having debates on  tough issues like sexual violence.    

In his speech to Parliament, Minister Power said that "It's our job to tackle the tough issues, the issues the public pays us to front up to, and come to a view on. There are many debates that Parliament does not want to have for fear of losing votes or not staying on message: abortion, adoption law, children’s rights, and sexual violence issues.

The truth is, if we don’t have those debates here, where will we have them? Surely people don’t run for Parliament claiming they want to “make a difference”, only to vote for the status quo, otherwise presumably they would be so satisfied with the way the country was running that they wouldn’t feel the drive to seek public office in the first place.”

A full copy of Minister Power’s speech is available here

Further coverage of his speech is available:

From the New Zealand Herald here

From Stuff here

Photo: iStockPhoto