Member's Day

Today is a Member's Day, and its crunch day for David Seymour's End of Life Choice Bill. But its only third on the Order Paper, and has to wait a bit. First up is the third reading of Kieran McAnulty's Employment Relations (Triangular Employment) Amendment Bill, and after that is the second reading of Hamish Walker's KiwiSaver (Foster Parents Opting in for Children in their Care) Amendment Bill. The bigots will probably try and talk those out to filibuster the euthanasia debate, and its possible there won't be a vote tonight as a result. But if there is, it looks like the bill will pass, for this stage at least. The real shitfight is going to be the committee stage, as the House tries to do the work its select committee refused to do, and amend Seymour's bill into a functional shape. And it may be difficult to find a version agreeable to enough people. Meanwhile, the bigots have filed hundreds of amendments to delay the process and in the hope of wrecking any compromise. Its politics as usual - ugly, brutal, and petty - but in this case, the stakes are rather higher, and this spectacle does the House no credit whatsoever.

Regardless of whether there is a vote tonight, there will not be a ballot tomorrow, and there is unlikely to be for some time: the Order Paper is stacked up with later stages as bills from last year come back. So we're at least two months away from any chance at new bills being drawn for debate.