This bill has had a complicated passage through the House so far. It was originally introduced four years ago to re-enact and update the 1995 legislation. The bill, as introduced, included provisions around digital access to information and responded to the review of burial and cremation law by the Law Commission. The House was unanimous in the first reading, and its contents were well canvassed by the select committee. So why are we here four years later for the second reading debate? It's because of a wholesale repeal of current law requiring people to get a Family Court declaration to change the sex recorded on their birth certificate. That has been the law in New Zealand for 25 years and, as Crown Law has observed, the fast-paced social recognition of a diversity of genders and self-identification has outstripped the legal framework to accommodate it. 