National gives Labour MP Louisa Wall speaking slot after denied call in debate over suicide report

Labour MP Louisa Wall breaks ranks to accuse China of organ harvesting. Video / Red Line / RNZ

Labour MP Louisa Wall has been gifted a speaking slot in a debate on suicide by National – after her own party denied her one.

National’s mental health spokesman Matt Doocey said Wall was “blocked” from speaking, which he said was “absolutely disgusting”.

Wall was a founding member of the cross-party mental health group who recently published a report on suicide, which was the subject of debate in the House.

Labour whip Kieran McAnulty said the party was glad Wall was able to speak, and said their speaking slots were allocated to “the most relevant Ministers” instead.

Wall made headlines this week after speaking out in her capacity on the International Parliamentary Alliance on China, accusing China of harvesting organs from political prisoners and calling on her own Government to do more to combat slavery.

Last year she was seen to be pushed out as the Labour candidate for her long-held seat of Manurewa.

“What I think is absolutely disgusting is Labour blocked Louisa Wall from taking a call in this debate.

“Louisa Wall is a founding member of the cross-party mental health group. She championed this report and worked hard on it.

“She has been blocked from taking a call on this debate, so National has given Louisa one of their calls – one of our calls – because it’s important that Louisa has a call in this debate.”

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Doocey told the Herald Wall was a “powerful advocate for suicide prevention, particularly in Māori and rainbow communities”.

McAnulty said the Government decided it was important to allocate slots to the “most relevant Ministers, including the Health and Youth Ministers who are doing work in this area”.

“We also included the Health select committee chair and people representing communities such as Māori and rural New Zealanders.

“This was a powerful and important debate, and we acknowledge the work the cross-party group did in bringing it together.”

The debate on the Report of Zero Suicide Aotearoa included a range of emotional speeches from MPs across the House.

Act’s Mark Cameron, a dairy farmer from Northland, had tears in his eyes and was audibly emotional when he discussed his experience with suicide.

Cameron acknowledged the 685 people who took their lives in 2019, and the many more who have contemplated it.

“I was one of them. I was medicated for three years because of it.

“Thankfully as a young man when I was really struggling I had the support of family and friends to cope when so many didn’t.

“I was that guy in my 30s, the guy troubled, terribly.

“The harder I worked the less in control I felt.

“I was the normal guy who would do 110 hours a week just to get something done, something significant, so I was still the farmer.”

Cameron, a dairy farmer from Northland, said mental illness was an “absolute scourge in rural communities”.

He said in 32 years he had “seen it all”.

“I have seen drug use run amok, depression, I have also buried four of my farming colleagues.”