Russell DeborahHon Dr DEBORAH RUSSELL (Minister of Statistics): Talofa lava Mr Speaker and I'd just like to begin with a mihi to my lovely colleague Willow-Jean Prime for that beautiful kōrero in te reo. I know it's something she works on and gosh that was beautiful.There is a particular item in this Budget that I was delighted to see and I want to talk about it this afternoon. It was a change that when it was announced I just cheered—I was so pleased to see it coming. That is the change to prescription charges the simple removal of a $5 fee and I want to talk about why it matters so much. It matters a huge amount to so many people.Let's start with the impact on family budgets. One of the things we know is that people who have a very tight income who don't have a lot of money in the house they budget down to the last dollar. They're incredibly careful with how their money is spent and that extra charge can just be a charge too many for them. Only $5—maybe a bit more if it's a specialist script—but that $5 can make a real difference in a family that is living pretty close to the breadline. As one of my friends tweeted saying: If you've never had to transfer 87c from one bank account to another in order to pay the $5 charge then you don't know what you're talking about." The difference that that $5 charge—removing it—will have for so many people is enormous. It takes real pressure off people. We know that about 130000 people chose not to get their medication the medication they needed because of that $5 charge. Now those people will genuinely be able to get their medication for $5.But it's not just the impact on individuals. In the last few years I've spent a lot of time talking to pharmacists in my electorate and talking about how their businesses operate the services they offer what prevents them from doing a better job. Of course I was in close contact with them as we were rolling out vaccinations but I've talked to them frequently about this prescription charge. And I'd like here to thank in particular Liz Young who is the pharmacist who runs the Avondale Family Chemist—it's at 1794 Great North Road in Avondale.Liz spent an hour or so one day talking me through why that $5 charge made a difference and it made a difference in that when it has been in place it has undermined pharmacists—it has undermined our community pharmacists. And what she said was that the problem is it might only be $5 but there are people who can't pay it. So instead of going to their community pharmacists they'll go to one of the big chain pharmacists the big ones that are backed by the wealth of supermarkets that are backed by the wealth of a large chain who can afford to say that they will pay the prescription charge on behalf of the customer.Now you might think that doesn't really matter but that $5 it didn't go to the pharmacy; it went to Government. So what the pharmacy was doing was collecting it on behalf of Government and the pharmacists themselves earn their income from the fees that Government pays to them for each script they fill. So when a big chain went with a loss leader—said it would pay the pharmacy charge themselves the prescription charge themselves—it removed business from a local pharmacy and that undercut the model of our community pharmacists. So it really mattered to community pharmacies.And why does that matter? Well it's fairly straightforward. It was not only undermining the local business; it undermined a local healthcare provider. Pharmacists are front-line healthcare providers. They're the people we go to for easy advice. They're the people who know which medications we are on so they can give us good advice about it. They are the people who will respond to the need in front of them when someone walks through the door and yet we were undermining their business. So removing that $5 prescription charge means that our community pharmacists now have a much more viable model for doing business.So this is why that removing—it's only $5 but it mattered: it mattered to families it matters to the business of pharmacists and it mattered for the quality of healthcare that we can get in our communities from our community pharmacies. It has made a real change and what it shows is what this Government is all about: supporting New Zealanders with the cost of living delivering the services that New Zealanders rely on and doing it in a way that is fiscally sustainable. This is a great change.DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Hon Judith Collins—five minute call."