Hague Kevin: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHague Kevin: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 08 August 2013. Volume:692;Page:12524. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]7.KEVIN HAGUE (Green)to theMinister of Health: Exactly how many of the 21 recommendations to the Minister in the 2010 Public Health Advisory Committee ReportThe Best Start in Life: Achieving effective action on child health and wellbeing has he implemented?Hon TONY RYALL (Minister of Health):Nineteen.Kevin Hague: Why over the last 2 years has the Minister actually chosen to ignore the vast bulk of the recommendations in the report including speeding up the implementation of the Child Health Information Strategy requiring district health boards to develop child health implementation plans with measurable outcomes and accountabilities developing a set of cross-agency policies that reflect cross-party agreement on child health and well-being outlining the specific actions and accountabilities of each relevant Government agency requiring all significant Government policies to be assessed for potential impact on children assessing access and quality—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I have got to ask the member to bring this question to a conclusion.Kevin Hague: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The Minister in his response to the primary question indicated that with no further detail he had implemented 19 of the recommendations. I cannot properly challenge that without listing the very many recommendations where clearly there has been no action.Mr SPEAKER: I do not accept that for a minute. The member disagrees with the answer that was given by the Minister which is debatable but he does not then need to breach the Standing Orders with the delivery of a supplementary question.Kevin Hague: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. In the last question being considered by this House Minister Joyce on several occasions gave answers that lasted several minutes. This question is not taking anything like that amount.Mr SPEAKER: Order! I do not need any assistance from the Leader of the House. There were some answers in the last question by the current Minister that were long and I stood when I felt that they had gone on for too long and told him that the answers were to cease. I can take a very similar approach to the member if he likes and conclude his question and let the Minister answer or I will give him a very brief chance to bring that question to a conclusion.Kevin Hague: Well the very last point that I want to include in this one then relates to the recommendation to assess access and quality of health care and disability support services: why has he ignored all of those recommendations which strongly emphasise a public health approach to child health?Hon TONY RYALL: The Government has seriously considered this report and we have effectively implemented 19 of the recommendations in our view. What the member listed were a number of the things that this Government has taken in a cross - Government agency collaborative way involving the Hon Paula Bennett the Hon Judith Collins the Hon Hekia Parata the Hon Anne Tolley and the Hon Jo Goodhew. A large number of Ministers have worked effectively together. In fact our Government has made this such a priority that our record is actually unparalleled compared with many other parties in this Parliament.Kevin Hague: For the last 2 years has the Minister ignored recommendations to develop monitor and report upon universally agreed high-level indicators for child health and well-being because he knows indicators would actually show his Government is failing the children of New Zealand?Hon TONY RYALL: No. I draw the member to a number of reports that the Government has which have regular reporting including the national health targets the Prime Minister’s key result areas the new quality improvement framework for the Well Child Framework and I would also draw the member’s attention to the latest immunisation statistics which show that for 2-year-olds in 12 of our nation’s 20 district health boards theMāori immunisation rate is either greater or equal to thePākehā immunisation rate. That member and his colleagues spent 9 years trying to close the gaps and we are doing it.Kevin Hague: I don’t remember those 9 years I must—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I am on my feet. Would the member please assist the order of the House by just asking his supplementary question.Kevin Hague: Why is the Minister providing no leadership to develop the recommended cross-party agreement on child health and well-being policy as recommended by the report but instead pushing an increasingly political agenda of ill-conceived narrow targets that ignore the public health approach?Hon TONY RYALL: The Government is pursuing a number of initiatives for children that enjoy the support of all parties in this House. I have not heard any parties criticise the work we are doing in immunisation; I have not heard any parties criticise the leading work we are doing in rheumatic fever which was ignored by the previous Government; I have not heard any parties criticise the work we are doing with the Children’s Action Plan; I have not heard any party opposite criticise our extra investment in Plunket; and I have not heard any party opposite criticise the 24-hourPlunketLine—other than the Labour Party.Kevin Hague: Has the Minister not implemented the report’s recommendation to set measurable objectives to reduce the number of children living in serious hardship because he agrees with the Minister for Social Development who says that there is no official measure of child poverty?Hon TONY RYALL: I draw that member’s attention to the Prime Minister’s key result areas which are specifically targeted at making sure we help vulnerable children in New Zealand. You see the difference between this party and that member’s party is that we are actually committed to action instead of carping from the sidelines.Kevin Hague: Is the Minister so opposed to the recommended public health approach to addressing our poor child-health status that he no longer sees the need of the Public Health Advisory Committee which made these recommendations and which was established under statute but whose last meeting under his watch was in 2011?Hon TONY RYALL: Our Government is taking a very strong public health approach to improving the health and well-being of New Zealand children. In fact I can recite the hundreds of millions of dollars that have been spent on the home insulation programme where far more children are now in warmer homes subsidised by this Government than was ever achieved under the paltry little scheme of the paltry littleGreen Party. I would also look for example at immunisation rheumatic fever and the Prime Minister’s key result areas. We have achieved an awful lot.Kevin Hague: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. This point of order is not about the gratuitous insult but it is about the fact that my question was actually about the Public Health Advisory Committee established under statute which has not met since 2011.Mr SPEAKER: If the member goes back and examines his question there were about three legs to that particular question. I disagree with the member.