Loheni AgnesAGNES LOHENI (National): Thank you Madam Speaker. It's a pleasure to be in the House this evening to support the second reading of the New Zealand Superannuation and Veteran's Pension Legislation Amendment Bill. I'd also like to acknowledge the speakers tonight on this bill and while we're at it I'd like to acknowledge my parents as well who are pensioners.This is an omnibus bill and it does deal with that social assistance for that very particular special part of our community our older New Zealanders. This bill as had been noted by the member Chris Penk earlier—but I'll just repeat it just in case it was missed—amends the New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Act 2001 the Veterans' Support Act 2014 the Social Security Act 2018 the Income Tax Act 2007 and the Tax Administration Act 1994 and it is about moving the assessment of eligibility towards an individual basis. The purpose of this bill which has been already highlighted by speakers is essentially to modernise and simplify our superannuation and veterans pension. I agree with the Minister Sepuloni who spoke it is time. The nature of our relationships for younger and for older has changed and complexity or not and simplicity at the end of the day we needed to have an Act that reflected the reality of relationships today. So I applaud this bill in doing that.I'd just like to note some of the particular provisions that are included in this package. In clauses 8 and 9 we've got provisions that relate to missionaries and volunteers for secular charitable organisations. Part of that is the treatment of the various periods of absence from New Zealand. I do note and I definitely support those changes to section 9 including that humanitarian work will be added as a valid reason for absence from the country. Also included is treatment of overseas pensions that include a voluntary component the scope of a single living alone rate and the legislated wage for New Zealand super and veterans pension. We do support the intent of this bill and the broader policy intent to make sure that our veterans are not left behind at all. New Zealanders are living longer and just this week in our Social Services and Community Committee we heard from the Minister for Seniors Tracey Martin who provided some very relevant demographic data for our committee. Some of that data was very interesting. In 2001 65-plus-year-old New Zealanders accounted for less than 12 percent of our population and by March 2020 that has gone up by 4 percent. So it's now 16 percent of our population. We also heard that by 2034 seniors are expected to make up more than a fifth of our population which will be over 1.2 million. In March 2020 11 percent of seniors were aged over 85. This is expected to rise to 15 percent in 2034. So not only are New Zealanders living longer they are a part of our community that contribute hugely to our society in employment to our families to our communities and to our volunteer roles as well. On that note I would just like to acknowledge a submission by Age Concern New Zealand. I acknowledge their very strong voice and advocacy for our older New Zealanders. In particular in their submission I noted their vision which is older people live a valued life in an inclusive society and that's a vision I think that I fairly could say that all members of this House would also agree with: a vision for all our older people living a valued life in an inclusive society.The National Party is committed to ensuring that our older New Zealanders do receive the respect and the support and the security that they deserve for the service and the work they have done during their time working raising kids and being part of the community. It's wonderful to be here to support this bill because we do want a superannuation system that is more sustainable. The rate of our New Zealand super and veterans pensions that recipients receive does depend on your relationship status—the spousal reduction; or was it spousal deduction which is actually a reduction as was mentioned by the member Tim Macindoe. And I actually am delighted that Tim Macindoe has become a member of our Social Services and Community Committee. No doubt about it most if not all submitters made quite strong points around that part and it's good to see that under this bill spousal deduction is gone. It will no longer apply to the standard rates of the New Zealand super and veterans legislation. That means that superannuitants will no longer be affected by what a partner will be receiving from an overseas pension. Again it is good to reflect the changing nature of our relationships in terms of modernising this legislation. So that's a good thing. That's a fantastic thing: that we can reflect society today. I just note that around 450 superannuitants in the 2022 period will no longer have their entitlement reduced because of the removal of that spousal deduction. So that's a significant amount.Also in relation to the submission from Age Concern it's a body that does a lot of advocacy for older New Zealanders. They are one of the many social service providers in our communities. I note that they have over 4500 volunteers who gift around 5000 hours per week of volunteer work to the community. They also have 150 paid staff throughout New Zealand who work almost 4000 hours per week and across boards to provide governance for local Age Concerns and other care. This is not the only body that does this work in terms of older population and in terms of the contribution that they make in our community. And as we know many of our older New Zealanders are still in the workforce. I would also like to acknowledge that in terms of the tabled Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 508 we do not support that SOP but I would like to acknowledge that this was a part of our community that was very vulnerable to the COVID-19 virus and the lockdown. It was a very anxious time for them and it would have been good to have that reflected in terms of this bill in terms of allowing the date for that to still remain as it was for 1 July 2020. So we won't be supporting that SOP.But I would like to acknowledge my fellow committee members on the committee. We worked very collaboratively on this bill. It was good to be able to generally be in consensus of the views and wonderful to hear all the submissions. I acknowledge all the submitters. I would also like to acknowledge our chair Gareth Hughes. I echo the sentiments of member Tim Macindoe. I think Gareth Hughes has done a tremendous job as a chair for our committee. Thank you very much Gareth. Thank you Madam Speaker.