Pugh MaureenMAUREEN PUGH (National): Thank you very much Mr Assistant Speaker. I stand to oppose the Social Assistance Legislation (Budget 2019 Welfare Package) Amendment Bill this morning in its first reading. We've heard a lot of very impassioned pleas from the Government benches about why this is such a good idea but actually none of them have been particularly convincing. In fact when I think back over time to the 2000s when these sanctions were actually introduced by the Helen Clark - led Government they were introduced for very good reason. Unfortunately we haven't heard a very good reason for undoing that particular part of the legislation.We know that this is an omnibus bill and it does affect the Social Security Act. National has very supportive views about the impact on the Veterans' Support Act 2014. It makes common sense to include that in some of the indexing that we're going to be talking about further in this bill I'm sure. But I would like to pick up on some of the things that have been mentioned by the Government—in particular the Minister who introduced the bill the Hon Carmel Sepuloni who said that people on benefits deserve to live with respect and dignity. I don't think there's a person in this House that would argue with that point of view but I guess where our views differ is how we actually reach that as an outcome.Living with respect and dignity in my very humble opinion also means living independently but with a safety net provided by the State in situations where we do need that safety net. It is not intended to be a lifestyle choice and that is the very real risk we run when we start playing with some of the indexing and we start playing with some of the sanctions that ensure that people comply with the intent of these benefits which is to be that safety net not a lifestyle choice.Now we are going to be talking in some detail in the committee of the whole House stage and I've prepared a Supplementary Order Paper too to attend to some of the detail in this removal of the sanctions out of this bill. As my colleague the Hon Louise Upston shared with us before having been on the DPB herself—I too have been in that situation with my two young children. I'm not sure if I was a freak of nature or whether I was just extremely frugal but I never had a problem living on the DPB with my two children. It provided adequately for me and my family for a couple of years—Darroch Ball: When was that?MAUREEN PUGH: Mr Ball asks when that was. Mr Ball I was 16 when my first baby was born I was 17 when my second child was born and I was 19 when I needed the State to support me to escape the situation I was in. I was able then to buy my own place—a very humble place but it set me up in my independence where I also went on to do extra study. So Mr Ball there are ways that people reach their independence with respect and dignity.But I'd also like to pick up on something that that member mentioned about National relying on flimsy evidence. Well this piece of flimsy evidence will tell you that during National's watch teenage pregnancies actually fell by 60 percent. That means that we have less people reliant on the State. But the purpose of my comment around the sanctions is that when a parent—in particular the mother—refuses to name the father for the purpose of supporting her while she is receiving the safety net from the State it is because we have failed to think about the people who are providing that safety net. We hide behind the fact that it may be the Government but in actual fact it's the taxpayers of New Zealand that provide that safety net.Now if the mother refuses to name the father so that the father can then subsidise the taxpayer so he can pay his fair share of what is required for him to support his child then that is entirely reasonable. If the mother knows the father of that child and refuses to name him then I would suggest if he is then providing some casual support financially—under the table we call it—then she is actually complicit in a fraud against the taxpayers because this is the taxpayers' money we are talking about. I'd like to talk a little bit about the indexing too. I know it's been raised by my colleagues in their contributions. Indexing to the Consumers Price Index (CPI) as it was has ensured that benefits have kept up with inflation. Now we are going to be—if this bill is successful—indexing to the average wage; we are not going to be indexing to minimum wage. Much has been made of this over the course of announcing this Budget about how generous this Government is with taxpayers' money. But in actual fact this does not come into effect it doesn't start until next year and then over the next 3 years the difference between the CPI indexing that we have now and indexing it to average wage by 2023 which is the goal of this particular bill is $11—$11. How generous are they!I think perhaps they have oversold this policy because as we all know the very first point of attention that this Wellbeing Budget got yesterday was a new tax—a new tax on fuel. A wellbeing Budget tells me that that was more important: to penalise hard-working Kiwis who pay the taxes now. And here we are making such a song and dance about $11 by 2023 when already they have found a way of taking more than $11 off these same people by increasing fuel taxes—the same people who struggle to make ends meet as it is.I thought it was ironic. We were talking last week about the appropriations bill. I had prepared a quote from the former Minister a Labour Party Minister. I thought that was quite an irony then but I find it even more of an irony now. I quote the Minister for Social Development and Employment at the time the Hon Steve Maharey. He said Removing sanctions on women who don't name the father of their child is a complete reversal of position for Labour. It is a rort and I have said time and time again in this Parliament that fathers must front up to their obligations and we will make sure they do." That's straight from the Hansard.What we do and we know this—I know that Darroch Ball talked about flimsy evidence and using flimsy stats but I can tell you that the stats are very very clear that children who grow up in safe secure families have much better outcomes in their lives. That is what this side of the House is more concerned with ensuring that where parents are involved in their children where they do not abdicate from their responsibilities they are doing more for their children and their outcomes. The purpose of having the safety net of a benefit is well understood but in terms of letting—as they've been called—the deadbeat fathers off the hook and keeping them out of their children's lives we actually end up disadvantaging the children who the safety net is designed to protect. I think it's a sad day when we make it easy for people to abdicate from their responsibilities. Let's face it: a woman does not accidentally get pregnant. There is a father and he should be named."