Menéndez March RicardoRICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH (Green): Thank you Madam Speaker. Reflecting on the fact that through the course of this debate I've been hearing National Party members advocating for cuts to taxes and effectively services and at the same time also throwing some dog-whistles about this bill potentially reaching some of our migrant communities—so I think we've got this kind of scapegoating narrative on the one hand and then the Labour Party members are expressing concern about the wellbeing of low-income New Zealanders. And I agree: the Green Party is deeply concerned about the state of our inequality crisis and the fact that so many low-income New Zealanders are doing it tough. This is why we are deeply frustrated that this cost of living payment bill is not reaching some of those New Zealanders who are doing it the toughest: people who are on the main benefit some of our senior citizens who are relying on superannuation and they're still renting and are struggling to make ends meet. It makes absolutely no sense to be giving a stimulus and exclude some of the people who have been doing it the toughest.I was looking at the departmental disclosure statement and one of the sections was around external consultation and there was basically an admission that stakeholders other than key Government departments were not consulted on the proposals of the bill. For the purpose of this bill I think we've got a trove of feedback from community from researchers and from advocates on the ground about the state of things in Aotearoa and the fact that poverty continues to be a massive issue. The Government could have looked at the Fairer Future report which showed that some families are $300 a week behind to be able to participate in their communities. The Government could have listened to the countless people on the benefit who are speaking about the need to constantly go to Work and Income to get a hardship grant because they cannot make ends meet. They could have listened to the stories that have been out there for so many years. So while I would have loved for the Government to consult with key stakeholders and communities affected they could have also looked at what was already out there and realised that including people on benefits would have been the right thing if their genuine intent was to support low-income communities. I look back at the narratives that this Government was talking about when it came to the intent of the Budget which was to ensure that our communities are healthy. I repeat what I said in the first reading speech: if we want our communities to stay healthy we need to address low incomes because far too many communities are getting sick because they don't have adequate and abundant kai because they're stressed from not being able to meet rent and because they're transient from moving to one emergency housing place to another. So if this Government is serious about our community staying healthy they should be looking at including people on the benefit in this bill ensuring that everyone is looked after and committing to permanent increases to incomes for the families that are doing it the toughest. The inequality crisis did not start with the rising inflation or the war in Ukraine that has caused some basic essentials to go up; it has been here since before even this Government came into power. If we're going to do service to the communities that we talk about that we serve then I urge this Government to include people on the benefit and to look at permanent welfare reforms so that all of our communities are able to thrive and fully participate in our communities. Kia ora.