Joyce StevenHon STEVEN JOYCE (National): Thank you very much Mr Chair for giving me the opportunity to take a call on this stage of the bill. I want to raise a few questions that perhaps the Minister of Finance will be able to answer and address in due course around this Part 1 of the bill.Firstly I want to focus on the calculation of children lifted out of poverty and the various numbers that have been pushed around as a result of the Best Start approach and also the increases to Working for Families. As we know most of the increases to Working for Families were done by the previous Government through the original Family Incomes Package. Of course the accommodation supplement changes were a very significant part of alleviating poverty and that was also done by the previous Government. The calculation—I assume that we're using the same database that was used at the time—was that it would lift 50000 children above the OECD definition of 50 percent of median incomes by 1 April 2018. So effectively that was to happen straight away from 1 April 2018 as those things and the lifting of the low-income tax threshold took place at that time.Labour have talked of a couple of numbers that they say their package will address but the dates are quite different. Now obviously they weren't going to achieve anything by 1 April 2018 because it doesn't start by 1 April 2018 but then they talk of achieving 88000 by some point in 2021 I think which I presume is 1 July or 30 June 2021. But that actually of course includes a number of things that are occurring or are predicted to occur at the same time as this package beds in particularly of course the continuing lift in incomes and the increase in employment and so on that has a significant impact. So we're not actually comparing apples with apples in this case and I think—and the Minister might choose to address it at some point—the Minister's listed another number which is 71000 which is apparently going to apply at some point in 2019. So again we see we have a continuum of numbers. We have our number of 50000 which was going to apply from 1 April next year. We have a 71000 number and an 88000 number three or four years hence.So from 71000 to 88000 presumably applies to both parties' packages because the income and the employment continues to rise in the economic situation that is being laid out both prior to the election and since the election. Then on top of that the National Government had scheduled a second Family Incomes Package in 2020 which would target—as was said before the election by Bill English—another 50000 young people at that time. Of course we now know that Mr Robertson has no money for that—he actually doesn't have money for lots of things—to be able to repeat the same programme of his in 2020.Hon Andrew Little: You had none either. It's all on the never-never. It's all you ever do.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Perhaps Mr Little could start by taking his pills. So we have an issue of comparison and actually if you do the comparison properly it is more than possible in fact probable that the National Government's programme would lift more children out of poverty than this Government's programme—more children out of poverty. So that's something that we will want to continue to unpick because if I may get into the mechanisms by which that's done it's not immediately clear how providing three thousand and something dollars to people on very high incomes actually helps alleviate poverty. And I do want to address that part of the calculation because the lifting of the threshold of Working for Families also doesn't actually target that group of people at the lower end who are affected by poverty. So you look along the list and there's not much in that package beyond what the previous Government was doing that is actually going to contribute to alleviating child poverty—the stated aim of the Government.I think that's one of the issues that this side has with the package: it doesn't appear to be well-designed or coherent compared to the stated objective of the package. That's something we need to focus on I think in this House. We will submit over the course of the day other things that may achieve more—other things that may achieve more—for poverty. For example one of the things that the Government is cancelling in this part of the bill is the lifting of the bottom tax rate—the bottom tax threshold—from $14000 to $22000. That could hardly be described as a hard right move—lifting the bottom tax threshold from $14000 to $22000. You couldn't actually turn around and say that that's a really nasty thing focused at the top end of society. That's literally trying to improve the rewards for work for people who actually get the least money from work.That's the bit I don't understand. How is it that this Government has forgotten the link between work and income? Actually this Government has after stating how important it was to lift the linkages to improve the linkages between work and income to get more working people to have the opportunity to see more from their work—the first thing they do is take away some of that linkage some of that improved linkage. They take away the improved tax rates for people at low levels of income and they take away the tax benefits for people on median incomes—for the sort of people that Andrew Little used to represent back when he was a unionist and cared about them. Those people are missing out through this package and they have—Hon Andrew Little: You've done nothing for them. They saw their wages going down.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Well you're definitely doing nothing for them Mr Little. You're doing less than nothing for them by cancelling the tax threshold changes that would improve their lives. Cancelling those—that's less than nothing that the new Government is doing for those people less than nothing. That's actually what this committee has to face today: we are dealing with a package that yes provides more money to a group of people—and Mr Robertson is fond of saying it's 70 percent of a certain type of family arrangement. Fine; but what about the people who don't qualify? They are not just being left neutral; in the course of this day we are planning—if the Parliament agrees to take money off those people from 1 April next year we are literally saying to those people No your work does not qualify you for more." We are saying that those people shouldn't have more.So we will be presenting some alternative options to the Government through the course of the day when we say "Actually it is important that you recognise that these people are moving into higher levels because of bracket creep because their incomes are growing." I mean median incomes have gone up around $10000 since 2010. I know it's not something that the Government likes to concede—Hon Andrew Little: But it's just not true.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: But it's true actually. Well Mr Little I suggest you go and digest some statistics books for breakfast which would have a dual benefit: you'd learn something and we'd have a quieter time in the Chamber while you're digesting the books. But that $10000 means that people move into higher tax brackets and they end up paying 30c in the dollar and as we discussed last night people on the median income are now paying around $800 or $900 a year more tax than they were six or seven years ago and this Parliament needs to address that.The failure to address that—if we walk away today having undone an attempt to address that—then effectively the Parliament is saying to those people "Your work is not valued. The way you live your lives is not valued because we're not actually valuing your type of living arrangements—whether you're a single person a young couple starting out you've got grown-up kids and you trying to pay off your mortgage and perhaps support one through starting their own small business or whatever then we don't value that. The only thing we value is this narrow group over here which we all value." Actually the previous Government has done most of the work of lifting children out of poverty. This Government has just added a little bit to it and rebranded it. It's a bit like the housing programme: rebranded it and called it their own. That's what they're doing.But we need to address this fairness issue and we need to address this issue of balance across the different groups in society because everybody's worked to deliver the strong economy that this Government has inherited and they all deserve some say and some benefit from it in terms of their lives."