Stewart Barbara: Financial Assistance for Live Organ Donors Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeStewart Barbara: Financial Assistance for Live Organ Donors Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 26 August 2015. Volume:708;Page:6234. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]BARBARA STEWART (NZ First): First I would like to congratulate Chris Bishop on having his bill drawn from the ballot. It is purely luck but it is a good feeling when one’s bill is drawn. On behalf of New Zealand First I am pleased to rise in support of the Financial Assistance for Live Organ Donors Bill. Organ donation is a selfless issue and it is to be commended.I had a look at the Kidney Health New Zealand statistics and found out that in New Zealand approximately 200000 people have been diagnosed with chronic kidney disease. Of these about 2600 are currently on dialysis and of that 2600 there is a waiting list of about 700 for a kidney transplant. Unfortunately New Zealand has got one of the worst live donation rates in the world. Last year there were fewer than 150 kidney transplants performed in New Zealand.The number of live kidney donations has always been relatively low. It has been at about the same low level for the last 5 years and this bill is basically introducing a much-needed change that hopefully will raise that number significantly. New Zealanders currently have to decide whether or not they are going to save the life of a fellow Kiwi—often a family member—or continue to support their family financially. The current rate available to donors for any lost income is capped at $355 per week. That is not enough to cover a mortgage. It is not even enough to really cover the living costs of a family. So it is understandable that people find it very difficult to decide whether or not they are going to lose their income for the 8 weeks of recovery time following a kidney donation.What makes the lack of compensation offered by the system all the more surprising is that the cost of caring for a person on dialysis is tremendous. The latest figures put the cost of looking after someone on dialysis at $60000 a year and this is an overall cost of about $150 million every year for those who are currently on dialysis. That is about three times the expense of transplantation on a per-patient per-year basis. Any increased cost to the taxpayer through this bill’s offer of compensation is going to be saved more than tenfold in reductions in health costs.New Zealand First believes that we do not have to go down the path of organ donation becoming an option by which people believe they can actually make a profit—they sell their organs for money. We believe that donating should always be in the domain of altruistic motivation not financial motivation. So we support the bill’s compensation rate—80 percent of previously earned income.We do have some questions. Kevin Hague alluded to one of them and we are looking forward to working on it in the select committee. We would like to acknowledge the Hon Michael Woodhouse for the bill because we know that this member’s bill has been altered. It has been around since 2010 and it was originally sponsored by that Minister. The bill does have cross-party support. It is financially responsible so we wonder why it has languished in the ballot for so long. Obviously we could have done as a Parliament more about this issue earlier. Having raised that point I would say that New Zealand First is very pleased to support the bill. We look forward to working on it and we are looking forward to some great outcomes. Thank you.