Mackey Moana: Families Commission Amendment Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMackey Moana: Families Commission Amendment Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 02 July 2013. Volume:691;Page:11498. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MOANA MACKEY (Labour):Ā tēnā koe Mr Speaker. Ngā mihi nui mō Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori.[So salutations to you Mr Speaker and in regards to Māori Language Week a huge one at that. ]The problem with that speech by Mike Sabin who has just resumed his seat is that that is not what the Families Commission Amendment Bill does at all not even vaguely. The disestablishment of the Families Commission is not something that the Labour Party necessarily has a problem with. In fact it was its policy in the last election. It is what you replace it with that is key and what we are replacing the current Families Commission with this watered down weakened Families Commission is not a good step forward for families. It seriously undermines the advocacy role—the independent advocacy role—of the Families Commission and makes it something more akin to a Government department.If that is what the Government wants then it should just roll it into the Ministry of Social Development and put the funding there. But that is not what the Government is doing. It is keeping this fig leaf of a commission this fig leaf of autonomy and yet constantly sprinkled right the way through the bill we see the phrases “on behalf of Government” and “Government’s priorities”—that is not autonomy. That is not autonomy at all. That is simply another Government entity controlled by the Government which is not what the Families Commission was set up to do.We supported the bill going to the Social Services Committee because we wanted to look at what the changes would mean at the role of evaluation and research within the Families Commission and where that would now sit and at the reporting around outcomes. Unfortunately we now have to oppose this bill because it is a step backwards for the Families Commission. The cut in funding for the commission is also going to severely limit the role of the Families Commissioner especially now that they are being required to produce an annual families status report.Well we have to ask ourselves why the Government got rid of producing the social report through the Ministry of Social Development every year and will now be doing that every 3 years. It was a report that was providing good information on how the Government Government departments and all the relevant Government entities were doing in dealing with the issues facing not just families but all of our community. That is gone. It is now only every 3 years and it is now being replaced with this families status report but the funding that would be required to actually do that work in a robust manner is not being provided; in fact the commission’s funding is being halved. There is nothing wrong with parenting courses and more assistance for youth mental health is great. There is nothing wrong with that. But that is just a distraction from what we are actually doing to the Families Commission which is the issue that we are discussing under this bill which is slashing its funding reducing its ability to advocate on behalf of families and limiting its independence.We had seven commissioners before and that number recognised the complexity of the issues facing families. So we had people who covered a broad range of disciplines particularly in the research field all of which were relevant to families and all of which had something to bring to the table in terms of advocating for good policy for families.Well now we have got one commissioner. I am sorry but there is absolutely no way that one commissioner can have the required depth of understanding across the broad range of disciplines that the Families Commission covers which just shows the complete lack of respect for evidence-based policy-making from this National Government. If it did respect good research and having good research underpinning policy for families then it would not be moving from having seven experts to one—seven experts to one.Even our Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor Peter Gluckman does not have the experience across all the disciplines that we are talking about that are currently represented. He is a very knowledgable man and very useful to have there but I think even he would acknowledge that the broader the range of disciplines represented thebetter. I note that he is one of the people who are going to be on the social science experts panel; it has mentioned the Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor.What if the next Prime Minister’s science adviser has nothing to do with family research? What if the late Sir Paul Callaghan had been the science adviser? With his experience in physics would he still have been on the social science experts panel? So I hope the flexibility is there in case the next science adviser does not have an expertise in the area of families or child development as Sir Peter Gluckman has. I suspect that is how short thinking this bill is—we are not even thinking about what discipline. It might be an astrophysicist. It might be from my discipline—a biochemist—and that would be a wonderful and beautiful thing but perhaps not the best person to sit on the social science experts panel. That just says to me that this has not been thought through properly.You see that again in the very very confused governance structure of this organisation. We are not clear about whether the Families Commissioner will actually be the chair of the board. We do not actually know what the role of the Families Commissioner is. The National Government keeps saying that this is just like all the other commissioners—this is just like bringing it into line with the other commissioners. That is actually not true. Their roles are clearly defined in legislation.The role of the Families Commissioner is no longer defined in legislation. There is a confused governance structure. We are not clear what the roles of the various parts of the organisation now are. The chief executive role is retained. It appears from first reading that the chief executive might be the chair of the board not the Families Commissioner. This is very very confused lawmaking and it will not result in good outcomes. The member Mike Sabin said before that it will deliver lean and efficient outcomes from the Families Commission. In fact I suspect it will be the exact opposite as they muddle their way through trying to work out who is in charge of doing exactly what in this new and confused structure.The other thing that worries me is the new social policy and evaluation unit within the commission. The bill says that this will provide independent monitoring and evaluation of programmes and interventions in the social sector. Well that is all very well and good. It is now sitting within the unit so I have to question how independent it is given that this unit is now far more beholden to the Government than the Families Commission once was. Of course currently the commission uses peer reviewers from universities from other research centres and from independent experts. It does not just use the people it has within its own commission. It goes broader outside to really maintain that independence and get that expertise and that is now not going to happen.Currently the Families Commission has the independence to identify where the gaps in research are and child poverty is a good example of where the Government is not putting a focus on research and where the Families Commission will step in and say: “This is somewhere where we need some robust independent research so that we can have good evidence underpinning good public policy.” Well now where the Families Commission has this function of identifying opportunities for evidence and research it is now only where it will assist in achieving the Government’s priorities in the social sector—commissioning research on behalf of the Government and managing contracts on behalf of the Government. That is not independent at all.So currently the commission can go out and see where Government is failing to step up to the mark in protecting our families and where the Government is failing to do the research because it does not want people to know what is going on out there. The Government knows that the evidence will show that it is not taking issues like child poverty seriously enough so it does not want that research done. It does not want that evidence pointing to its utter failure as a Government to address the growing inequalityin this country the growing inequality within families and the increase in child poverty. It does not want that research done. So it is changing the rules for the Families Commission to say that it can identify gaps only where it is working to achieve the Government’s priorities. That is unacceptable—completely unacceptable. So it is a shame. As I said we would have no issue with the disestablishment of the Families Commission if what was being put in its place was going to guarantee better outcomes for families and for children in this country.The key question is: what are you replacing it with? What is the Government replacing it with? It is replacing it with a fig leaf that is going to be hamstrung—the new commission is not going to be independent. It is not going to be allowed to carry out research where it feels that the Government is falling through the gaps. Also the new commission will be shambolic in its structure and it is going to cause enormous uncertainty. The Government is limiting the pool of experts within the commission across the broad range—and as for the number of disciplines you need only look at that Otago University longitudinal study to see the incredible range of disciplines that are included when you are talking about families.A reduction in the number of commissioners from seven down to one means that it will be a hard task to get that broad range of disciplines represented effectively. That just shows the scant regard this Government has for peer-reviewed independent research underpinning good public policy.