Marcroft Jenny; Rurawhe AdrianJENNY MARCROFT (NZ First): Tēnā koe Mr Assistant Speaker he mihi mahana ki a koe [Good evening Mr Assistant Speaker and warm greetings to you] and thank you very much for the opportunity to stand and speak on this bill on behalf of New Zealand First. I'd just like to reiterate the call to Melissa Lee and congratulate her on having this bill come before the House the Accident Compensation (Recent Migrants and Returning New Zealanders) Amendment Bill. It is a thrill indeed as I have had my first bill read and I'm sure even after a decade a thrill it is indeed to have a piece of legislation before the House.I like to make mention of the Minister Mr Lees-Galloway and the statement he made right at the beginning of his contribution on this bill to consider the principles of the Accident Compensation Corporation as well as to consider the principles of New Zealand superannuation. I'd also like to thank the Minister for the detailed explanation that he gave of how ACC works for those who are over the age of 65. His clarity on this is much appreciated.Looking at the bill the Accident Compensation (Recent Migrants and Returning New Zealanders) Amendment Bill what does this bill do? In reality who will it affect? It's going to be a very small group of people that this legislation will create a change for. The bill will contain provisions to continue entitlement to weekly ACC compensation for those who are over 65 years of age. They may be recent migrants or they may be returning New Zealanders until they meet the qualifications for New Zealand superannuation.So this small group people—who are they? Well if you take a look at the numbers and if we go to the 2015-2016 statistics of those granted residence over the age of 60 90.7 percent fell under the parent category. That's a very large number in there that 90.7 percent in that parent category. Now those under this category should be in fact supported by their children if they happen to injure themselves so why would they need ACC? Now currently migrants and expat Kiwis are entitled to full New Zealand super after just 10 years' residency. Now this also requires that five years has to be after the age of 50. However I'd just like to note that recently it was amended for a small group of pensioner residents in the Cook Islands Niue and Tokelau—there has been a change there. Ten years to receive full super is unusually generous by international standards.So just taking a look now at the member Melissa Lee's press release that she put out on 1 February she says this is unfair in terms of making these changes for this small group of people because these are people who have lived and worked in New Zealand who through no fault of their own suffer an injury and as a result of an accident maybe which means that they can't work—causing them to rely on support from ACC to get by. But I don't in fact believe that that is strictly correct and I'll point out why. Migrants who have not been in the country for 10 years have not paid much into the ACC as much as maybe the average citizen who's worked and spent their life working here in New Zealand. So frankly it would be a little unfair for them to be utilising the ACC system when they've not paid any substantial amount of money.Now if this amendment did go through depending on the individual's income level even from a short stint on ACC they would have drawn more from the system than they'd actually contributed to. This bill could force New Zealand taxpayers to help pay for double superannuation for non-residents who may be injured in New Zealand but receive also at the same time an overseas pension. Now that's not fair on New Zealanders either and it certainly doesn't make sense. Migrants who have had permanent residency for two years will in fact be eligible for sickness or invalid's benefits so it's not like there isn't a basic minimum already in place. There's already a mechanism for them to be taken care of by the State.So ACC if someone did get injured it would be 80 percent of their income and if someone is over the age of 65—maybe they're a lawyer and they're still working—imagine the cost of that to the State. At 80 percent income cover it's usually more than the New Zealand superannuation if they happen to be injured and can no longer work. So just in summary New Zealand First—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! The member's time has expired.