Pugh MaureenMAUREEN PUGH (National): Thank you very much Madam Speaker. I stand in opposition tonight to the Social Security (Subsequent Child Policy Removal) Amendment Bill. The National Party has made no secret that it was not going to support the bill and simply because it was one that was introduced by the fifth National Government under the Hon Paula Bennett as part of the significant amount of welfare reforms that went on there. I take note of one of the comments that the previous speaker the Hon Kelvin Davis has just made regarding the effect of some of the National Party's policies in the previous National-led Government. They were world-renowned welfare reforms and I pay great tribute to the Hon Bill English for his visionary stand in terms of the social investment approach that a lot of those policies were guided by. It's a shame to see legislation now unwinding some of that work. The reason that we are opposing this bill is because it simply makes it easier for people who have multiple children on benefit to stay on benefit and that ultimately punishes those children—and I'll get into that in a little bit more time.Basically what this bill does is it reverses the subsequent child policy that was introduced in 2012 and what it does is it basically takes away any obligation and any commitment and the sanctions that were imposed under that previous amount of legislation. The Government says that the purpose of removing it is to reduce the stress on parents and increase the time that parents have to interact with their children and support their early development. That is great if you have that ability to do that when you are paid by the State but the reason it was brought in to align with the one-year age bracket was because that is what people in paid employment get in terms of parental leave. So if people who are at work get 12 months parental leave so that they can spend time with their children then it was seen as a perfect alignment that people on benefit would have that same time frame.Why we brought in that policy in the beginning the subsequent child policy was because we always felt and still do that the welfare system—and one thing that New Zealand can be very proud of adopting back in the early days—provided a safety net. It is a safety net for those people who really needed it but it was never designed as a lifestyle choice. We know that the subsequent child policy when we introduced it went alongside a whole lot of other support and that went along with employment support preparation for employment extra education and some sort of workforce training so that people could become ready to re-enter the workforce. So that subsequent child policy did not stand alone; it stood as part of a suite of initiatives that wrapped around those and provided support to those most at risk. The point of it was that it did not then risk that long-term benefit dependency because you are reducing that risk and engaging people in the workforce earlier. The best way—we know this and I know the Minister that has just spoken said that it has not worked but the reality is that the research is clear that in order to escape hardship and poverty the best avenue out is to be in paid employment. It's not only about being paid for that employment; it is about the increase in confidence that it gives people it is about the support networks that they get from being in a workplace increased social mobility but it also interrupts that intergenerational transmission of disadvantage. They are great reasons to have that subsequent child policy in place.We also have evidence about why that policy did work. I go back to the 2010 and 2011 Welfare Working Group's work and have a couple of comments out of their report:  – the level of support and general expectation to be looking for work in the benefit system – makes an important difference in how long someone stays on a benefit." That's a very good incentive. There is also quoted in the report: "There is growing consensus that joblessness is particularly harmful to mental and physical health. There is increasing evidence that long-term benefit receipt has harmful effects on confidence skills and future employability." But most of all it says that "Children raised in long-term benefit dependent families are likely to suffer adverse health effects poorer educational achievement and reduced aspiration." We are starting to see that with the truancy levels in this country going up the slide in our educational achievement especially in our high schools. If we can do anything to reverse those trends we should be.I move on to the submissions—and the Minister has mentioned some of those submissions. There were only 31 which is probably not surprising but we did have some top-quality submitters to the select committee and some that we would expect and hope to hear from in that process like Barnardos New Zealand; the Child Poverty Action Group; the Office of the Children's Commissioner of course—Judge Andrew Becroft was a passionate submitter—and the Salvation Army of course. But one of them was a young person called Ali Haidari—I hope I've said that right—and part of that submission I will read. It was quite inspiring coming from a young person: "it will stop parents or a sole parent to get into the workforce as they now have an extra child that they need to look after. Especially for families who rely on the government benefit which is simply not enough for them to raise more kids and if they do have another kid then they do not have enough financial support or they are sitting on a government benefit which just isn't enough for them to raise more kids. That's where the child ends up in poverty because the parents cannot financially support them and they are facing hardship." And that I think out of the mouth of babes. The Prime Minister herself put herself in charge of child poverty and that has been an appalling failure up until now. We look at the cost of implementing this policy this piece of legislation and it is very minimal. In fact the cost estimate in the August 2020 departmental report put it at about $4.01 million and of that $3.966 million was for the Ministry of Social Development and Work and Income IT support and changes for training and for comms. So basically not very much of it—some small change in fact—is actually the financial advantage to any of the people that it is targeted at. So there is very little to support in removing this benefit. I think it does a disservice to the people who it is ultimately targeted at. In fact if we look at the benefit assistance numbers now sitting at 365937 you can see that this Government has taken us in the wrong direction."