Jackson Willie; Xu-Nan LawrenceHon WILLIE JACKSON (Labour): Thank you. Kia ora—kia ora tātou. I'm just following the kōrero from some of my colleagues particularly from Deborah Russell and Lemauga our MP for Māngere.We have early childhood on our marae Minister. We have always gone down the track of reo of support for our kids—we used to have a kōhanga reo on our marae—and so we're always balancing what was in the best interests of our kids. So these are big political decisions particularly in South Auckland—you know you also attract some criticism when you make a decision on behalf of your whānau to go some would say the Pākehā way in terms of early childhood. And we got there when we shut down our kōhanga reo. There's always been this conflict in terms of kōhanga reo and early childhood.Minister I'm wondering in terms of that consultation process—and I accept that you would have gone down that track—how did you balance that? What sort of balancing act did they require? Because I can see through the Budget that there has been some support and assistance for kōhanga reo but there's a competition—our kōhanga providers have been a bit twisted through the years because they felt that they were totally ignored in the interests of early childhood. But for us as community providers we have to make the best selection for our whānau and for our communities. I'm interested in that wider consultation Minister if you can help me there.I'm also interested again in the process for whānau particularly Māori and Pasifika whānau. As has been pointed out by colleagues it's all so clunky and heavy and administration-heavy and it'll probably come back on so many of the mothers to work out how to get the rebate. Has there been consideration given in terms of how they work in tandem with the providers? Have you been able to coordinate a strategy say with Whānau Ora Minister? I note that in that particular area at least this Government has not reduced any funding in that area which I'm very pleased to see.So is there a coordinated strategy or are whānau just being left on their own to work this all out? Because our worry is that they give up and they do not access the support that is due to them. Some of our mums are just fantastic and I'll give them their credit. Some of our other mums are just so busy trying to get the kids their lunch and everything else that they are just unable to access the community provider and the support necessary.So has the Government thought about a coordinated plan working with community providers? Because this system in terms of accessing funding looks very clunky and very very tough in terms of the whole administration side. I'm also worried about providers and the extra burden on them now to claim what is rightfully theirs. So just some questions for the Minister.Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN (Green): Thank you Mr Chair. First I don't think the Minister answered my question before around the modelling of the potential increase in the cost in the early childhood education (ECE) sector. I guess reframing it the regulatory impact statement actually shares my concern that this has the potentiality of increasing the cost of ECE. I would like to hear some more about a commitment from the Minister if possible that this is not going to drive up the cost of ECE.But what I want to really talk about is a perspective that we haven't talked about yet which is the interaction between the FamilyBoost tax credit and the already existing 20 hours free ECE. So one of the things that we're looking at—and again I understand the intention of this FamilyBoost tax credit which is to support and supplement the existing 20 hours a week of ECE. But at the same time I would like to ask the Minister—my first question is: has there been any modelling done? I do not see in the regulatory impact statement anything about potentially expanding ECE to longer hours beyond 20 hours which then would require less as we heard compliance from parents having to do the rebate and having to do it and then only getting a tax credit quarterly after they pay it and there's a statement and calculators and all of those. So has it been considered to increase—simply increase—the extension of 20 hours of ECE to beyond the 20 hours?The other thing is—and I'm looking at paragraph 10 of the regulatory impact statement on the future outlook on ECE affordability. It says The recent repeal of the planned extension of 20 hours ECE to 2-year-olds also reduces future support to some families to meet ECE costs." So the second question I have here is whether the 20 hours of ECE applies to those who are aged three four and five and whether the FamilyBoost here will add on top of that what they already get for 20 hours. However what additional support will there be for families with children who are two and under other than the FamilyBoost they get and also additional family subsidies because of the fact that they don't have the 20 hours of ECE? So those are my two main questions.And then my next question again because when we're talking about the amount and abatement and of the $975—I'm looking at new section MH 3 subsection (2) and (3)—is: how does that $975 come about? Because again we have heard the impact that this has particularly to lower-income earners. And when we're looking at something like the statistics and the census we know as mentioned that Māori and Pasifika and for me my constituents of the Chinese communities on average earn less in Aotearoa than others. So as we see here the cost of ECE increased faster in the report—and this is from Stats NZ as well—that from June 2018 to 2022 you can see that the bottom 20 percent of salary earners face increased costs much more than all households against the average.So the question here would be whether there has been consideration—and this is particularly subsection (3)(b) of new section MH 3—that is being placed on the inequity that we see in our communities. We have talked about the fact that the language barrier is a real concern—and for me I can think of Chinese families—and I'm sure that other Chinese MPs will also echo the same sentiment that certain Chinese families who may not be proficient in English will find it a struggle when navigating this system. On top of that they have the additional barrier of already earning less than average of the income and having to face additional complexity but also not necessarily getting the same amount.So the third question I have to the Minister is: has there been any sort of modelling being done in terms of balancing out some of the inequity that we're currently seeing in our communities and particularly the ethnic communities?"