Wall Louisa: Veterans’ Support Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWall Louisa: Veterans’ Support Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 10 April 2014. Volume:697;Page:17169. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]LOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa):Kia ora. Thank you very much for the opportunity to contribute to the second reading debate on the Veterans’ Support Bill which Labour supports. I want to acknowledge my colleagues who sit on the Social Services Committee for the manner in which we normally conduct the discussions and dialogue. It is fair to say that there have been intense discussion and dialogue specifically about whether or not veterans should qualify for a veterans pension by virtue of having a disability. I thought I would provide a little bit of history not only on how we have come to where we are now but also on the whole philosophy about why veterans have to have a disability to receive support.What I wanted to do was pick up on my colleague Andrew Williams’ mention of veterans who have specifically served our nation in Viet Nam because it was in fact a 2003 Health Committee inquiry into agent orange that started this process. One of the findings of that particular Health Committee report was that we needed to review the 1954 War Pensions Act. What the Government then did at that stage was enter into a memorandum of understanding with the Royal New Zealand Returned Services Association and the Ex-Vietnam Services Association. Then in 2007 we instigated the Law Commission review. So the momentum for the review of the 1954 Act and for the piece of legislation that is here before us is now over 10 years old.In terms of why you have to be disabled to receive any form of State assistance actually goes back to a quote from Queen Elizabeth I: “such as have adventured their lives and lost their limbs or disabled their bodies in defence of Her Majesty and the State should be relieved and rewarded that they may reap the fruit of their good deserving”. I repeat that—the fruit of their good deserving. What happened after that speech was the formation of a charity called the Chatham Chest which occurred in 1590. So the reality of the philosophy around why our veterans have to be disabled to receive a veterans pension actually goes back to that undertaking—yes which is interesting—by Queen Elizabeth I. So we have seen that philosophy just be transferred historically.What happened from that was that in 1713 essentially that is when the pension for veterans was created. The same was replicated in the USA which became a pension plan for disabled veterans and that occurred in 1792. So essentially all New Zealand has done to get to this point in time is to continue to perpetuate a charitable response to veterans who have fought for our country and have become scarred by that experience or disabled by that experience. I think the question we have to ask today is whether or not that philosophy should drive the provision of a veterans pension now and into the future.I do want to look at the numbers. The Hon Phil Goff mentioned that currently we have 16700 veterans who would qualify. We have a lot of veterans within the 80 to 100-year age range. These are our veterans who served in World War II. But the interesting statistic I want to share with the House from the regulatory impact statement which is dated 27 September 2008 is that in 5 years 28 percent of those veterans actually will not be alive any more. So that means of those 16700 in 2019 we are actually talking about only 12000 veterans. So it is incumbent on the House I think to challenge itself to be critical about the provision of services and of support to our veterans to understand the history of that provision and as I said before to question whether or not that is acceptable and relevant as we move into the future. Because certainly both the Law Commission and the Royal New Zealand Returned and Services’ Association were very clear in their submissions that they could not see any rationale as to why all qualifying veterans—and these are veterans who have gone over and risked their lives and their limbs to serve our country and to protect all of us—should not qualify for a veterans pension.I actually think there is a compelling argument for this House to work together which is what we have tried to do in the select committee. To be forced as an Opposition—and I know I stand here as a member of the Labour Party with our New Zealand First colleagues and with our Green colleagues as servants on the Social Services Committee trying very hard to get a consensus around this point. So we are not playing politics actually. What we are playing is a very straight bat founded on a Law Commission process—recommendation 95—and founded on a fantastic submission by the Royal New Zealand Returned and Services’ Association.My colleague the Hon Phil Goff as our veterans affairs spokesperson will be proposing within the Committee stage a Supplementary Order Paper so that we can get consensus and all of us as a Parliament can recognise that our veterans are worthy of recognition. For a lot of them—and I am speaking on behalf of veterans from my Manurewa RSA and I have spoken to Graham Dolan who is the president—they are proud to have represented our country. It is a sense of pride for them to have a veterans pension. Yes there are going to be benefits and additional support that they will get. But I think they are not a charity any more. Our veterans do not need to be treated as a charity any more. I guess my plea to the House and to the Opposition is to please have a look at it. If we are to debate the Committee stage next week we still have time to reach consensus.As I said before if we actually put veterans at the centre of this bill—because in fact the Veterans’ Affairs Act is all about meeting the needs of veterans. Mike Sabin might think that is strange but actually saying that someone has to have a disability to get support and then haggling over the level of that support seems really disingenuous when we say that we honour what they do. All of us on Anzac Day will be at the services in our electorates honouring the people who have risked their lives for us. I think it is really disingenuous of us not to be really critical about why we will not open our minds to a change in philosophy that is actually about recognising the contribution that our veterans have made to our society the contribution that our veterans continue to make to our society the sense of pride that we have in their achievements and the sense of contribution that we have within a global context for participating in these wars to bring peace to the world. So as a member of the select committee it has been my pleasure and my privilege to be involved in the passage of the bill through the House. I look forward to further discussions and I commend the bill to the House. Thank you.