Allan KiritapuKIRITAPU ALLAN (Labour): I perhaps will seek to bring a little more decorum to the House as we go into the final stages of this particular reading. It's a great honour to rise to my feet to speak on this particular matter. Post maiden speech these will be the first remarks I am honoured to make in this House. As I scribbled a few notes you think back to why you come to an odd place like this to stay up until 10 o'clock at night debating the nuances of these various matters. Reflecting on the Rates Rebate (Retirement Village Residents) Amendment Bill it really strikes at the heart of why most of us come to this House.We're trying to make right the wrongs that have existed—or do exist by anomalies in our law—for the little guys for those that are the most vulnerable within our communities. For bringing this bill into this House to the Hon Ruth Dyson I want to commend you for your work and note that this is exactly the type of bill that many of us came here—these are the types of laws that many of us came into this House to make. So thank you for your hard work.It is on that note too I think probably many of us particularly those first-timers that come into this House—we come into this House after nine years of absolute frustration with the conduct by the opposite side of the House which looks at things like this. You see it's a simple bill as has been said throughout this House. It's a simple bill that has immeasurable impact for many many people. Those people that this bill has immeasurable impact upon are some of our most vulnerable within our communities.The measure of any society they say is in the way that we treat our most vulnerable. When we think of them it's usually our children and our elderly. Now the reality is that—I'm very proud to stand amongst a Government where our Prime Minister is the Minister for Child Poverty Reduction. But I'm also very proud to stand in a Government that has been the bastion of standing for those most vulnerable at both ends of the spectrum. I want to acknowledge too because he's in front of me the Rt Hon Winston Peters for his constant work at the coalface advocating for our senior citizens.Many of us have just come off the back of a hard yards campaign out in our various regions. I want to acknowledge the Deputy Speaker Anne Tolley who is not in the House right now—the member for the East Coast.Hon Members: Not in the Chair.KIRITAPU ALLAN: Not in the Chair but certainly will be in the House no doubt.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! I must remind the member not to refer to members who aren't present.KIRITAPU ALLAN: My apologies Madam Assistant Speaker. But I wanted to make reference to the member of Parliament for the East Coast because I'm a very proud resident living on the East Coast. All throughout our region one of the striking aspects that struck me consistently throughout our region was the number of our elderly that came to me with stories of extreme poverty; the number of our elderly and those that advocated on their behalf that would bring the most egregious stories; and the number of our elderly that are too ashamed to tell their stories of how they actually don't have a roof over their head or how they're living in crowded accommodation or how they can't afford to go into retirement villages some times. It's bills like this: simple solutions that have immeasurable impacts for so many of our citizens. I'll turn to the nuances of that bill now.When Big Norm" as he's been referred to previously but when Norman Kirk introduced our primary legislation which was the Rates Rebate Act back in the 1970s—I must admit there were some cackles from across the other side of the House or perhaps it was this side that some of us that sit in this Chamber now aren't old enough weren't around at the introduction of the original Act. I'm one of those members. Jami-Lee Ross: I was offended—I was offended.KIRITAPU ALLAN: You're offended. The good sir over there Mr Jami-Lee Ross was offended. I wasn't offended. But it made me reflect. Look at the time when this bill was introduced it was introduced to give reprieve to those most vulnerable within our communities to ease the pockets just a little bit and to provide some kind of rebate by way of rates to those members in our community that simply didn't have enough cash in their back pocket at the time. That was 40-odd years ago; well it was 45-odd years ago. Well at that time it hadn't yet been envisaged that retirement villages would become popular residential environments but we know now that it's a growing area where many of our elderly live. In fact I think that over 50 percent of our residents now that are living in retirement villages are superannuitants so not necessarily of major means. But this bill—a very simple bill a very effective bill—enables so many of our elderly to have a little bit more cash in their back pocket.I want to acknowledge that there's been widespread support from those that are at the coalface who work within this environment. In particular I want to acknowledge John Collyns and the Retirement Villages Association. I also want to acknowledge Rob Wilson Dick Williams and John Moore who are the office holders of the Retirement Village Residents Association of New Zealand who've all swung in behind to see sensible practical common-sense legislation like this legislation pass through this House.When I was going through the submissions that had been made one of the first that I stumbled across was from one of our constituents from the East Coast Freda Woisin who is a resident at Carter Village in Te Puke. Now that took me back to my childhood you see because my mum a working-class woman was a cook and a cleaner at the Te Puke retirement village for many many years. I spent many many years growing up really in those retirement villages and seeing the daily life that many of our elderly and superannuitants at that time were living. It can be an immeasurably tough life if people aren't of sufficient means. I remember spending many a Christmas while my mother cooked in those retirement villages for the residents and noted that for some people there wasn't necessarily a lot of joy come around each Christmas. I remember that every single year. If you hadn't been fortunate enough to be able to set aside savings for your retirement years—another year over; another year not too much in your back pocket. So I reflected on that and I felt compelled to make comment that over the course of the campaign too those memories flooded home of sitting amongst those retirement villages through my childhood. When I went up to for example Kiri Te Kanawa Retirement Village in Gisborne or Dunblane Retirement Village in Gisborne the common request from many of the constituents living within those environments is "Look we just don't have enough to get by. Look the superannuation amount in our back pocket it's just not enough to get by." People spoke directly to this bill that it might just enable them to have a slightly better life. For what we hope and what we know will bring just many more benefits for our constituents particularly in the East Coast which I'm very proud to be from; for those 15000 people that are superannuitants that are living in the East Coast but the many more throughout the country they will have a couple more dollars in their back pocket—immeasurably proud.Madam Assistant Speaker almost there—no it's an absolute honour to speak in favour of this bill. I just want to note that what we found for nine years over the opposite side of this House was that there are all these issues that we could see bubbling to the fore at every single stage whether they were with our children whether they were with our elderly but there was this complete opposition to actually cut through and act for those that were must vulnerable within our communities. It is with absolute pride that I commend this bill to the House."