Laban Luamanuvao Winnie: General Debate 
Laban Luamanuvao Winnie: General Debate 
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Hon LUAMANUVAO WINNIE LABAN (Labour—Mana) 
: 
 Kia ora talofa lava and warm Pacific greetings. I stand to speak in this debate with much concern and anger. I stand as Labour’s associate spokesperson on aged care and I want to focus on the elderly: generations who have built and contributed to our society and economy and generations that for many of us represent our parents our grandparents our great-grandparents and us. It is the responsibility of the Government to look after the welfare and well-being of its citizens. Today we are focusing on our elderly our senior citizens. 
In my role as the associate spokesperson on aged care I have visited met and spoken with people in rest homes people in hospitals and people who are still living in their own homes with some home-based support. I have also spoken with doctors nurses caregivers family members and members of the community. I have also met and spoken with members of Grey Power and of Age Concern. As the spokesperson on Pacific Island affairs and the Interfaith Group and as the MP for Mana I have also spoken and met with church organisations and with elderly people from Palagi Maori Pacific Island Asian and other ethnic groups. 
Aged care is the collective responsibility of all of us. Surveys conducted by organisations like Age Concern have shown that the majority of people over 65 years want to continue to live in their own homes and to maintain independence as much as possible. Social isolation is also a major issue. The elderly have expressed their appreciation for having support in their homes especially where they have medical conditions that limit their activity. There are currently around 28000 older New Zealanders living in residential care and a further 60000 older people are receiving home support services. Reducing home-based services could result in more people ending up in hospital and costing health boards more money. People need better not reduced home support. Where that has become a cost-cutting service it means we have rendered elderly people unsafe in their own homes. That is not acceptable and it can also put tremendous stress and anxiety on them and their families. 
We also know it can be more cost-effective to provide quality home-based support to our elderly while they are still able to remain in their own homes. In April this year the  
Southland Times 
 reported in its headline: “Home support faces razor” and we all know that Tony Ryall’s razor ain’t blunt! The media release also quoted David Crisp the local district health board’s regional planning and funding general manager who said that reductions were most likely to be where the boards funded domestic help to the elderly. It is very important that the actions follow the rhetoric when the Minister of Health has publicly stated his commitment to moving health resources to the front line. Yet district health boards are stating they will make cuts to home-based services to the elderly. It is very clear that these cutbacks will be disastrous for our senior citizens some of whom rely on those services in order to stay in their own homes and to lead relatively independent lives. The Minister of Health Tony Ryall has promised that he will improve front-line services but it has become increasingly clear that the current Government does not see home support services as front-line or essential. Our elderly deserve to be treated with dignity and respect and not as a drain on resources which is clearly the message these district health boards and the Minister of Health is sending. 
Financial arguments for reducing home-based support services are critically flawed. Providing support for people to stay in their own homes is always going to be a less expensive option than providing 24 hours a day 7 days a week residential accommodation. Without home support more elderly will have no choice but to look at the option of residential care. The elderly deserve more than to have their health compromised because of a call for financial restraint from a Government that promised better health care. Instead National is delivering rhetoric and cuts to front-line services and in this case to home-based services for the elderly. 
Our elders deserve to be treated with dignity and respect which is why last month and again this morning I have sought at the Health Committee with Labour members’ support to have a select committee inquiry into the quality of health care for older people. It is to ensure that older New Zealanders are receiving the appropriate access to health services both in the community and in residential care.