Woodhouse Michael: Veterans’ Support Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWoodhouse Michael: Veterans’ Support Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 29 May 2014. Volume:699;Page:18516. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (Minister of Veterans’ Affairs): Mr Chair I trust you will indulge me if the introduction to the Committee stage of the Veterans’ Support Bill sounds a bit more like a second reading speech because I was unable to offer any intervention when the bill was read for a second time. As a consequence I have not spoken on this bill since its first reading in October of last year.I think it is appropriate to first acknowledge the very thoughtful speeches that were made by people who have a very strong empathy with this bill. I specifically and strongly remember the speech of my friend and colleague Melissa Lee that of Andrew Williams and that of Meka Whaitiri all of whom have very personal stories about why this bill is important to them. I want to acknowledge their very thoughtful contributions.Can I also thank the submitters especially those from the veterans community who have informed the bill and its subsequent changes and also members of the Social Services Committee ably chaired by Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga who is now the Hon Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga. His promotion resulted in the bill safely passing through the select committee by Melissa Lee.I also thank officials especially SarahLuxford and the team at Veterans Affairs New Zealand and Major RebeccaThornley both of whom worked incredibly hard and still are working on the regulations that will support this bill. Others who contributed too are KeithMcLea Robert Buchanan Victoria Hinsonthe Parliamentary Counsel Office and others.I also want to acknowledge another individual who has a very strong connection to this bill and to support for veterans and that is Brigadier RickOttaway.Rick retired from his role of probably 7 or so years as the general manager of Veterans Affairs and Secretary for War Pensions but that was only a small proportion of a long legacy of service to this country militarily over 50 years. I think it is worth acknowledging in this House and thanking BrigadierOttaway for his long and loyal service. I am pleased to say that although he has retired from that role I do not lose all of his services. He will be continuing to support the efforts to plan for the commemorations for Anzac Day 2015.As we know we are here because the War Pensions Act which this bill replaces is now 60 years old. It was written for a time and a situation in the post - World War II period and has served very well but it was recognised that it was necessary to replace it. The Law Commission after its deliberation recommended two schemes and made 170 recommendations of which 132 were accepted by the Government in what I think was a very generous package—a $60 million package—that resulted in material increases to disability and surviving spouse pensions last year.Most of the recommendations that were not taken up were administrative in nature—the setting up of a committee and some consequent amendments that the Government felt were not necessary. But there were a couple of thorny issues I think it is fair to say that were debated and continue to be debated about whether or not they should have been agreed. I think the overall package however was very generous in the circumstances particularly in the straitened times when Cabinet was considering it.Overall I am very satisfied with the way in which it has landed but one particular issue that has been debated—and I know we will continue to do so during the Committee of the whole House—is the issue of lump sum on death. The best estimates of that suggest that the cost of removing the current disability threshold for the payment of lump sum on death would be in the region of at least $40 million over 4 years. It actually depends on what is included if the bill is to be amended. It could be much higher than that.My parliamentary colleague the Opposition spokesman on veterans affairs Mr Goff—a very experienced member—generally in the race to see which side of the House can be generous will talk up the value of an initiative like this. Indeed he has talked it down because he realises that in straitened times it is probably not appropriate. Nevertheless although I agree that the diminishing number of veterans may make this affordable in the short term the very reason we are replacing the War Pensions Act 1954 is that although our older soldiers will pass on in time and although the numbers needing support may diminish in the short term thanks to a number of recent theatres including Bosnia the first Gulf War Iraq Afghanistan East Timor and the Solomon Islands in the medium to long term there is no doubt that the 15000 to 17000 new and modern veterans who have served this country with distinction will as they age need to be well supported including in their retirement.So we will have that debate and I think it will be a robust debate—I have no doubt. I for one am not swayed to the view that we need to invest an extra $40 million at this time but that will be a framework we will set up and we will be able to debate and have that discussion in the future. But if I was to be swayed into making the extra investment right now I think I would be inclined to support our veterans while they are alive rather than after they pass away. Their families have made sacrifices as well. I am not trivialising the importance of providing some sort of support as a lump sum on death. That is certainly the case for those who under the new language have an impairment of greater than 52 percent under the new American Medical Association guideline nomenclature.My very strong preference is actually to provide support to veterans while they are alive. However in the reflections around this—and I gave a great deal of thought about the recommendations that were being promoted by Mr Goff and the RSA and other submitters—I was swayed by the simple proposition that anybody who requires retirement support and who was a veteran having reached the age of retirement should be entitled to a veterans pension and for their superannuation to be called such. I was swayed to that view and to the view that a couple of other entitlements could be attributed to all veterans—that is a non - means-tested community services card and the removal of abatement provisions on the veterans pension if a veteran is required to spend an extended period of time in hospital.So the Government has introduced Supplementary Order Paper 450 which makes some minor technical amendments including the extension of the commencement dates for scheme one to 1 October 2014 and for scheme two to 1 October 2015 in order to give people time to prepare for those changes. We will discuss this in our debate on Part 6 when it comes up but I do want to put in my prefacing comments that I think it was an important recognition—that simple statement that when you are a veteran having reached the age of retirement you are entitled to a veterans pension.We will debate that robustly I have no doubt but I hope we can debate it in a manner that is befitting of our veterans. We stand in this House with those silent sentinels of theatres past—LeQuesnoyCassino which is very current at the moment andMessines—and our modern theatres of Timor-Leste Afghanistan and Missions inSupport of Peace. I trust that when we do have those debates we respect the dignity of the veterans who served in all of those theatres.