Logie Jan: Child Support Amendment Bill — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeLogie Jan: Child Support Amendment Bill — Third Reading[Sitting date: 09 April 2013. Volume:689;Page:9171. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JAN LOGIE (Green): It is with a heavy heart that I rise today to speak to this inaccurately named Child Support Amendment Bill because I believe it is a rough day for women and children in this country as this Government seeks to pass two bills—namely this Child Support Amendment Bill and the Social Security (Benefit Categories and Work Focus) Amendment Bill—into law. Both of these pieces of legislation will reduce women’s economic and social independence and as a consequence the security of children in this country.The most recent estimates are that around one in two mothers have spent some time as sole parents by the time they reach the age of 50 and that a third of children have lived with a sole mother for some time by the time they are 17. According to the Families Commission’s research we know that the amount many receiving parents receive the majority of whom are women is considered to be too little to meet the needs of their children. In 2009 90 percent of sole parent families had incomes belowthe median household income for all households with or without children. And we know that women in our country are earning a lot less than men. Women’s average weekly pay is $879 and men’s average weekly pay is $1058. It is a gender pay gap of around 17 percent and we know that on an annual basis it is a much bigger gap. Research just last week by Statistics New Zealand showed that women are still doing most of the parenting in this country whether it be in or out of relationships. This bill will result in a disproportionate reduction in entitlements under the child support scheme for female sole parents and also some male sole parents. Almost 30000 female parents receiving child support could experience a reduction in their monthly child support receipts—30000 families could experience a reduction in income. In one worked example that we were given a sole parent with two children who has the other parent spending 2 nights a week with the children could have their annual child support entitlement reduced by 36 percent or more than $3000 a year. This is significant.These bills being introduced today will further exacerbate child poverty and the feminisation of poverty in this country. And I challenge anyone in this House to tell me that a sole mother’s economic and social status has nothing to do with a woman’s ability to leave a violent relationship. A women’s safety survey in this country conducted in 1996 found that 70 percent—70 percent—of separated women had experienced some form of domestic violence. That is what we are dealing with in this legislation—the safety of women and children in this country and their ability to leave violent relationships. Far too many New Zealand fathers—and this is backed up by evidence—have a long history of not paying child support paying too little and paying erratically. This bill seems to support in part at least the view that child support should be less onerous because liable parents resent paying it. I know of an example of a woman in Wellington who traded sex with a violent ex-partner just to be able to get her child support payments. That is not a rarity in this country because that is what we are dealing with in the imbalance of power in these relationships. This bill will make leaving a violent relationship more difficult and will put more power in the hands of abusers.This bill has been developed as if none of this reality was true and it puts women’s and children’s lives at risk. And this is just 1 month after our Minister of Women’s Affairs committed New Zealand to “a comprehensive approach towards ending violence against women and girls” in this country. Yet here we are just over 1 month later eroding the protective factors inherent in two fundamental pieces of legislation to ensure women’s and children’s safety in this country. It is a disgrace.