Ngaro Alfred: Support for Children in Hardship Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeNgaro Alfred: Support for Children in Hardship Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 01 December 2015. Volume:710;Page:8398. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]ALFRED NGARO (National): I just want to make some remarks in regard to the Support for Children in Hardship Bill and the comments from the previous speaker Carmel Sepuloni: she talked about the 305000 children in poverty. We know that the indicators for that—approximately 20 indicators—have a broad sort of reach inside that. Inside those indicators there is a continuum of those who are captured under what we would call children in hardship.That is recognised because just last week there was in fact a cross-party hosting of Unicef. It was called Make My Future Fair. While we were there it talked about the factors. It has got a new website and what it has done is it has captured the 100000 kids that it believes are captured under what it would call hardship. So when the member opposite talks about the 305000 we have got Unicef which has defined the true number of those in true hardship in that continuum as being 100000. The Opposition can talk all it likes but go on to the website and have a look for yourself. You will see it there indicated: 100000 kids. We think that is further evidence right across the sector that these are the kids that we need to focus on. So that is a little bit of evidence just to put out there for the member as well.There were some comments around social obligations. I would like to ask the member also if she does a bit of research to see that in 1998 the Hon Roger Sowry who was the Minister for social development included inside that an amendment to the Social Security Act 1964. Under that amendment was the talk about work obligations. I can tell you this: Steve Maharey was in the Opposition Annette King was in the Opposition as well and they also contested this issue but since that time when it was introduced there has been no change under the Social Security Act. Even in the 9 years of a Labour Government—if it thought it was the beast of burden and if it thought it was the issue of contention why did it not change it? I will tell you the reason why: even Labour knows that work obligations are important. In fact if it looked at the primary section under the Social Security Act 1964—yes Michael Joseph Savage was the founder and the father of this Act—what does it say? The primary clause talks about the fact that work is the best opportunity for those to further themselves out of that vulnerable circumstance. Work obligations are not an evil; this is a necessity. However what is important is the way in which we ensure that we wrap around support for those who are much in need in that sort of situation.There were also comments about the question of where is the evidence. The Minister has talked about international evidence and the Opposition said there was a lack of evidence. We have heard from the Children’s Commissioner Dr Russell Wills. I actually saw him in Copperfields this afternoon and had a chat with him there. But even in his comments he did not go against the issue. In fact he said it is actually a common trend—it is happening. In fact if the member had actually read the regulatory impact statement on page 29 this is what it says: “The children of beneficiaries face a greater risk of educational underachievement and are more likely to benefit from quality ECE from an [early age].”From a career perspective women are probably best advised to go back to work around 6 months after childbirth—so it talks about this. The international evidence that it comes from is the OECD report. You can download that and you can read from the report. The OECD report adds further evidence to the fact that the growing trend around fertility rates and around workforce placement for women internationally is that more of them are heading back to work when their children are between the ages of 3 and 5. We believe that not only is this piece of legislation in line with international evidence but it is supported very much there.We can talk about international evidence but let us talk about our own evidence. If we talk about the census Statistics New Zealand talks about this: “This reflects significant changes in employment patterns over the past two decades. As Figure 6”—on page 29—“shows below over the last 20 years the largest gain in employment rate for all mothers has been in the group where the youngest child is aged 3-4 years.” This is evidence not only from our own census and statistics not only from international evidence and not only from organisations like Unicef that has said that we are talking about those who are most in hardship being at around about the figure of 100000. We believe that is the evidence that supports even in Part 1 of this bill the Support for Children in Hardship Bill. Thank you.