Logie Jan: Address in ReplyText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeLogie Jan: Address in Reply[Sitting date: 28 October 2014. Volume:701;Page:274. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JAN LOGIE (Green):I rise to speak this afternoon about one of the two crises that the Green Party has identified as facing the world as well as this country and that is inequality. The levels of inequality in New Zealand are killing children. That is a bald and brutal truth. University of Otago research has shown that every year around 60 children are dying before the age of 1 due to diseases related to low incomes. The Government tells us that it is going to save these children by getting their parents off benefits even though there are not work-test requirements for sole parents with children under the age of 1. I doubt that anyone in this House would want any.The Government tells us it is going to save these babies by getting their parents off the benefit while refusing to even check what happens to those babies after their parents get off the benefit. The Government tells us it is going to save these babies by getting their parents into work and then the very first piece of legislation the Government introduces into this House undermines the ability of people to negotiate decent pay and conditions. This Government tells us it is going to save these babies by getting their parents off benefits and then intervenes on behalf of an employer trying to argue against pay equity for some of New Zealand’s hardest-working and poorest paid women—caregivers.These babies are not dying because their parents are bad; they are dying because we have not acted to save them. They are dying because of the policies that entrench and exacerbate inequality. In this place we have the power to make decisions to stop those children dying. The Expert Advisory Group on Solutions to Child Poverty created the road map for the Government to save the lives of these babies but the Government has largely ignored this. The Green Party used that document to create a comprehensive suite of policies to save these babies and to make our entire society fairer and more productive to boot. On average another 24 women and babies are killed every year due to domestic violence in this country. We do not even know how many more are dying because of health problems suicide or related injuries associated with domestic violence. Australian research suggests that it is probably more than those who are dying on our roads.The Government has said from the initial speech that it will be trying to reduce family violence and I am just hoping that the omission of sexual violence in that list was an omission rather than a decision. The Government has previously said though that domestic violence was a priority last term while at the same time it systematically eroded and undermined essential protections like core funding for Women’s Refuge like legal aid like functioning Family Courts like social housing like Work and Income protection for women coming out of violent relationships and like the survivors’ network that networks up all the community agencies and helps them share stories and respond appropriately. It just makes me despair when Government members say on the one hand that they are taking this seriously and on the other hand they remove the vital protections that we need to save lives.In the Prime Minister’s reply to the Speech from the Throne he said that the Government would be focusing on gangs in relation to family violence. Sure it is one part of the puzzle—sure—but not the sole focus surely when we need to be reviewing all of our legislation and policies to make sure we can turn this round because we can turn this round. You know that a core aspect of the prevention of domestic violence is reducing inequality. New Zealand deserves better and I welcome the opportunity to work collaboratively with Ministers and MPs right across the House to save lives because this place has the power to do that.