Turei Metiria: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTurei Metiria: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 02 July 2014. Volume:700;Page:19117. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]3.METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green)to the Prime Minister: Does he stand by all his statements?Rt Hon JOHN KEY (Prime Minister):Yes.Metiria Turei: When the Prime Minister said “the much more pertinent question to ask is income sufficiency. Do people have enough to live on?” does he think that the 40 percent of all children living in poverty whose parents work have enough to live on?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: What I do know is that those families receive Working for Families. They probably receive an accommodation supplement. As we know the 50 percent of New Zealand households who earn $60000 or less pay approximately $2.4 billion in tax and receive approximately $7.4 billion in benefits. So what I can say is that the Government is supporting those families as best it can and has done so under very difficult economic conditions.Metiria Turei: Is the Prime Minister saying that children whose parents work full-time and get their full suite of entitlements from Working for Families will have incomes above the poverty threshold because of those additional payments?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: They may do. To give you an example if somebody earned $40000 lived in Auckland and had three children then the very good question to ask is what the equivalent take-home pay or equivalent earnings of their next-door neighbour are if they have no children. The answer is $73000. So in principle I think the Government does give a fair degree of redistribution to those families.Metiria Turei: Does the Prime Minister agree with the analysis from the Parliamentary Library showing that an Auckland family with two children working full-time on $15 an hour with their full Working for Families entitlements is still $132 a week below the poverty threshold?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: No.Metiria Turei: I seek leave to table the research from the Parliamentary Library dated 1 July 2014 provided to me which shows—Mr SPEAKER: Order! The document has been described and it was utilised in the question. Leave is sought to table that particular paper prepared by the Parliamentary Library. Is there any objection to it being tabled? There is.Hon David Cunliffe: On what date was he his office or his officials first advised of the alleged sex crime by a Malaysian diplomat and what action did he then take?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: I was advised soon after the incident took place—so that would have been at some time in the latter part of May—that there was an incident involving someone from the Malaysian High Commission. I was not given details of it or that it was a sexual offence just that there was an issue with a member there. I was formally advised of all of the details on Saturday.Hon David Cunliffe: Was the Prime Minister advised that New Zealand Ministers or officials may have tacitly or actively sanctioned the use of diplomatic immunity by the Malaysian Government?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: No. On Saturday when I was advised that the topic was going to be in the Herald on Sunday I was advised that New Zealand had issued a third-party notice which is the formal notification for the fact that New Zealand wanted diplomatic immunity waived. I was advised that that was refused by the Malaysians.Metiria Turei: Does the Prime Minister consider it acceptable that children whose parents are working full-time and earning $15—well above the minimum wage—are still living in poverty and going without the basics or do these people just not exist for him?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Well firstly the member was attempting to table a document that was 2 years out of date. Secondly I haven’t denied that there are people in New Zealand who are on low incomes. What I can say is that the Government firstly is working very hard to support the economy so that more jobs and more opportunities can be created. Secondly the Government invests heavily in education to allow people to move up into more highly skilled jobs. Thirdly I go back to the basic point: the Government has invested in the worst of economic times to ensure those most in need continue to get Working for Families payments income-related rents and a variety of other support mechanisms. New Zealand has for instance the highest minimum wage in the OECD as an average compared with the rest of the countries. It is 50 percent of the average wage. The Government is as generous as it practically can be at this time.Metiria Turei: In light of the research provided by the Parliamentary Library—yesterday Prime Minister—showing that families who work full-time for $15 an hour are still $132 a week below the poverty threshold what guarantee can he give those families and the thousands of children who live in those families that a family on $15 an hour now will be out of poverty through work within 2 years?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Well the first guarantee I can give them is their household will not be $500 a year worse off because of the emissions trading scheme that the Green Party would bring in. I can guarantee them that they are far more likely to have a job because under a Greens Government they would not. Thirdly I can guarantee that family that their community would be safer because we are a political party that believes both in law and order and national intelligence agencies to protect those families unlike the Green Party.Metiria Turei: Will the Prime Minister finally take responsibility for the fact that the children of ordinary New Zealand families both those who work and those who are out of work are going without warm homes without proper food and without decent clothing because he has allowed them to fall impossibly behind and neither he nor his supposed team are working for them at all?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: The reason the member is getting no traction in the public domain with that argument is New Zealanders know it is factually incorrect. If this was a Government that in the worst of economic times in the recession and the global financial crisis had cut the main support mechanisms for those families including things like Working for Families that argument might have some traction but in fact this Government did not do that. It borrowed the money. If this was not a Government that was working hard to ensure that New Zealand families have jobs I could accept that argument but in fact this Government has been very focused on that. If this Government had not insulated nearly 300000 homes—Dr David Clark: Where are the jobs?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Well there will be one as Leader of the Opposition on—Mr SPEAKER: Order!Rt Hon JOHN KEY: This is a Government that has—[Interruption] And Grant is counting the days. Do not worry—Mr SPEAKER: Order! The answer has now gone on long enough but it is an example of what happens when we get interjections.