O'Connor GregGREG O'CONNOR (Labour—Ōhāriu): I rise in support of this bill. Before I get into the winding up of the bill I just want to speak to some of the things that have been talked about today. Firstly there's been quite a lot of commentary from across the floor around the fact that this is work that they began and that we are finishing. Well it would appear that it only ever was a press release and very little else before this Government came in and the drafting and the work has been done by this Government. Like all things this Government is a very responsible Government.I look at the work that's been done by the previous Government; there's been some very good work done and it behoves us as a new Government to look at what's been done and to make sure we take the good and do away with the bad—improve it. You've seen our legislative programme and our legislative programme is going to considerably improve—as every Government should seek to do—on the work that has been done. This piece of work is simply something that when we've looked at it we've said Yes this is something that we'll carry on that piece of work. We'll put a lot more meat on the bones"—in fact there weren't any bones when we got it—"and we'll now put this before the House."There'll be many members of the public out there—as my colleague the Hon Peeni Henare talked about—watching with one eye out the window on Cyclone Gita and seeing what effect that's going to have who'll also be watching this in the House. Some of them may be a little alarmed that they think the very tool that they're about to use when they get the call from the emergency services their Subaru may be in some way in danger. I can assure them that it is not the Subaru we're talking about; it's SuPERU which is actually an acronym—a quite badly put together acronym—the social policy evaluation and research unit which is actually now being wound up.Also I'd imagine that a lot of the people watching and listening to this—so often when they watch politics they see what comes out of this House. We are seen to be always building putting in some more investing some more money in various other agencies. They'll be pleased to know that actually we do move on that we actually do disestablish agencies as well which is part of that whole evolution part of making sure that legislation social—that whatever we are doing we are actually making sure it is a moving target and that we're constantly seeking to improve. So no one should be in any way perturbed that SuPERU is going to be going.But I suppose we should really talk about some of the things that it did do breaking down what did these guys—if they were that important why can we all of a sudden do without them? But let me just talk about some of the things they did do which you will understand were incredibly important and will all continue.One of those pieces of work they did was the Centre for Longitudinal Research. People watching may be aware of the longitudinal study which has been referred to before. This is a different piece of work. This was put together by the Labour Government in 2007-08. For those that are interested when the previous Government came in they took it on put some meat on the bones of that and did recruit the people but all the work was done the conception work was done and it was simply a matter of putting as I say a bit of meat on the bones of that research project which is now in its ninth year.Just how that works—the parents were interviewed before birth at nine months at two years and at 4½ years in its initial periods. They were also spoken to by telephone during that period as well just to ensure that those parents who were all seeking the health and well-being of those children—the family/whānau life the education the psychological development the neighbourhood and environmental issues and the culture and identity. These were all the things that this questionnaire in this survey that those who were taking part had put to them. It's been a mine of information for planners and policy makers. That sounds like a piece of work that should continue. It will continue and that has been transferred to the Ministry of Social Development.Another piece of work that this agency did was around gangs. Again we won't go into the depth of how little work was actually done on gangs by the previous administration—that was something that we're now paying the price of. One of the real issues around gangs is improving the outcomes for children of gang-involved parents—again trying to break that cycle. The children of gangs for instance—and it's common sense but it's nice to actually have this identified—of course are at greater risk of abuse neglect and witnessing violence. We can only surmise—we don't need to surmise; we know the effect of that. A quarter of families of gang members or gang families are known to Youth Justice. They're already in the system. They're more likely to join a gang. They're more likely to be fatalistic about life in the gangs. They're going to end up there and are more likely to have every other family risk factor that is going to result in poorer life outcomes. Again this is the work that was done by this agency. Fortunately that work will continue and it will continue for the greater good of us all. That is an issue we really do need to get to grips with in this country and this Government is going to be doing that.What are some of the responses and what do you do about it? That's obviously identifying the problems. Helping young people at risk to reach the potential outside gangs providing alternative lifestyles sport—you'd be surprised how many of the well-known names in sport in league in rugby in netball—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): I apologise to the member. Could I just encourage you to come back to the bill please?GREG O'CONNOR: Oh well yes. Excuse me Madam Assistant Speaker. I can come back to—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): I have given you quite a bit of leeway.GREG O'CONNOR: Certainly Madam Assistant Speaker. Another aspect of the bill I will come back to is the decommissioning. We don't just wipe an agency. They don't go away. Some of the previous speakers have spoken too about the very good work that has been done by the previous people working but it's important that we do identify where for example these organisations have assets. Where do they go? They don't go to the local auction shop. Progress on various management tasks are required upon the legal disestablishment and these include preparing physical and electronic records for archiving and the identification of residual assets and liabilities. These are again aspects that are addressed in the bill quite specifically so it's very important that we don't just shut down an agency shut down a building but that we know where the work is going to go but also it's very important that we know where the physical assets are going to go and the records.One of the previous speakers—we should take time to actually think of those that have actually worked for this agency for SuPERU. You grow. Whatever we've done before we came to this place—we're all part of an agency we're all part of a life. You have ownership. You've seen this thing grow and now that organisation is—hopefully all those people have found work in other agencies. They'll take their work elsewhere but it'll never be quite the same around the ownership they've had of this—as it turned out—relatively temporary agency that had done its work.To sum up the work to sum up this bill this is now going to be—the Act that we are set up to disestablish—the Families Commission Repeal Bill which is actually the bill which essentially is now going to disestablish SuPERU. This bill now which is before the House is going to ensure that while we make a good transition it also ensures that that work will carry on. The best thing about that of course is that as each new agency takes on that new work there'll be a large element that will ensure that they are looking at the good part of that work. It's going to be re-evaluated and I'm sure that it will be a better product. Each of those different aspects that the bill addresses whether it be the Family Violence Clearinghouse or the Families and Whānau Status Report in their new home I'm confident will be a better product as a result of this work. So I commend this bill to the House.Bill read a first time."