Dean Jacqui: Home and Community Support (Payment for Travel Between Clients) Settlement Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeDean Jacqui: Home and Community Support (Payment for Travel Between Clients) Settlement Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 11 February 2016. Volume:711;Page:8959. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki): I want to acknowledge first of all the officials who are in the House and who worked so very hard and diligently on this bill. It was a negotiation and we do appreciate all of us—and it has been expressed but I want to also express my appreciation for the work that the officials did on this bill to get a good outcome. So thank you to the officials in the House and also to those in support of getting this Home and Community Support (Payment for Travel Between Clients) Settlement Bill to this stage.I also want to acknowledge that there have been some pretty good speeches in this House this afternoon. We are all in agreement with this bill so essentially we can all end up saying very much the same thing. But a couple of speeches have stood out for me today. One of them was a comment from Barbara Stewart who said that it was important that there is a sustainable home support service. That member is absolutely correct. In saying that it means that we do not care about the clients and recipients of that service but actually we should and do care for the providers of that service the home-care workers themselves.I also want to acknowledge Kevin Hague who acknowledged Maureen Pugh and welcomed her to the House and I do so as well. Go the West Coast! Kevin Hague also acknowledged that the provision of good-quality home support and community-based care is integral to the well-being of disabled folk and older folk in our rural and smaller provincial communities. Throughout the consideration of this bill I always had in my mind Palmerston and Ranfurly because the homes there are very widely dispersed. They are rural communities in the South Island and much the same as you get all around New Zealand but in fact those home-care workers do spend a lot of time travelling from client to client. It was good to hear Kevin Hague acknowledging that need.I also want to make a very brief comment about the clients themselves. I know somebody who is in receipt of home-care services. That person will damn well make sure their diary fits in with the home-care worker. If I say to that person “Right let’s go and do such and such today.” if it does not suit the person will say: “No no. I need to be at home at 10 o’clock because such and such is coming around.” I go: “OK. We’ll reschedule.” The reason why the person will do everything to be at home for the home-care worker is that they have a bond. They enjoy each other’s company. The home-care worker comes in and does a marvellous job of supporting that person and they are now friends. I think we should never underestimate the benefit of that to the recipients of home-care support but also the value of those people who go into this work and who willingly cheerfully diligently and lovingly provide that support to people so that they can live in their homes in comfort.In my short contribution I say thank you to all those who have worked so well on this bill. I commend the bill to the House.