Reti ShaneDr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei): It's truly a privilege to take a short call on this bill an excellent bill from my colleague Dr Parmjeet Parmar who I congratulate for getting through to this point. The goal of this bill has been well enunciated—to increase newborn enrolment with general practitioners before the age of six months—and when you just stand back a bit and look at it for a moment you've got to say Why is the Government voting this down?" Just take it on its statement for what it is: why is the Government voting this down? Why is this not a good thing? The benefits have been clear. Again they were well described and they were well described through select committee as well: early access to social services housing vaccination rates and early collaboration with other professionals. Again why is the Government voting this down? Why is this not a good thing?Now at first reading David Clark called the bill toothless because—and the quote's important here—"there are no penalties for patients who do not do their part in this process on time." There are no penalties for patients who do not do their part in this process on time—that's an extraordinary statement. The Minister wants punitive actions for patients who don't do as they are told. Surely this is a harbinger for other primary care initiatives this Government is looking to deploy and remember this mantra when they do. This will be the hook: there are no penalties for patients who do not do their part in this process on time. I think the imposition of penalties is especially ironic when the Government's removing sanctions from other social service areas and yet the health Minister is on record saying there should be penalties for patients who do not do their part in this process on time.Darroch Ball: Oh rubbish! Don't put words in his mouth. He didn't say that.Dr SHANE RETI: Read it from the first reading. It's on record. That's what he's saying.Darroch Ball: That's not what he said.Dr SHANE RETI: It's exactly what he said.Darroch Ball: No no he did not.Dr SHANE RETI: Yes it is. I can show it to you here now. I'm not going to argue. Go and read it if you can read.The next point is we've just heard from my colleagues and others espousing "Everything's OK. All is well. We've set health targets: 55 percent enrolment at six weeks 85 percent at three months." and we're told that the ministry will be accountable for that through the district health board (DHB) accountability frameworks and primary health organisations services agreements. Well several points: am I just hearing "health targets"? Could that possibly be a health target: 55 percent at six weeks and 85 percent at three months? That sounds like a health target to me. But hang on we're abolishing health targets. Could this be why we need it to be legislative? If we actually believe in health targets and we don't want this Government to waive them away like they're doing in other areas could this be why it needs to be legislative? We've also been told that the actions can also be done for newborn enrolment—and I'll read here clause 39 of the departmental report: "Newborn enrolment is chosen by some DHBs as a contributory measure to support system level measure outcomes (SLMs)." Now hang on a minute hasn't there been a recent report saying no one understands SLMs and they don't work? But that's your answer to the bill? Using something that no one understands and that doesn't work just does not make sense.I think a consistent theme was the burden on general practice and I get that. I guess of everyone in the House I should get that and I do get it. I can see parts of that. But there was a provision in this bill to cover that. That provision was clause 6(3) which said "If the nominated general practice is unable to assist the family in finding another primary health care provider it must refer the pre-enrolment request to the relevant DHB and primary health organisation." There's a solution. She'd already come up with a solution to what had been touted by a number of submissions as almost a fall-over issue. Parmjeet Parmar had thought through the answer and it was in her bill.Look in conclusion the Government's position is "Do nothing; it's working fine." Well I would suggest no it's not working fine and this Government has truly sucked all the imagination out of the room and is actually offering nothing. I'm very sad for newborns and I think this bill should proceed."