Mallard Trevor: Budget Measures (Financial Support for Newborn Children) Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMallard Trevor: Budget Measures (Financial Support for Newborn Children) Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 15 May 2014. Volume:698;Page:17999. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Labour—Hutt South): There are two issues that we are currently debating. The first is whether the Budget Measures (Financial Support for Newborn Children) Bill is appropriately titled. I think we are beginning to develop a consensus—in fact I think it has been unanimous amongst all the speakers in the Chamber on this particular phase of the bill—that this bill is not appropriately titled. I think it could have been titled “An Election Attempt to Steal a Wee Bit of LabourGreen and New Zealand First Policy Water it Down and Pretend it is Appropriate and to Mis-phase It - Type Bill” or there are a number of other points. I think that certainly the implication that the newborn children who most need support are getting anything at all from this bill is wrong.I want to refer to the question of timing and commencement. This bill is coming in across quite a wide range of time. There are parts of it that come in from April next year—not very much; about $3 million worth I think—there are parts of it that come in from July next year and there are parts of it that come in from July the year after. I think that there are bits that come in from April next year and April the year after depending on which particular part it is. The question I have got—and it is a technical question on which the Minister in the chair the Minister of Labour might need to get advice—is why it cannot all be brought into force tomorrow. Even if we are sticking with the dates that were previously agreed as to when the payments are to be made why is the bill being brought into force with some parts coming in as it is approved by Royal assent and others not coming in until dates that are much later? I just do not see the need for it.Within the bill there is very clear phasing and very clear very well-set-out transitional provisions. They are wrong because of course things should have been brought in much much more quickly and they should have been much better but even if one accepts as the Committee appears to be accepting the timing of the actual provisions the question I have got for the Minister is this. Why has an unusual format been used in the drafting in order to bring some of these provisions into force on the legislation getting its Royal assent and some do not come into force until a long time later?I just want to be a little bit cynical. Is there some ulterior motive here? Is there a motive in the provisions that bring these measures into force to reverse this out at some stage after 20 September? I am just feeling a certain lack of love and a certain lack of trust with the Minister. If the Minister had been upfront and defended Part 2 and even if he had defended Part 1 then I might have been slightly more inclined to go along with these provisions. Normally of course you do not argue with them but it is a genuine question. I have been around this place for a little while and normally when there is a delay in the bringing into force of provisions there is a reason for it. The fact that a bill does not come into effect until later—and that is clearly set out in the clauses of the bill—is not a reason for the bill to be broken into different parts for the commencement clause. There does not appear to be a good reason for it.We know that for example with the parental tax credit measures that are sitting in the bill the Inland Revenue Department has to be prepared to do some things in April next year and in April the year after. There is no reason why given what is in the bill it cannot actually do that. You do not need to phase in the bringing into force of provisions which on the face of them cannot be brought into force anyway—