Sepuloni CarmelHon CARMEL SEPULONI (Minister for Social Development): Continuing on from my last five-minute speech can I just say that it is for us about changing the narrative about who's in the welfare system as well. Over one million people access the support of the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) every year and as I said only about 290000 of them are main beneficiaries and we believe on this side of the House that they should be supported to access opportunities that are meaningful to them. But also not only them but every superannuitant in this country every person with a disability that needs to access the support of MSD should be able to do so feeling comfortable that they will be treated with respect and their dignity will be upheld. I don't think that's too much to ask actually. Common sense tells me that if you treat people well and you actually support them to take up opportunities then you're more likely to have success than what you are when you put the boot in while they're down which was the previous Government's philosophy. I'm really proud of the fact that as a Government we've been able to have a public discussion about welfare and about the changes that need to occur in a way that does not polarise New Zealanders and in fact in a way where most New Zealanders are sitting back and saying Actually what you're proposing makes sense and actually this is the right thing to do." I think that's the first time in my memory that I can remember that happening and I think we're in a really good space with regards to making sure that we help people get ahead. There is a lot in the Welfare Expert Advisory Group's report that will inform what we do moving forward and it needs to be well-thought-through. We need to canvass all of those things but I'm really proud of the report that we have been presented with and the fact that we have a Government that is absolutely in solidarity on the changes that need to occur. We've been criticised from the other side of the House for things that we're doing in the employment space. Can I acknowledge not just MSD but also our employment Minister and everyone else that has a role in this—the Minister of Education the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety and others who are actually actively working to make sure that we are proactive on the work front and we are being proactive. Actually the stats show us that. Our unemployment rates that we were presented with recently showed that we've got a 4.2 percent unemployment rate. That is better than what was achieved under the previous Government.They talk about job seeker numbers but when we look at the number of working-age New Zealanders who are unemployed then actually we see that the stats—I think most recently—were at 9.3 percent of working-age New Zealanders on benefit. Now that's actually better than what the previous Government achieved as well. So perhaps there's something in our approach—perhaps something in our approach—with regards to how we treat people how we make them feel welcome when they come into the office. And we've already announced in this year that we plan moving forward to have a much stronger work focus in our Work and Income offices which under the previous Government diminished because they did not put the investment in the places that they needed to. So please to the general public I hope that they are feeling very optimistic about what this Government has to provide and not only as a Minister for Social Development but as the Minister for Disability Issues who's very cognisant of the fact that 53 percent of those on main benefits are actually people who have an illness or a disability or are caring for a person who has an illness or disability—that we're cognisant of the evidence behind why we're making decisions as opposed to being led by some ideological view that you need to put the boot into people that find themselves in a difficult situation. We're very optimistic about the future for New Zealand and I get the sense from those that I come across that they are very hopeful that with a Labour - New Zealand First coalition with the Greens in support as our confidence and supply agreement partners we will actually be looking out for the best interests of those that have to access the welfare system and for New Zealand overall. We've got a lot of work to do and I'm not going to deny that but the wonderful thing is that lots of the work was already under way before the Welfare Expert Advisory Group came along. They've challenged us and we are taking up that challenge."