Barry Maggie: Student Loan Scheme Amendment Bill (No 3) — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBarry Maggie: Student Loan Scheme Amendment Bill (No 3) — Second Reading[Sitting date: 13 February 2014. Volume:696;Page:15956. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MAGGIE BARRY (National—North Shore): I rise to speak to the Student Loan Scheme Amendment Bill (No 3) at its second reading. Let me just say from the outset that this is about making sure that student loans which are amongst the most generous in the world are going to be sustainable into the future. This Government is absolutely focused on that. They need to be sustainable and that means that people need to see their obligations through and pay off their debts. It is absolutely not a gift; it is a loan.The Opposition members rabbit on. You know there is much more flannel than fact. They talk about people who want to come back for weddings. They talk about offering carrots not sticks. What we are talking about is people taking personal responsibility for their obligations. What this loan scheme is all about is actually trying to make sure that the overseas borrowers who are in fact the people who are at fault here really step up to the plate. It is time and there are mechanisms within this bill. It was a robust process through the Finance and Expenditure Committee. We have debated it already in this House and it now comes up as something that needs to be examined more closely.Let us look at what needs to happen. People from 2010 onwards have been encouraged by this Government to repay their loans—$90 million has been repaid. We have tried a variety of measures. We have tried to encourage. We have tried to give them every form of encouragement actually and now we are stepping it up. Let me say actually from pretty much the outset of my call that I would really like to congratulate the majority of borrowers—like Simon O’Connor like many other students like many of us on this side of the House and probably on the Opposition benches as well—who have actually repaid their student loans because that is exactly what we need to do. Icommend them for that. For those of you who have paid your loans back it is an issue of fairness. Why should others who default go overseas and do not bother to meet their obligations get away with it? They need to step up to the plate and that is something that we really need to encourage.Nobody wants to arrest people at borders but let us look at the facts. Basically this bill is consistent with the Child Support Act 1991. There is a precedent there. A warrant can be issued if the court is satisfied that a liable parent will leave New Zealand with intent to avoid their child support obligations. That is the same wording that we use in relation to student loans. It is about obligations. When we look at that precedent we are saying reluctantly that if there are persistent defaulters who live overseas and who are not paying then we must look very carefully at that. It would be a last resort but we need to use these kinds of measures because when we look at the numbers when we look at the facts there are over 100000 overseas-based borrowers. A very significant number of those—61000—are just not meeting their repayment obligations.This is simply not acceptable so this measure needs to be put into place. We need to ring their parents. You know we need to put some pressure on from thewhānau and the families. In fact some of the people who came to the select committee hearing talked about this and people we have talked to on a number of occasions around this have all said the same thing—that in fact when the mother or father or the relations ring up funnily enough the children do get a sense of shame and they get on with it and repay the loan.Hon Members: Shame!MAGGIE BARRY: Well shame they are not meeting their obligations. Not meeting their obligations and having a sense of entitlement are things that the brayers andnaysayers on the other side of the House are very very expert in particularly those who are trying to heckle at the moment. Labour members do not really care if the loans do not get repaid. There is a lot of political mileage being made out of this and it is all stuff and nonsense.We are taking measures that may not be popular with your friend who wants to come back for a wedding Mr Robertson but that is just too bad. That individual should actually step up to the plate and make a point of trying to pay back their loan. If people are getting into difficulty with paying it back then they should get in touch with the Inland Revenue Department they should say that their circumstances have changed and they should try to make an arrangement because it is not fair on all those people who have paid off their student loans over the years that these people continue to get away with it.I support the Student Loan Scheme Amendment Bill (No 3) unreservedly and commend it to the House. Thank you.