Upston LouiseHon LOUISE UPSTON (National—Taupō): Thank you Madam Deputy Speaker. National of course did recognise the need to rewrite and update the Social Security Act after 80 years—a significantly complex piece of legislation. I also want to commend the Hon Anne Tolley as she was the Minister who did the very very heavy lifting to put this piece of legislation into a more workable order so that it was more user-friendly.It is unfortunate that I stand as the first speaker on the National side to say that we will not be able to support this legislation because of the farce of a process that this Government undertook with a 500-page Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) dumped on us literally hours before the second reading and then refused any ability for the public to be consulted. For the Minister for Social Development to say that she valued the input of 121 submitters in the select committee process is a farce when she turns around and does that to them. The second reading was on 2 May. Even if an SOP that significant had had two weeks there was plenty of time until now 19 September for our final reading.We hear all these platitudes about this Government being the most open and transparent. Yeah right! This side of the House did try very hard to improve the legislation with a number of SOPs that were tabled in the committee stage but with the Government's own Supplementary Order Paper 49 the Minister in the chair—having dumped it on the House at short notice—refused to even answer one question which is an absolute outrage for the process in this House.I want to just also say that it's a significant lost opportunity and I want to speak about the lost opportunity. Many of those minor amendments were all around enabling those front-line Work and Income officers to better serve the people who are in front of them. So that's just the ultimate contradiction when the Minister talks about wanting to have a Work and Income that is more caring and compassionate. Well Minister you've actually got to give them some tools. This is the opportunity that you had as the Minister to give them some tools and you completely avoided that opportunity. It is a lost opportunity and it is the most vulnerable New Zealanders that will pay the price of that.It's interesting that the Minister in charge of this legislation which is now split into three bills is also the Minister responsible for the Social Investment Agency. It's pretty dire that nearly a year into this Government's term—a third of the way—they still don't understand what social investment is. They still don't understand it. The principle that was put into this piece of legislation—which National when we were in office actually believed—was about the most vulnerable New Zealanders: the families and the individuals that have the most complex and challenging lives. We wanted to serve them better than the system was serving them today and the Government—the Labour-led Government—has removed that opportunity. It says that for those who are at risk of long-term welfare dependency the Ministry of Social Development may identify appropriate assistance support and services. Why wouldn't the Government want to do that? Why would the Government not want to provide the individuals and families in this country who are the most vulnerable with better support better services and better funding?It's very practical. It's about changing lives of New Zealanders that probably everyone in this House worries about—well at least this side of the House does—and it's about enabling and ensuring that people have the opportunity to lead better lives to be able to move past what are incredibly difficult circumstances to lead lives that look quite different. I just wanted to touch on some of the very practical changes that the Government's ripped out of this legislation and there was a lot of work that had gone into this piece of legislation before they turned up.One of them—it's just an absolute no-brainer. Unfortunately in some circumstances we will have families that are separated where both parents have a requirement to seek support or benefits as sole parents where both parents are looking after children from that family. The simple change with this split-care scenario was to allow both sole parents to apply for and get the sole parent support benefit—a bit of a no-brainer really. Oh no but the Labour-led Government have decided that that's not a practical solution. Instead you would deny the financial support of one of those parents and not allow them to get financial assistance through the sole parent benefit. How is that helping the most vulnerable families? How is that helping a family in need when you deny the opportunity of a parent who is a sole parent applying for the sole parent benefit? Absolutely ridiculous—it is an absolutely crazy crazy change particularly from a Government who bleats on about putting children at the centre of everything. Well this was a lost opportunity. The Government could have made it easier on those children but decided not to.Another practical example that again actually speaks to the heart of child-centred policy was the combining of the orphans benefit and the unsupported child's benefit—pretty much putting them into one benefit and giving it a new name. It was actually a name that was far more positive and meaningful. It would have made it the supported child's payment". But no that was too much. That was too much of a stretch for the Government to think of that particular change which introduced a new single rate of sole parent support and actually meant that those who are caregivers for orphans or for supported children would get the same entitlements and the same access that other sole parents do. So again it was a very very minor amendment and an opportunity to actually make it easier for the life of a parent—in this case a foster parent—who is looking after a child. But no that was too much as well.The third change—again a very unusual one that the Government would dump—is a change in the name of the emergency benefit to the "exceptional circumstances benefit" which actually reflects what it is: it is about exceptional circumstances. So part of that was clarification and the whole process for this legislation was about making the legislation easier making it more simple to use and making it more user-friendly for Work and Income staff and policy makers as well as of course for customers. But no the Government couldn't accept that change either.In terms of the process I referred to the fact that it's hardly been an open and transparent process when a significant SOP—500 pages—is dumped on us an hour before a second reading. The social security legislation covers $25 billion a year of taxpayers' money—$25 billion a year. So to the Minister in charge Carmel Sepuloni: two weeks—two weeks—you could have given and provided the opportunity for consultation. In this House the Minister in charge of this legislation could have answered questions on it and could have answered questions on SOP 49 which in her mind obviously didn't even warrant any answers which I think is a disgrace. When you're talking about the scale of funding that this particular legislation will govern—$25 billion—this Parliament and the people of New Zealand deserve openness and transparency. But that's a bit of a common thread of this Government—Labour-led coalition New Zealand First - led whatever we call it these days. What we do know is that it's definitely not open and transparent and unfortunately this is now legislation we can't support because this is a Government that actually didn't take the opportunity to support the very people we're all supposedly here to serve."