Parmar Parmjeet; Tolley AnneDr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): Thank you Madam Deputy Speaker. I'm taking this call to support the Social Security Legislation Rewrite Bill in its second reading in its current form. So I want to make it very clear from the start that this side of the House will be supporting this bill in its second reading only in its current form.It was the previous Government—that is the National Government—that undertook this huge task of rewriting the Social Security Act 1964. This Act was passed 55 to 56 years ago. Yes it started with around 130 sections but now we have more than three times that number of sections in this legislation. So not only have we added more sections but we have amended almost every section of this Act and obviously what happened with that is there was a lot of patchwork. It turned out that it was causing some confusion and a rewrite was needed. Given it's huge legislation and very important legislation for our social welfare assistance when we were in Government we undertook this huge task of rewriting this legislation. So yes when we took this opportunity to rewrite this legislation we also wanted to reflect the modern-day approach towards social welfare assistance.I want to remind the member who has just resumed her seat Jan Logie that it was the National Government that increased benefits for the first time in 40-odd years for families with dependent children.Jan Logie: Ha ha!Dr PARMJEET PARMAR: Yes—that's not a laughing matter. It's a very serious matter because we care for children in families that are dependent on benefits.So what we are seeing is that this Government is changing their stance hugely from the stance that they had when they were in Opposition and that is reflected in the Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) that the Minister has come up with. So yes the bill went through the first reading it went to the Social Services Committee it went through the select committee scrutiny and then it has come before the House for the second reading and just this afternoon before it came before the House for the second reading what we see is that the Minister has come up with SOP 25 which is 500 pages long.With this SOP what I can see is that this Government and this Minister are letting down all the submitters because submitters—[Interruption]—yes the submitters took time—Hon Carmel Sepuloni: She must have been asleep during the submission process.Dr PARMJEET PARMAR: —and made a special effort. They took time—don't undermine the submitters' efforts honourable Minister Carmel Sepuloni. Don't undermine their contribution. So they turned up thinking that they were being heard. Some appeared before the select committee and I know that some of them actually travelled from far distances. The purpose of having a select committee process is giving the public of New Zealand an opportunity to be heard. Now it's come back for the second reading—Hon Member: They don't like the public Dr Parmar.Dr PARMJEET PARMAR: Yes they don't. Now it's come back for the second reading and what we see is this Government this Minister coming up with this SOP. Yes very rightly the Hon Louise Upston wanted to seek the leave of this House to send this back to the select committee but no the Government refused.So how is it fair? How is it fair for those submitters those who were thinking that they were heard—actually they were not heard because of the stance that this Government is taking with this SOP before the House. They think that they stand for children that their policies are going to be children-focused but no. We have several examples.I just want to give a couple of examples one which is outside of this bill and that is my member's bill which is to see that all newborns are enrolled with general practitioners before they are six weeks old but this Government will not support that legislation because it needs more resources. In this SOP what we see is that the Government—just giving an example. If there's a family for some reason they split—for example if they have four children and one parent decides to look after three dependent children and the other parents decides to look after one dependent child then in that situation this Government thinks that both parents getting a sole parent benefit is not fair.So what I see is that there's a huge change in their stance since they have come in Government from the stance they had when they were in Opposition. So yes with this SOP and the stance that this Government is taking actually they are really letting down all the submitters. So we will support this bill only in its current form. Thank you.DEPUTY SPEAKER: The next call is a split call.