Ardern JacindaRt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Minister for Child Poverty Reduction): Thank you Madam Chair. I thank the Hon Louise Upston for her contribution but I actually want to respond directly to the Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) that's been put forward by the member David Seymour SOP 155 not least because of course he remains the member of the House yet to be convinced of the wisdom of this legislation so it might mean that I pay him a little more attention on this occasion.He made some comments around the targets that are embedded in this bill and he specifically talked about the relative measures. Look those have been accepted broadly by the international community. Of course the relative measures are used by UNICEF by the OECD. They don't give us a complete picture on their own and I accept that but I would be alarmed if the member is rejecting those measures altogether because they are well entrenched within the international community as being a good indication of the general well-being of a society based on those who are living with 50 percent of the median income.But I just want to acknowledge what the member has said about his Supplementary Order Paper. He said that we might get a better picture if we break down some of the circumstances of individual children into questions surveyed by the statistician around things like whether a child lacks pairs of shoes sets of warm clothes a waterproof coat access to meat fish or chicken a separate bed etc. etc. That is all incredibly important information to know which is why the member might be interested to know what the definition of material hardship is.Material hardship of course is measured by the number of individuals who identify with not having seven out of 17 particular forms of well-being in the form of food clothing their accommodation or their ability to pay bills. The list looks like this—you might recognise it because it's very similar to the member's list: enforced lack of essentials meal with meat fish or chicken at least every second day two pairs of shoes suitable clothing home and contents insurance whether you have borrowed money in the last 12 months whether or not you could pay an unexpected or unavoidable bill of $500 whether or not you put up with feeling cold to save on heating costs or whether you postpone visits to the doctor and visits to the dentist. I acknowledge most of these as far as I can tell are actually in your list Mr Seymour.Mr Seymour so that is the definition of material hardship" and you'll be very pleased to know that clause 12 in Part 2 of the bill includes material hardship as one of the things that the Government must measure and report on. So exactly what you've asked for is exactly here in this bill. We have not taken a singular view of what poverty issues are. We have included reference to material hardship. It is something that we are mindful of and we will be reporting on and we will be driving activity as a result of reporting on that. So I hope that the inclusion of the range of issues that you've highlighted and I think you're right to highlight—we haven't put the expanded list in the bill. So look there may be things where there are some minor differences. I think for instance you've said access to meat—"a meal with meat fish or chicken … each day:". Look the Minister of Health might have some questions to raise over whether that's good for bowel health. Apart from that there's some slight differences there but by and large many of the things that you've raised are included within those surveys that are undertaken around the 17 essential items and whether or not someone falls in the category of being in material hardship by being without a certain number of those. So I'm happy to discuss that further but I'm hoping we may have convinced the member to support the bill."