Tinetti JanHon JAN TINETTI (Minister for Women): I'm not sure the other side are very aware of what their situation is over the borders. One moment they want them closed; one moment they want them open. They sound very confused. It must be very confusing for the public of this country to hear their arguments over there and also their lack of complete awareness around the pressures that are being put on managed isolation and quarantine. Maybe they need to do some better research or find some better research than what they currently have. In a week that started with a wonderful International Women's Day celebration I'm absolutely delighted to be able to stand here and contribute to this general debate as part of a Government that has put us in a strong position in our COVID-19 economic recovery and rebuild. We have always said as a Government that the strongest economic rebuild will come from a strong public health response and we are so seeing that in what is happening now. We moved very quickly. We moved quickly just over a year ago to put in supports for over 1.8 million workers in this country with the wage subsidy and we also invested billions in the economy through infrastructure training and creating jobs. Thanks to our team of 5 million we have been put into a good place and we are in a better place than most other countries in this world. But as Minister for Women I want to also focus and make sure that women are part of that recovery and have a strong focus in that recovery. Our New Zealand women have been absolutely amazing throughout our response to the pandemic. We have seen women who have led the charge: women scientists healthcare workers people at the front lines in essential working positions innovators and community organisers—the majority of whom have actually been women who have stood up and faced this pandemic head-on. We also know that for those women many of them have had a disproportionate burden that has been put on them by taking on a disproportionate load with childcare and home responsibilities domestic chore responsibilities. For all of those women in this country I say a huge thank you for everything that they have done. Quite a lot their work has gone unnoticed or their work has been undervalued in the past and I think it's about time that we stand up and say thank you and we value everything that they have done for this country.We know that women who already face barriers are more severely impacted by this pandemic but these trends are not new. They have been well recognised in the past. We know that in past labour market shocks—such as the global financial crisis or the Christchurch earthquakes—women have been disproportionately impacted. This Government is not shying away from that. We want to focus on putting women back at the centre and we are delivering for women.We have passed through the last term of Government equal pay legislation that delivers record pay settlements for female-dominated workforces to ensure that women are being paid fairly. We have extended paid parental leave from 18 to 20 weeks. Recently I was excited and proud to acknowledge and announce free period products into schools. This Government has proved that the gender pay gap can be narrowed and in fact get to the point where we can completely close it. We have through the Gender Pay Gap Action Plan delivered the biggest drop in public service gender pay gap in 17 years and now it's at its lowest ever recorded of 9.6 percent. But we realise and know that there is more to do. In that I want to acknowledge my predecessor the Hon Julie Anne Genter for the work that she did to achieve that. We know that there is far more work to do in this space but we are making sure that we are putting women front and centre. Our strong health response and economic response has put us in the position to do just that. Making sure women are more economically resilient will be an important factor in this commitment to building back better.