Upston Louise; Rurawhe AdrianHon LOUISE UPSTON (National—Taupō): It's a pity that the speaker before me Andrew Little really kind of diminished the serious issue that we are speaking about today. I think it sort of brought the House to a level that was rather unfortunate in terms of politicising an issue that I'm sure each and every one of us in this House can share a story about of a family member or themselves or a friend.I do want to start by acknowledging Jan Logie in drafting a member's bill and bringing it to this House and given that the speaker before me didn't really acknowledge it I want to make clear for the House that National supports the intent of this legislation. It of course builds on the significant record that the National Government had both in terms of supporting victims of crime but more importantly around tackling the very real challenges of family violence and the substantial work and attention that were brought to this issue with the cross-ministerial group of which I was a member with 16 different portfolios involved.One of the challenges with a complex issue such as family violence is really unpicking it and making sure that the efforts of all of the agencies involved do have the maximum gain for the very people that the agencies are intending to support. One example that my colleague the Hon Judith Collins raised was the Integrated Safety Response—Chris Bishop: Which they cut—they've cut it.Hon LOUISE UPSTON: —and I do hope—yes. My colleague Chris Bishop refers to the fact that it's only funded for one more year and I do hope that members opposite realise the value of the Integrated Safety Response and listen to the very people that are working in the Integrated Safety Response team in Hamilton and in Christchurch. I'm sure Jan Logie has gone and visited them and met them and heard about the stories of the impact that that is having on the victims.One of the examples that was given on my own very recent visit to the Integrated Safety Response was the ability for such a greater impact on the victims on the perpetrators and actually on the family members and wider community that they are involved with. One of those groups is the employers. One of the things that I think that we've seen a significant shift in recent years on is the number of employers who have come out with family violence policies. Countdown is a fantastic example of how they support people that work in their environment and there are many many others.One of the points that I want to make is—it was made by my colleague the Hon Judith Collins—that when there is such a critical issue such as family violence and ensuring greater access to support that victims need where should that responsibility lie? I think if we were honest with one another we would say the responsibility lies in many different areas—within families within communities and within government and government organisations. It's important that that balance is struck in the right place. So yes in terms of public good in our time we funded a number of initiatives—the Integrated Safety Response that I talked about which included $46 million of operating funding that was very much around a new approach to the services but also front-line delivery.One of the other things that hasn't been raised today that I think has had a significant impact on the ability for victims of family violence to deal with the many and multiple challenges they have to face is the change to the Employment Relations Act that we passed around flexible work. It meant that anyone and everyone could request flexible work and it wasn't just restricted to caring responsibilities. The number of conversations that flexible work has really transformed the relationship between employers and employees—Andrew Little was a bit kind of contradictory in his contribution. On the one hand he was saying that the employers he knew whether they were the small dairy owners or larger employers had very trusted relationships in their workplaces and that was fantastic. Well if there were such trusted relationships in their workplaces why don't they trust the employers and the employees to navigate these and to use the existing legislative frameworks to be able to do that? So it was somewhat contradictory.On that note of flexibility I do hope that the Government and Jan Logie in particular is seriously examining any proposed changes to employment relations law to make sure that the unintended consequences don't affect women don't affect the victims that Jan Logie has intended in this legislation. I say: we support the intent of it but one of the key differences with our side of the House—and I know Mark Mitchell has worked hard to try and make improvements to this legislation with significantly thought-through Supplementary Order Papers (SOPs). It's about being practical it's about being sensible and it's about looking at how you deliver a solution on the ground. That's really the only reason that National's not supporting this bill.We support the intent absolutely. As I said I am concerned about potential other changes to employment relations law. I'm saddened that the SOP around a nationwide campaign so that employers understood what their choices and options were—so they understood how they could support victims of family violence. I recall an example where a workmate was a victim of family violence and every time their work phone rang they just went into a state of paralysis because the perpetrator of family violence would harass them at work. You'd just never know what time of day they would phone and I know the very real impact it had on this person and the challenge of the employer in terms of understanding how to provide support.So coming back to Andrew Little's comment it is about that trusted relationship. It is about the ability of an employer and an employee to navigate a very challenging issue together. So we do support the intent but unfortunately don't support the way that this bill has finally been drafted. I hope that the Government picks up our earlier work in legislation that's currently before the House and picks up our strong record of support in a number of different practical and sensible ways to support and reduce family violence.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): I call Angie Warren-Clark.Hon Ruth Dyson: Oh this will be better.