Street Maryan: General Debate 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Street Maryan: General Debate 
[Sitting date: 17 October 2012. Volume:684;Page:5909. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour) 
: 
 This Government which came in with such ambition such aspiration and such promise is turning into a profound disappointment for the people of New Zealand. If there is anything that characterises the second term of this Government it is disappointment. We have children living in poverty. We have 270000 children living in poverty and we have a Government that has no interest in addressing the causes of the illnesses and diseases that come from poverty such as housing or wages or jobs but proceeds with targets that are now becoming meaningless in the health sector. Children living in poverty are at a 1.4 times higher risk of dying in childhood than children in higher-income households. Children living in poverty are more likely to die of sudden unexpected death in infancy than their peers. They are three times more likely to be sick. They are at least 1.5 times more likely to be hospitalised than their peers. They are likely to be hospitalised at 5.6 times higher a rate than those in wealthier areas for injuries from assault neglect or maltreatment. They are more likely to have poor outcomes in adulthood including higher risk of heart disease alcohol and drug addiction and worse oral health by the time they are 26. 
Between 2007 and 2010 the increase in children admitted to hospital with socioeconomically sensitive conditions—that is things that are transferable like infectious skin diseases and respiratory illnesses—was 4800 admissions per year. It increased by 4800 per year compared with the 3 years previously. And let us have a look at some of the Maori and Pacific Island statistics. Maori babies are five times more likely to die from sudden unexplained death in infancy than New Zealand Pakeha babies. Maori and Pasifika mothers are more likely to have stillbirths and neonatal deaths compared with New Zealand Pakeha. Pasifika children and young adults from birth to 24 are nearly 50 times more likely than Pakeha children to be admitted to hospital with acute rheumatic fever. These are not the statistics of a Government that has aspirations or ambition for its people. These are the statistics of a Government that is a disappointment. 
We have a “Minister of Illness” not a Minister of Health. We have New Zealanders who are disappointed across the board in the way this Government has been performing in the health sector despite the set piece song-and-dance routines that the Minister likes to give in the House. We have people from west Auckland to Porirua who are disappointed that funding for their Healthy Eating - Healthy Action programmes has been cut and that they are no longer able to provide those services unless they do it through volunteer labour for those who are most at risk of obesity diabetes and chronic illness. 
 This Government is a disappointment to 120000 type 2 diabetics in the process of changing blood glucose meters. Twenty thousand type 1 diabetics and particularly the parents of children with type 1 diabetes are disappointed in the way the Government has handled proposed and overseen the change to blood glucose meters. There are 507 recipients of the Johnson and Johnson DePuy hip replacement device who are disappointed that there will be no inquiry as Australia saw fit to have. There are 106 recipients of the Smith and Nephew hip replacement device who are disappointed that there will be no inquiry into that either. The Government resists inquiries and resists any examination of anything that might be going wrong in the health system and in the meantime one gets very disappointed people and health consumers in New Zealand. 
There are 790-plus pharmacists who are disappointed that they have been bullied into a contract that does not have any prices in it post 1 February next year. That is no way to run a very essential health service in our pharmacies. We have a very disappointed Pacific Island diabetes support worker out in Porirua whom Kris Faafoi knows who now has to retrain elderly Pacific Island people with diabetes in how to read their new blood glucose meters. The time that that is taking brought that woman to tears. We have 48 percent of nurses who were surveyed say that the pressure they are under at the moment caused them so much moral distress that they wanted to give up nursing. Those people are disappointed. 
The disappointing legacy of this Government’s efforts in health is not a brighter future but a blighted future for the children of the poor.