Kuriger Barbara; Andersen Ginny; Grigg NicolaBARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki - King Country): Thank you Mr Chair. I just want to take a short call on the bill and again commend the member for bringing this bill. I was actually the spokesperson for women in the last Parliament when we actually went through the process of the—I wasn't part of the committee and the submissions but when we were trying to put the finalisation of the bill together. There was just a couple of points and the member did clarify one before around surrogate parents but I just wanted to clarify and make sure that the public—you know it's been a while. The first reading version of the bill used the term spouse" but it excluded the possibility that the father was no longer the spouse. So just reconfirming that really rather than a question. The second thing is we did spend a bit of time clarifying that the parents who experienced the end of a pregnancy due to an abortion were not eligible for bereavement leave. So I just thought given that we're in a new Parliament the 53rd Parliament it's just worth clarifying those two things because there was a lot of work across parties actually spent getting those couple of things right.GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much to the member. Interestingly as well as COVID happening since this bill received its first reading in the House we've also passed legislation specific to abortion and removing that from the Crimes Act. So I think it's well raised by the member that we clarify that this bill excludes abortion. I as the member in charge of the bill was very keen for this not to become tied into the wider abortion debate which has subsequently taken place. The recommendation also that we received was that it would be clear that abortions are excluded from the bill and that it was specific to miscarriage and to stillbirth. We sought and I was very happy to receive support from all parties within this House on the basis that we would focus on the areas of the law that we could change in agreement and I'm pleased to be able to continue to do that.NICOLA GRIGG (National—Selwyn): Thank you Mr Chair. Just one more clarification from me if I may. Really pleased to note the select committee clarification that it should apply to both known and unknown pregnancies but I just wondered if the member could flesh out: is there any onus of proof on parents who have suffered this kind of loss?GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): No I do not think there is a requirement—I think we covered that at the beginning. So New Zealand is different in the sense—I think we're one of the first countries from the research I've undertaken to actually pass legislation to enable bereavement leave to be taken for miscarriage. Most other countries enable it for stillbirth which is 20 weeks-plus or in some countries more. So we're one of the very few countries in the world from what I can understand that would enable bereavement leave to be taken for miscarriage. That in itself raises some medical difficulties because quite often a woman can have a miscarriage without even knowing initially she was pregnant and it's only at the point of miscarriage that it's realised that there was a pregnancy. So the requirement in the bill is that there's no need to have proof of pregnancy such as a doctor's note or a pregnancy test or such thing. It'll be clear as a result of having a miscarriage that you were pregnant and that is what is required. But there is no requirement to have written proof to prove to your employer that you were pregnant."