Prasad Rajen: Child Support Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Prasad Rajen: Child Support Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 27 February 2013. Volume:687;Page:8311. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD (Labour) 
: 
 Just a reflection first: there have been so many interjections from members opposite and most of them have been quite inane. I wish they had simply taken the time throughout the second reading of this bill the Child Support Amendment Bill to actually debate the issues. It would be much easier to have more respect for that point of view than when they simply chip away with inane comments and do not debate the issues. Throughout all of this many many questions have been posed to members opposite. Even the members of the Social Services Committee from that side of the Chamber have hardly taken any calls yet you would think that they would. 
In keeping with the theme from this side of the Chamber I note that this bill is another missed opportunity. The title of the bill is quite important. I started my second reading speech on this bill yesterday by asking whether this bill was for child support or not. Yesterday and today time after time speaker after speaker has said it is not about child support. It is not about what is in the title. The title is quite inappropriate. We can ask a number of questions as to what a title including the words “child support” would actually signal. Are children placed at the centre of this? Any child support system or method would do that. Does it? No. Children are hardly mentioned except as relating to some pathway to finances or money. 
Melissa Lee 
: It’s child support. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: Yes Melissa Lee it is child support and I do not know what that member understands by child support. What they have been arguing is that this is not about child support. Children are not being put at the centre and the member might have taken a call or two to actually defend it. 
Melissa Lee 
: It’s intrinsic in the bill. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: Well it is not because the basic principles of supporting children are just not there. The interests of children are not paramount. If Melissa Lee had been listening to all the submissions she would have argued that the title should be changed. Most of the credible witnesses that came to the select committee actually talked about children being at the centre etc. 
Melissa Lee 
: Who are the credible witnesses? 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: The Children’s Commissioner the Families Commission the Human Rights Commission and many others. They came to ask why children were not being placed at the centre. They argued that the pass-on system would be a much better system to actually support children. That one change that one provision in this bill would have convinced me that this was a child support bill but no it did not happen—nowhere near it. 
Tim Macindoe 
: This is a horrible valedictory Raj. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: I did not hear that sorry. 
Tim Macindoe 
: I said this is a horrible valedictory. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: Mr Macindoe! I am surprised that that member would make that kind of statement. I suspect that the member is trying to be funny and if he is it was a failure. If he is trying to predict my future then I do not know where the member is coming from. I hope that member’s own family is listening because they would expect better of you Mr Macindoe. And if you take a call after this maybe the member might be able to respond to what I am saying because the member has not responded—and parents’ privacy would have been protected. 
So I agree with what this side of the Committee has been saying that this bill is a missed opportunity. It is the “Missed Opportunity for Vulnerable Children Bill”. So the title is absolutely wrong. The title should be changed to reflect both the arguments that can be made against the provisions that the Government has come up with in this particular bill and indeed how it has lacked any defence of the lines it has taken. 
The other side of this is that the system for supporting children has still not been developed and we have been saying that you know it is amazing that here we are pushing out the dates for the implementation of this particular bill because the systems that support it have not been put in place and in this clause of the bill those provisions also are being argued for. So those are the comments I want to make. I hope that Mr Macindoe will take a call or make a personal explanation of whatever kind tonight to kind of put the record right to see what he was talking about because I think that would be not just the charitable thing to do but the gentlemanly thing to do. Thank you.