Collins Judith: Social Security (Social Assistance) Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
Collins Judith: Social Security (Social Assistance) Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:624;Page:19725] 
JUDITH COLLINS (National—Clevedon) 
: 
 I would like first to thank the Minister the Hon Steve Maharey for mentioning the fact that many members of the House have put a tremendous amount of effort work and cooperation into getting the bill through. There were a few snide comments in the Minister’s speech but that is of course what we expect from Mr Maharey. 
I have long been a critic of some of the piecemeal attempts to deal with the issue of what we will call for today’s debate “childless fathers”. I make no apology for the fact that the National Party is supporting this bill even though it is seriously flawed to various extents. We support it for a couple of reasons; first because we agree with the retirement villages provision to bring the situation for often the elderly living in retirement villages into line with modern-day practice. And yes we support the provision of particular rules to make it fairer for seasonal workers to be able to do more seasonal work without losing benefits—or in other words being discouraged from working. We agree with that. 
We agree that very significant steps should be made to ensure that every child in this country has a father. We think that the steps brought forward by the Minister which were agreed to by a majority of the select committee and no doubt will be agreed to by a majority of the House in relation to section 70A of the Social Security Act which is the measly $6 a week to be taken off someone’s benefit when she refuses to name the fathers of her children—and I use the plural because that is what we are often dealing with—is in fact a disgrace. It is a disgrace for various reasons. 
I make no apology for being in favour of the domestic purposes benefit. I make no apology to those fathers—those men who call themselves fathers—who write to me and email me and frankly abuse me because I stand up for the rights of responsible parents. I say that every child starts off with two parents and wherever possible those two parents need to be responsible for their children until those children are of adult age. Even then as many parents and many of us in this House would say one never ever is not responsible for one’s children no matter how old one is—probably until the day that they become responsible for us in our old age. 
In fact to me it is a very personal situation. The reason I feel so strongly about this is that in my family I had a grandfather who left my grandmother with seven children and no money—not one bit. He went off overseas. There was no domestic purposes benefit there was nothing. I would not stand in this Parliament or be part of any Parliament that would say we would do that to our people. That is why I support the bill. 
I have stood in this House and given speeches about this and I have been abused by various people in the House and told that I am cynical. I find that a disgraceful statement. I feel very strongly about this. When I hear of fathers who say: “I can’t get access to my child so I am not going to pay.”—so what? Access is a child’s right. I say to Mr Maharey that yes I know there are dreadful fathers. As he said there are some fathers who are not fit to be fathers and have no right to be. Those were his words. Yes but every child has the right to know his or her father. When we take away that right we take that right not from the father we take it from the child. 
I find that attitude of: “Oh you’re just going to impose financial penalties. That’s being cruel and heartless.” utterly ignores the fact that these children are in almost all cases the children of our poor. Unfortunately the attitude we are getting in this society is of fathers who are there for the fun times but not for the bad times and the tough times. They are running off to Australia. So many mothers have contacted me and said: “We are trying to get the Inland Revenue to get these fathers to pay for their children.” What are they told? They are told that the Inland Revenue Department cannot help them or they are told that the Inland Revenue Department will not tell them what it will do. 
I want to read to the House a statement from a woman whom I will rename “Mary” because I want to protect her privacy unless she says otherwise. Mary has been trying for years to get child support from her ex-husband who lives in Australia. Mary now has cancer. It is of grave of concern to her—which I think is putting it pretty mildly—that her partner is now having to support her children and she cannot work. 
Despite Mary supplying the Inland Revenue Department with addresses contact numbers and the times and dates of her husband’s arrivals and departures in and out of New Zealand neither the Inland Revenue Department here or in Australia has been able to make her ex-husband pay any child support to her. He has the money to travel around the world but he will not give any to his kids. 
Mary of course is not on the domestic purposes benefit so the only way in which she can get any help with her children is through either her family or the father of her children. She has supplied the authorities with her ex-husband’s website address which apparently shows that he contracts to Australian Government departments. But the authorities either cannot or do not have the will to follow up on him. A copy of that information was given to the Child Support unit and to the Inland Revenue Department earlier this year but nothing so far has happened. And that is what happens! 
We have heard at various stages that attempts are being made to bring those men into line. They are almost always men; we know that some women are involved but mostly they are men. We know that attempts happen but the attempts are too small. We know that in 2000 a reciprocal agreement was signed between Australia and New Zealand and we all support that. But that agreement has to be enforced. The people who are responsible parents must be supported—not by doling out money to them but by actually helping them to provide for their children and by saying to those children that even if their fathers do not have the gumption and the courage to be their fathers we think they should have. At least those children should know who their fathers are. 
If a child has a father who is a murderer that child should know who that father is. If children do not know their fathers they do not know themselves and that is a tragedy not just for those children but for the grandchildren and for generations to come. Recently I was in the office of my colleague Nick Smith in Nelson. He had there a list of all the people who had come to Nelson on ships in 1842. I was able to go through that list quickly and say to him that my ancestors’ names were there. They had come to New Zealand in 1842. I was able to do that for one reason: I know my forebears; I know where they come from; I know who I am. I am not sitting around looking at someone and saying: “Well maybe that’s my father.” I am not looking around and saying: “Maybe that’s my brother.”—because I know my family. Why is it that in this society we tolerate the fact that those people do that to their children? If that is not child abuse I do not know what is. It certainly is! It is a disgrace and we need to bring it to an end.