Genter Julie Anne: Social Security (Fraud Measures and Debt Recovery) Amendment Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeGenter Julie Anne: Social Security (Fraud Measures and Debt Recovery) Amendment Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 18 March 2014. Volume:697;Page:16789. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green):I rise to speak on the Social Security (Fraud Measures and Debt Recovery) Amendment Bill. I have to start by reiterating what my colleague Jan Logie said earlier this evening. The Green Party is working for a social security system that provides everyone with enough income to fully participate in their community and to live safe healthy lives because ultimately giving people that freedom and security is going to help us have a more prosperous and sustainable society and country in the long run. We support policies that are sufficient to ensure this simple to understand and access and universal in their application. It is incredibly important that they are equitable within the wider social context and we need to be mindful of that. We are not starting from an even level playing field. A lot of people are disadvantaged to begin with and policy needs to take that into account and find ways to build them up and give them opportunities.This bill unfortunately is going to further stigmatise the most marginalised people in this country and in some cases further entrench poverty and really for very very little gain. If I was to ask people at home what they thought the Government should be spending the most time and effort trying to track down in terms of revenue they would probably think that it would make more sense to put the focus and effort into getting the $1 billion to $6 billion that is estimated to be owed because of tax avoidance—so that $1 billion to $6 billion is money we are not getting because of tax avoidance—or perhaps the $2.6 billion that is still owing in child support. There are 800 fathers in the country who are earning more than $100000 a year and there is $2.6 billion owing in child support. There was $591 million that was tracked down in unpaid fines over 3 years. So we have got these huge sums of money that people are not paying because they are cheating the system and they are cheating their fellow New Zealanders of their contribution.In many cases the people who are avoiding taxes and the people avoiding child support are actually people who are pretty well-off and have means to pay and to give their fair share to the rest of New Zealand and yet this Government is putting all this effort into chasing down a tiny amount of money owing in benefit fraud which is literally less than 5 percent of the money that is not paid due to tax avoidance. We are not condoning benefit fraud but let us put it in perspective. Let us put it in perspective and be rational about where we put our efforts because it is not fair that high-income earners are not paying their fair share and instead we are going to go and target and put all this effort into the small number of people who are committing benefit fraud.What is incredibly concerning is that during the select committee—I was not on the Social Services Committee for this but I have got the report here from my colleague Jan Logie—from what she was told the fraud investigation system is still quite imperfect and quite fraught. Officials said that the evidence they are using is often unsubstantiated. And we are hearing from women in violent relationships that they often feel persecuted through the system as it is at the moment. Previous speakers this evening on the Government side have stressed that victims will be protected but in fact we have very good reason to believe that that is not the case. This bill is not going to protect victims of domestic violence who are not in a position to report on benefit fraud because of their partners. The Green Party believes that the Government needs to develop a policy or legislative response to these problems based on the experience of women and beneficiaries who have been affected that also involves the Women’s Refuge. That is how we are going to get an approach that is fair and that ensures the safety of all involved.We are particularly concerned and we share the concern of the New Zealand Law Society about joint liability which means that both partners will be liable for the whole debt should both parties be accountable for the debt arising from the fraud. The New Zealand Law Society told us that it believes that this could lead to unfair or disproportionate outcomes. In its view liability should be shared on the basis of attribution of benefits as per the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act 2009. This has been dismissed in part due to cost and a potential increase in reviews and appeals but the Green Party believes that it is essential that our laws are fair and proportionate and open to appeal.