SpeechJAN LOGIE (Green): Thank you Madam Speaker. It's with pleasure that I rise again today to speak in support of a member's bill this time the Employment Relations (Protection for Kiwisaver Members) Amendment Bill in the name of Dr Tracey McLellan. Basically this bill aims to ensure that workers cannot be discriminated against for being part of the KiwiSaver scheme or superannuation fund. Currently employers are not legally obliged to offer workers enrolled in KiwiSaver the same terms of employment salary or wages conditions of work fringe benefits or opportunities for training promotion and transfer as a worker not enrolled in the scheme. So the bill aims to restore these protections which were retracted by the National Government I think under urgency not long after coming into Government in 2008 without any warning to the public. So public beware leopards tend not to change their spots. It also makes clear that an employee's wages cannot include the employer's compulsory contributions to KiwiSaver. These changes we believe should provide greater incentive to join KiwiSaver or a similar superannuation scheme and just maintain the intention of the scheme. So we're fully in support of that. It just seems a small but useful tweak to the scheme. There's a sense we've heard from a member from the ACT Party that all employers are always great never take advantage of any loopholes or exploit their workers—always always good and shame on anyone who would suggest otherwise; seeming to miss the I thought generally acknowledged imbalance of power between workers and the bosses. I don't know. It's a different world perhaps that that person is living in. I don't think I've ever heard anybody here say that all employers are bad employers—I just don't think that's been said by anybody. But there is an imbalance of power and there certainly are breaches that we have evidence of that are widespread in terms of across our workplaces.In fact in this area I saw the review of the KiwiSaver scheme evaluation final summary—I can't remember the date—that noted that 18 percent of employers reported changing their remuneration practices as a result of KiwiSaver. Those who did applied a salary sacrifice. It's important to note that KiwiSaver can have complicated effects on wage rates which may not have been captured in this research. So I think that's a bit of an indication that this practice may not just be the very rare occasion that's been suggested or never happens as we may have heard.I do want to speak briefly in the remaining time about some of the points raised around security and old age which is one of the parts of the points of KiwiSaver and our national superannuation scheme: the point that national superannuation was designed at a time where there was an assumption of homeownership and that is no longer the reality for an increasing number of New Zealanders. And we do need to come to terms with that as a country. The people who are least likely to be able to own their homes are also the least likely to be able to build up significant amounts within their KiwiSaver. It is an inherent inequity within the KiwiSaver scheme when we are not addressing that in terms of wider workforce policies or adjustments to compensate for those inequities. And the evaluations of KiwiSaver are actually pretty on the line about the benefits of it while it's widely bought into but so many people only manage to get a small amount of savings that doesn't significantly help them at the end of their life compared to those who are already privileged. So I do believe there is a broader conversation for us as a country to how we address that inequity and ensure a life without poverty in retirement for everyone in this country.