Sepuloni CarmelCARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): We have given this bill much consideration and as most people in the House would know when it comes to members' bills we are actually quite fair-minded and usually are quite open to the idea of a bill going to select committee so that some consideration can be given to it. But actually after going over this and having some discussions with colleagues like Kelvin Davis and other colleagues we have decided that this bill is a waste of time and does not deserve the attention of the Social Services Committee so we will not be supporting this to select committee. Firstly the reason that this does not deserve the time of the Social Services Committee is that actually we have got a lot of other major issues that need to be considered at that select committee. We have got 305000 kids living in poverty in this country. We have got a major housing problem on our hands. We have got a complete overhaul of Child Youth and Family that is going through the select committee at the moment and that member brings us a bill that will address a handful of people who may have issues. He is trying to use the stick on them when in fact the real implication of what that member is offering up is just further stigmatisation of beneficiaries—an absolute waste of the select committee's time—so we are not going to support this bill. If this issue was of significance to the Government then we would not be seeing it brought here by Mark Mitchell. We would have seen the Minister of Corrections or the Minister for Social Development taking it through as a Government bill not having it presented here through Mark Mitchell. I do wonder what the backbench members over there think. You know they are sitting there they have got time on their hands and they get the opportunity to put a bill in the ballot and to make real change to the lives of New Zealanders. Then this guy Mark Mitchell is like: I'm going to put in a bill that is stopping benefit payments for offenders who repeatedly fail to comply with community sentences." This really implies that this is a major issue but we know that actually it is not. Someone should tell Mark Mitchell that actually the vast majority of beneficiaries are not criminals. They are not going through the criminal justice system. This is not a big issue Mr Mitchell and so I am sorry that someone has given you the impression that it is and that you took the time to draft this meaningless bill and bring it to the House. But as I said we will not be supporting this bill to select committee. And I do hope that other political parties in the House have the same level of common sense and will not be supporting this bill either. It is really worrying that we see the lines blurred so often by the National Government. Here we have an issue around corrections. We know it has a problem with corrections—it has really struggled to look after that portfolio and so its only way of trying to address that is to do it through the social development system. So National cannot look after the corrections portfolio—we know the National Government has failed on that front—and so it is like: "OK what do we do how do we fix this? OK we punish people through the social development portfolio and that will fix everything." Well actually it will not. As I said this is such a minute issue that it is embarrassing that we are even having a debate on it in the House tonight. There are other major considerations that we should have a conversation about in the debate and one of those is one that many NGOs social services and children's advocacy groups have brought up and that is with regards to the sanctions that have been imposed in lots of other different areas and the implications that those sanctions have on children. It is really unfortunate that the whole time the National Government has been in pushing its reforms implementing these types of sanctions it has never stood back at any time to actually monitor the implications of those sanctions on those children. That is concerning. And here they are looking to roll out another raft of sanctions in an area that is completely unrelated to social development and undermines what our social security system was set up for in the first place. I am not going to give this any more attention. I am not even going to let my speech get to the bell of 8 minutes because this bill does not deserve further consideration and should not be allowed to continue to the select committee. I do hope that the next bill Mark Mitchell puts in has a little bit more substance and is a little bit more meaningful to New Zealanders than what we have before us tonight."