Menéndez March RicardoRICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH (Green): Thank you Mr Speaker. It takes a village to raise a child but our welfare system has made it so that people cannot step in collectively to raise our tamariki and has created the circumstances where too often the State needs to intervene because the way that our benefit system has been made has created too many barriers for our extended families and communities to look after children.If I may take a call to speak on the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill. I want to begin like many speakers by paying a tribute to the caregivers who ensure that our children have the opportunity to thrive. I also want to reflect on the many comments that have been thrown around this House recently on the impacts of colonisation. I think about our welfare system and the fact that we have a benefit such as the unsupported child's benefit and the orphans benefit and one of them requires a break down in the family in order for a caregiver to step in when for many cultures—Māori Pasifika and even for my own culture in Mexico and throughout Latin America—we have a tradition where we collectively raise children very often and it is quite normal for people to step in and it's not always the case that there needs to be a break-down in the family relationships in order for people to become caregivers. It's unfortunate that a really Western often heteronormative system has been put in our welfare system that has created the problem that we are starting to solve through this bill.The problems that we're trying to solve in this bill are the differences that exist in the foster care allowance the unsupported child's benefit and the orphans benefit whether it's the rates or the fact that people in becoming caregivers and receiving the unsupported child's benefit and the orphans benefit had to previously show that they would be looking after the child for 12 months or more. We know that often people are slipping in for short periods of time and our welfare system should enable caregivers to step in for however little or long they need to be supporting our tamariki.The other issues are around income inadequacy and the fact that people who were receiving the unsupported child's benefit and the orphans benefit were not able to access a birthday or holiday payment. I want to make a quick pause just to acknowledge the fact that the select committee managed to arrive to a position where we were able to rename what was originally called the Christmas allowance" to "holiday allowance". That meant that we recognised the cultural diversity within our caregivers and that ultimately whānau have very different ways of celebrating meaningful religious or cultural events.The many other issues that we tried to fix that are very familiar for me personally having worked at the front lines in South Auckland for several years with people on the benefit were also raised by submitters. And while this bill doesn't directly address them I think the submitters to this bill have laid a really strong mandate for us to in the future review the rules around the break-down in the family as well as looking at income inadequacy because the truth is that for too many of the families that we used to see in South Auckland and Auckland Action Against Poverty often when they first came in they needed something like a food grant because they were not able to cover things like rent or food. And when we started discussing with the families who needed that emergency assistance about the make-up of their family we realised that they were actually looking after several children; it's just that they were not included in the benefit. The fact that we had to prove to Work and Income that there had been a breakdown the fact that we had to provide so many letters of support that may have shown that that caregiver was going to look after the child for 12 months or more just meant that it took sometimes weeks for that person to access the right benefit and therefore be able to cover basic expenses.Even when they were able to access the right benefit families too often would still be in debt would fall into arrears because the baseline benefits are far too low. And I hope that the allowances that whānau on the unsupported child's benefit and orphans benefit will receive will alleviate some of that income inadequacy. But I think from what we've heard from submitters there is more work that we need to do to address income inadequacy for caregivers. So I hope that that is one of the steps that this Government looks at as we progress and put through this bill.I'm quite thankful for the collegial nature we had at the select committee. I think it was an opportunity to look at some of those broader systemic issues and also I think to come together as a committee that it is made up of people from different cultures to address some of the language issues in the bill. I'm also thankful that the select committee identified and talked about the fact that the names that we used to define the unsupported child's benefit and the orphans benefit do not fully describe the nature of the caregivers who are stepping in to look after children because ultimately the for example unsupported child's benefit does not speak necessarily that a child is unsupported; it simply speaks more broadly to a child that is being looked after by a caregiver who may not be their biological parent. That does not speak of a lack of support; it may just speak to a different family configuration as well. We have to acknowledge that language is important and for far too long our welfare system has created language that has disenfranchised parents and has disenfranchised children. In saying that I want to also acknowledge the submitters who talked about the fact that the way that the rules are right now end up discriminating ethnicities and groups that have already been done hard by our welfare system including Māori Pasifika and migrant communities. So I hope that the issues that this bill is addressing will close the gap of the damage that colonisation has created through our welfare State.Lastly I hope that when this bill comes into action and we start seeing the changes and the requirements for children to come into care of people who are receiving a main benefit we do start seeing a reduction in child poverty because this should be at the heart of the legislation that we make. We should be working towards ending child poverty not just simply alleviating it and this bill will go some way towards that. But I hope that this Government acts a lot faster to put in place legislation that ensures all caregivers have the opportunity to let children thrive and that we implement the many recommendations laid out by the Welfare Expert Advisory Group the many reports that have already told us that there is a lot more work to do.So I commend this bill to the House and I look forward to the future contributions from members. Thank you."