Turei Metiria: Annual Review Debate — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTurei Metiria: Annual Review Debate — In Committee[Sitting date: 03 May 2016. Volume:713;Page:10723. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green): A fairer future for this country is 100 percent possible. Fixing the housing crisis in this country created by National is also 100 percent possible. Solving child poverty largely caused by National in this country is also 100 percent possible. It comes down to a choice—the choice of having the fairer cleaner more sustainable country that New Zealanders want to build leaving behind the disgraceful record of the National Government which is driving this country well into the past. It is time for us to move forward and away from these old policies of the past from National which drive our families backwards and into the good green changes that can be made for our families and for our communities.I have to say I found the Minister’s speech tonight disingenuous and disgraceful frankly. When she stood up to say how great it was that all these people were moving off the benefit she could not say where those people have gone. We have asked her for this information before. She does not know whether or not a person who has left the benefit has gone into a great job and is doing well—and we all hope that that is the case; we all want that to be the case—or is now living in a car with their kids desperate for a place to live desperate for a regular and decent income and desperate for some respect from the State agencies for which she has responsibility. The thing is she does not know because her department does not ask and it does not ask because it does not want to know. It does not want to know because it is interested only in the half measures that make it sound good; meanwhile our New Zealand families are still living in terrible houses that make them cold and sick and living on miserable incomes so they cannot afford to pay the power bill and the rent and feed their kids. That is the reality for New Zealand families under the National Government. That is what National has driven this country to but it need not be like that. New Zealand can choose a different way.I want to address two issues out of these reports. The first is the Children’s Commissioner’s report and then also the Housing New Zealand report. Let me first congratulate Andrew Becroft on his appointment in the future as Children’s Commissioner. [Interruption] That is one of the better decisions made by the Minister—yes I agree with that. He will be a very fierce advocate for children and young people. He understands—she does not but he does—how poverty impacts on children the kinds of choices it constrains them to and the difficulties they get into because poverty has exacerbated the risks that they face in their lives. He does not judge them and punish them and their families in the way that the Minister and her policies do. He is always looking for constructive ways to make sure that these children these young people have a path out of the circumstances into which they have been driven. I am really looking forward to his contribution as Children’s Commissioner.Let me also say that our team in the Greens and I have really enjoyed working with Russell Wills and with his people as well. Russell Wills has played a critical role in making sure that child poverty is on the political agenda. It is on the agenda of New Zealanders and that is part of the reason why New Zealanders over the years are increasingly saying that the gap between rich and poor and child poverty are major issues for them in this country. New Zealanders do not want to live in a country where children are going to school hungry. New Zealanders do not want to live in a country where they can see the gap increasing between them and their neighbours and their friends and their families. They want to live in a country that is inclusive that is supportive of children that does not judge people on the basis of their income and that does not punish them when they are poor. That is what National does. That is not what New Zealanders want to do. Russell Wills through his work with the Expert Advisory Group on Solutions to Child Poverty and through his continual advocacy around the effects of child poverty on New Zealanders has been exceptional and has really helped to put child poverty on the agenda.National has traded away the potential of thousands of New Zealand children by allowing child poverty and the gap between rich and poor to stagnate at an all-time high. Under National in the 1990s child poverty and inequality rose to record highs and it has stayed there because National’s policies continue to drive families down.