Pillay Lynne: New Zealand Public Health and Disability Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Pillay Lynne: New Zealand Public Health and Disability Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
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LYNNE PILLAY (Labour) 
: 
 I will first take up some of the quotes that the previous speaker Nicky Wagner used. I think I heard—people will correct me if I did not hear it—the phrase: “we need to get the best bang for our buck”. 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: What does that mean? 
LYNNE PILLAY 
: Exactly—the member asks what that means. I think that is the whole principle here. Maurice Williamson does not know what it means and he is supposed to be a Minister in the National Government. This bang for our buck is actually about redistribution which is what happens in the policies of the National Government. 
Let us look at the bang for the buck that we are seeing currently. We have seen cuts to accident compensation to victims of sexual assault to people who have been injured at work and are not getting back to work and to people in this country who are hearing impaired. Under this “bang for our buck” we see a complete redistribution of that money to—guess what—tax cuts. We see those tax cuts go very very disproportionately to people on high incomes. So when Maurice Williamson asks what bang for our buck means I actually congratulate him. Maybe he is not up with the play of this pretty sinister stuff that this Government is doing. 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: I’m not; I never have been. 
LYNNE PILLAY 
: He said he is not up with the play. I appreciate that. I know that he has been quite a rebel at times and I am saying to Maurice Williamson that he should be a rebel again. He should say that this is not bang for our buck. 
We are seeing members stand in this House and say that this is the best bang we can get for our buck. We know that that is not what is happening. Do we commend efficiency in the health system? Of course we do. In fact that was the way the Labour Government was going. This bill has two purposes: one is to establish the Health Quality and Safety Commission and the second is a mandate for collective purchasing across the whole of the district health boards. Of course we in Labour support efficiency with purchasing and with the delivery of services. But if it is at the cost of local people of consultation and of people having a say in their health services then we have serious concerns. Labour voted for the bill to go to the Health Committee and we are not opposing it at this stage but we are putting on record as did the Green Party that we will put amendments forward to this bill to ensure democracy and to ensure that local communities are having a say in health delivery in their regions their communities and their cities. 
I heard Nicky Wagner say that under National we are seeing much more happening that we see more bang for our buck and that we see health services the public health system and hospitals delivering far more on time services. Well that is not the experience that we have had. That is not the experience we are having when day after day we question the Minister on the health cuts under this Government. If we look throughout the country we see older people with their $5 a day meals cut. We have seen their home help which might be just a couple of hours a week to ensure that they can stay at home cut. We have seen those services cut not just in Southland; when we were visiting our providers in Waitakere just a couple of weeks ago we saw the same thing happening there. So when I hear members on the opposite side of the House say that this bill is all about bangs for the bucks I share with Maurice Williamson in asking what it is all about. That was the question that that Minister asked and it is a question that we share in asking on this side of the House. 
We have no problem with raising quality or with raising purchasing powers but as my colleagues have said before me we do have a problem with setting up another bureaucracy with taking democracy out of consultation and with communities not knowing whether health services will be delivered. Why do I say that? It is because I know how we got a full-service hospital in Waitakere. We got it under a Labour Government and we got it from a community that lobbied for it a community that went through rounds of consultation and said “This is what we want in our community.” This Government is not doing that. The Government that was going to get rid of red tape and bureaucracy is introducing additional tiers and layers. Although we want money to be saved we do not want those savings to be spent inappropriately; we would rather see them going into health services. 
I think it is pretty rich for members to come into the House and say that we are getting far more bang for our bucks when we are seeing cuts being made throughout the country. Tony Ryall calls it streamlining. That is the new term for cuts. We call it a cut in services and delivery. Because of funding cuts older people have had their home support cut by district health boards; but the Government calls it streamlining. It could equally be said that the Government calls it bangs for its bucks. We do not think that cutting services for older people in New Zealand is getting more bangs for one’s bucks. We have had many calls to our offices from people who despite what Nicky Wagner said are not being seen. They are not getting fast service or their operations on time to say nothing of the escalating cost of doctors’ visits. We do not see that as more bang for our bucks. 
We see a Government that is possibly—and we would not say this categorically but it was raised by many submitters—setting up something that is quite risky. In their submission to the Health Committee senior doctors called the restructuring proposal for the Southern District Health Board risky and erratic. The Nurses Organisation said that it believed that these proposals were removing nursing leadership from the region. We in Labour do not think that cutting services particularly services to older people in our communities is a good bang for the buck. 
Of course we support this bill as it is. We supported its referral to the Health Committee. The Labour and Green members on the committee listened to what the submitters said. We will be putting forward a number of amendments to ensure that should this bill come into effect it will be democratic it will not be another level of bureaucracy it will meet the needs of the community and it will ensure that local communities have a say. Can we ensure that health services will not be cut for older people and that people will get the medical and surgical care they deserve and need? No we cannot ensure that but we certainly can assure the public that in the Committee stage of this bill Labour will be putting up amendments that ensure the local voice will be heard and that the people who know about the health services—because they are living them and breathing them—are part of the consultation process. 
I hope that Government members listen to that and that when we look at bang for the health buck we look at the big picture and we ensure that New Zealanders receive the health care they need deserve and invest in that care is put into health and that health care delivers. Thank you very much.