Doocey MattMATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri): Thank you very much Madam Speaker. I do rise feeling slightly inferior to the last speaker when I reflect on his tie. I have a somewhat simple tie and I was reflecting on Duncan Webb's tie as to whether it was sort of a keyboard or an accordion or piano keys—Dr Duncan Webb: I think I got it from David Carter. MATT DOOCEY: OK. I'm here to talk on the Support Workers (Pay Equity) Settlements Amendment Bill—a very important bill—and I do want to acknowledge the former National Government. This bill follows on from the Care and Support Workers (Pay Equity) Settlement Bill which was passed in June 2017 under the former National Government. We do acknowledge Kristine Bartlett but also the Minister responsible the Hon Michael Woodhouse and we acknowledge his work in shepherding that bill through the House because you would have to question what the current Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety has been doing with this bill which has been languishing on the Order Paper. It looks like it was referred to the select committee in May 2019. We've heard plenty of speeches from the Government side about the importance of this bill yet submissions closed in July 2019 and here we are in the last few weeks of this Government and the last few weeks that this Government will have hastily going into an extended sitting to pass legislation that they clearly should have prioritised a lot earlier if they were living up to the words that they're stating today. Clearly this bill is very important for pay equity and we do know that for these sectors they are a female-led or a female-dominated workforce. I worked in the mental health field from my early 20s. It's fair to say I worked in this workforce which is very much a female-dominated workforce which I must say has helped me get a better perspective of the world working in the mental health and addiction sector for a number of years and I feel better for it in bringing that knowledge into Parliament. What we do know with the mental health and addiction support workers who will be the beneficiaries—or one of the groups because the other group is the vocational and disability support workers—is that they are a workforce that is very much needed because specialist medical professionals are quite bluntly very expensive and I would never underestimate the work our care and support workers do especially in the mental health and addiction field in keeping people well and keeping them out of crisis and keeping them out of specialist services. So that's why it's quite right today that we are acknowledging them and passing this bill in its second reading. Our fantastic Health Committee chair Louisa Wall clearly outlined the very technical amendments of this bill to progress. Our colleague the Hon Maggie Barry clearly outlined some of the reasons those two groups were not included in the original bill—the mental health and addiction support workers and the vocational and disability support workers—but this bill is very much needed. I think that's clear from across the House and my good Cantabrian colleague Duncan Webb was talking very much about the gender pay gap and how we need to address that inequity. This bill is one step forward towards addressing that and I do hope that this Government will be better organised to make sure this bill is passed into law before the House rises for this term. Thank you Madam Speaker.