Fox Marama: Annual Review Debate — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFox Marama: Annual Review Debate — In Committee[Sitting date: 28 April 2015. Volume:704;Page:2936. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MARAMA FOX (Co-Leader—Māori Party):Kia ora Mr Chair. I am not an economist. When you become a member of a party of two you learn quickly that you have to talk on all sorts of things. So today I am going to talk about what I know and what I know is that the minimum wage in this country is forcing people into poverty. In fact the minimum wage is set at the level of poverty. We are paying people to be impoverished. We need to ensure that there is a greater distribution of wealth in this country that we reduce the profit margins that are paid out to the wealthiest and that we ensure that the people who work very hard to create those profit margins are paid what they are due and are paid a living wage.Often I come into this Chamber and we talk about determining what poverty is and about how we can do that. People argue about whether it should be 60 percent of the median wage 65 percent of the median wage or 50 percent of the median wage. Well we will continue to have that debate for as long as we are unwilling to address it. What we need to be addressing are the hardship factors that impact on our people across this country. In fact if we do not act now to address poverty then it will be out of our reach to reverse. In this country we have the ability right now to address poverty and to reverse the factors that put our people into hardship—hardship factors such as whether a person has had a portion of protein with their dinner. Do they have a winter jacket? Do they have to go without a major meal once a day? Do they stay home from school because they do not have food with which to provide themselves lunch? Do they sleep in their car on the beach under a bridge or in a shack beside the river?In executing my duties I drive around this country quite a bit and I pick up hitchhikers because I think that I might as well get some benefit out of having a car that is paid for by the Government. So I pick up hitchhikers and I take them wherever they need to go. I picked up an elderly man who was clean and did not smell—a wonderful guy. He was hitchhiking to a rest stop because 50 metres from that rest stop down by the river there was a shack that he had found in which he could sleep and he has been there for the last 4 years.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order!MARAMA FOX: Yes I am coming around to the economy.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): I think the member will take a seat when I stand up. Thank you. I am pleased that she has indicated that she is going to come to the economy and especially the decisions that the Government made in the year that ended on 30 June last year. If she would just make even a passing reference to that that would make her within the rules.MARAMA FOX: Thank you. Hopefully that will not detract from the time that I have been given but thank you for the instruction.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): No it does not. We are trying to make up time actually.MARAMA FOX: Yes. The decision was that we increase our minimum wage by a paltry 50c on 1 January every year. That has brought our minimum wage to $14.75. Again if I can make the point that is actually paying our people to be impoverished. It is about 65 percent of the median wage of this country and that means that if you add accommodation and hardship factors on top of that we are paying people to be impoverished and to live in hardship.So what do we do? I think there has been some grace given in the speeches I have heard so far about what we might be able to do in the coming year to address that. What we need to do is raise the minimum wage and support the people who are suffering in hardship in this country so that we do not have to pay for food in their schools because they can afford to buy it themselves and so that we do not have to have charities that provide jackets and shoes for children because they can afford to buy them themselves. What we need to do is halt the march of poverty. We need to address it immediately and that way we can support the people of this country in an economy that is thriving so that not just the very rich are able to benefit from that thriving economy but there is a greater distribution of wealth across all sectors of our society. We must halt the march of poverty before it is out of our reach to do so. The system intervention that requires us to do that actually just requires a little bit of willingness and that willingness is about improving the minimum wage to a living wage. That is what I have decided to speak about because—