Collins Judith: Social Security Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
Collins Judith: Social Security Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
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JUDITH COLLINS (National—Clevedon) 
: 
 This Social Security Amendment Bill is a very interesting bill which came before the Social Services Committee. As was commented on the other day by Sue Bradford in the House this is yet another amendment to the Social Security Act. One of the points that Mrs Bradford made—and I thought made very well—is that this is just another part of the huge matrix that is social security legislation. We have a bill that although we who are on the select committee know what it is about to do and we know what it is all about most New Zealanders if they are trying to search for some change or amendment or for what this bill does will very soon have real difficulty in finding out what the rules are. That is because the bill refers to sections in other Acts and does not just deal with what is in front of it. I think it is incredibly important—and this is a point that Mrs Bradford made that I think was absolutely right—that we should always try to create legislation that is not only in plain English as much as possible but that is able to be accessed readily by the people who are meant to be able to access it. This bill simply does not meet that requirement. It is just another piece of legislation in this area that could in fact have been put together in one big piece of legislation to have this whole area looked at. 
This is a bill that could really have been called the “Single Core Benefit (Phase One) Bill”. That is because this is phase one of the single core benefit that the Government has been promising in its various forms really since 2000 and even before that in 1989 when Michael Cullen was the Minister of Social Welfare—before “welfare” was turned into “development” under this Government. So this is a bill that is just a little step along the way. It does not really put a lot in the way of sanctions for people who simply do not want to cooperate. It does have sanctions for people who do not want to have personal development plans it does have sanctions for people who do not want to carry out the personal development plans but for those who simply want to put together a plan that they will agree to where they do not plan to do very much it does not do a lot about them. I suggest to this House that the people who will be sanctioned are those who are genuinely trying to improve their lot and to contribute to the community the people who really do put together a plan and then find that it has been a bit ambitious for them and they cannot comply with it. 
I think it is a shame when we have to ask sickness and invalid beneficiaries to plan to work whether or not they really can be expected to. I think that is a shame. If only we had a system that said that those who really cannot work because of sickness or a disability do not have to be classed in with those who can work but wish not to. It is a real shame that we have this current situation. We have it of course because there are now over 125000 working-age New Zealanders who according to this Government are too sick to work. That is a 50 percent increase since Labour came into power despite the now $4 billion extra spent on health every year. So we are trying to deal with a situation here where a lot of people have been shifted off the unemployment benefit and put into a sickness or an invalids benefit category and now we will be asking them whether they would like to work. Well the answer in some cases will pretty much be no. 
The other thing is the question of why we are doing this for people who are genuinely too sick to work and should not have to be asked to work. 
I think that is a real shame. One of the things that the Minister has never really been very good at is being gracious. He needs to understand that some of the sensible amendments in the bill came about because of the good work done by National Party members on the select committee and also I should say by members from the ACT party the Greens and United Future—those people who were actually there. All the Minister wants to do is take credit for those who support him on everything he does which frankly is a bit difficult. I understand he has one or two votes in this one. In a major piece of legislation that is all he can scrape together. To hear him today praising Taito Phillip Field after all the other things he and his party have said about him is pretty interesting to say the least. 
Hon David Benson-Pope 
: Generous! 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: I would not say it was generous; I would say it was interesting. Of course we are not allowed to use the word that it actually is. So I think that is incredibly interesting. This Government is now relying on the votes of Gordon Copeland and Taito Phillip Field for one of its major pieces of legislation because it does not have enough sense to come along and talk sensibly to people in this Parliament and ask them about their concerns. Instead it needs to actually go to Taito Phillip Field and Gordon Copeland. Well I will not say anything about dogs lying down and getting fleas but some people might use that term. If people lie down with dogs they get up with fleas. 
This is legislation on which we received so many submissions and hardly any of them supported the bill. The people who came to talk to us about it were people from the disability sector like those from IHC New Zealand. They also are concerned that people who are genuinely ill will be expected to plan to work. I have no problem with saying that those who are malingering and do not really need to be on a sickness benefit should be working. We in the National Party think it is incredibly important that those who are genuinely ill and unable to work are assured that they will not be pressured into it by somebody in a Work and Income office with a quota or feel they are being bullied—bullied by this Minister and his cronies—into getting a job or trying to find one. 
The only other interesting things we heard were from a very good submission by the Rotorua People’s Advocacy Centre. Its submission was an incredibly good one. Its representatives said that at the behest of the Families Commission the centre had looked at just how good these personal development employment plans were. They found a very interesting fact which was that most of the people who fill out these plans do not do anything with them. One of the reasons is that the people do not even get a copy when they leave the office. In other words people go along do their plan then 1 year later go along and do another plan. When the Ministry of Social Development person was asked about why this was the answer was that nobody expects them to do anything with it. This is just another cynical attempt to look as though something is being done. 
The fact is that some people are going to be in work as a result of being asked to plan for this to happen and that is a good thing. Some people are not. At the end of the day a lot of this could be avoided if only we had proper medical criteria around the sickness benefit and invalids benefit. If only this Minister would stop saying that everyone who is on a sickness benefit should be there. If only he would work in with the doctors’ group to get better requirements around the sickness benefit in particular. If only he would make sure that doctors were not subject to intimidation; and if only he would make sure that doctors were not bullied by Work and Income people sending them hundreds of people to sign off on a sickness benefit. 
I noticed the other day that a doctor had signed off 300 people on a sickness benefit in the matter of a month. These are huge numbers. We worked out that this doctor was making about $600 a day out of the sickness benefit and that was three visits a day. Unbelievable amounts of money are going through under this system. Yet every time doctors stand up and say that they are being bullied that they do not have to be bullied on this and that they would like to be able to sign off things properly what happens? What happens is that this Government then accuses them of being part of some fraudulent activity— 
Russell Fairbrother 
: What happens? 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: If that member would like to take a call he should stand up and take one instead of just yapping from the sidelines with his little puppy-mate next door to him. That is what he should do; he should just take a call. What that member Mr Fairbrother over there should really do is contribute in a more positive way and talk about the good things that can be done in this area rather than constantly yapping from the sidelines with his little mate. That is what he should do instead of yapping from over there. This is one of the problems. This is why Mr Fairbrother is on his way out. But never mind; he is a nice enough bloke and I like the fact that he upsets Michael Cullen. That is a good thing. He is not a bad bloke at all actually and he did chair the committee very well even though I notice he has not been generous in his praise for the other parties that assisted the committee at all stages. 
This bill is not one we feel we can support. We think it is unfortunate that people who are severely disabled will in fact feel under pressure to find paid employment when they really should not have to. We think it is wrong that the “activity in the community” component has been taken out of any sanction activities so that in effect those who really could be getting some work experience will not have any incentive to get it.