Radhakrishnan PriyancaHon PRIYANCA RADHAKRISHNAN (Minister for the Community and Voluntary Sector): Budget 2023 builds on the support that we on this side of the House have been providing to New Zealanders in the face of cost of living pressures. We know that times are tough. We know that it's particularly difficult for those that are low and middle income households and those who have young children. Budget 2023 is a Budget that focuses on targeted cost of living support that will not exacerbate inflation pressures while also laying the foundations for long-term benefits including increasing education and health outcomes and meeting our climate change goals.The changes that kicked into place on 1 April were changes that supported over 1.4 million New Zealanders including those receiving a main benefit students superannuitants and that was funded through Budget 2023. There's also a particular focus on parents and young families including through the expansion of 20 hours' free early childhood education support for two-year-olds free public transport for children and half-price public transport for under-25s and community services card holders and half-price fares that Budget 2023 makes permanent for Total Mobility services as well.I just also want to spend a short period of time just focusing on the fact that we are also scrapping the $5 co-payment prescriptions. That will lead to better health outcomes for individuals for families and will support our health system. Soon after the Budget was announced a young Kiwi Indian doctor tweeted—I don't know her personally but her tweet went viral. She said that as a new graduate in the early 2000s at Middlemore it took a long time for us to figure out why patients were being readmitted when they'd been discharged with antibiotics for pneumonia or medication for heart failure. Turned out that they were too whakamā—that's ashamed or embarrassed—to tell us that they couldn't afford what was then a $3 prescription fee. So they quite rightly came back into hospital for a $700-a-night readmission and Middlemore started to send people home with packs of medication. This is one simple change that will help the 135000 adults who didn't pick up their prescriptions because of the cost to be able to do so. It's also one that invests in our health system and will level the playing field for community- and family-owned pharmacies as well.This Budget continues this Government's year-on-year investment in initiatives to eliminate family and sexual violence as well. It will specifically support more accessible services in ways that are relevant to those who need to access them. Budget 2023 will also enable existing mainstream family and sexual violence support providers to be able to meet the accessibility needs of disabled people and tāngata whaikaha Māori. It also expands the safeguarding pilot run in Waitematā which will help to protect disabled people who are at risk of violence through specialist services because people should be able to access the support they need in the ways that are relevant to them.This is also a Budget that adds to our Government's record investment in supporting disabled people both through ensuring that we can invest to help ease the cost and demand pressures on our disability support services and also to scrap the minimum wage exemption. Currently we have disabled people being paid less than the minimum wage for their work on the basis that they are perceived to be less productive—that is just not right. We are delivering on a commitment we made and ending this discriminatory exemption. We'll introduce a wage supplement so that disabled people are paid the minimum wage but in a way such that we can also protect the opportunities that are afforded to them.Finally on this side of the House we're committed to supporting all New Zealanders in ways that are equitable and relevant to them. On that side of the House if given a chance in October this year the coalition of cuts" will take us backwards. It is their policy to take us back to a time that led to the very inequities that our communities have faced and to worsen outcomes. So many from our ethnic communities advocated for a ministry to ensure that their voices are heard at the highest decision-making levels. That "coalition of cuts" will scrap the Ministry for Ethnic Communities amongst others. We will lose—Hon Judith Collins: How does that member say that? How can that member say that?Hon PRIYANCA RADHAKRISHNAN: Because that is ACT policy. And in the absence of National policy that is the policy of the "coalition of cuts". They will take us backwards and ensure that the voices of our people are silenced. Thank you Madam Speaker."