Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeParental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 08 June 2016. Volume:714;Page:11802. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment BillIn CommitteePart 1 Amendments to come into force on 1 April 2017The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): This is debate on clauses 4 to 18 and schedule 1.CARMEL SEPULONI (Junior Whip—Labour): I seek leave for this to be taken as one question.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is objection. [Interruption] Order! [Interruption] Order! I am dealing with the matter. [Interruption] Will the member please be quiet I am ruling on this matter.SUE MORONEY (Labour): It with a sense of strong déjà vu that I rise to take a call on Part 1 of the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill and it is my sincere hope that we do not see a repeat of what we saw last time around. The use of the filibuster against a bill that aims to actually support families and children was I thought particularly ugly last time around only accentuated by having to listen to speech after speech after speech from Mike Sabin telling us how to parent responsibly.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I am going to start by interrupting the member and reminding her that this is a debate on this bill on this part and it is a narrow debate. Referring to previous bills and previous debates is out of order.SUE MORONEY: Thank you Mr Chair for that guidance. I will now address Part 1 which is the part that actually tells the country about how affordable this bill really is.As the member promoting the bill I have worked hard to make sure that it is affordable for the country and Part 1 expresses that. It does not say we should get to 26 weeks of paid parental leave tomorrow or even next year; what Part 1 does is say that we should implement this in a staged way that is affordable for the country by increasing paid parental leave on 1 April next year to 22 weeks. That is effectively what Part 1 does and the Government Administration Committee did a lot of work on ensuring that we got agreement and we got good official advice on what the cost of taking that staged approach to implementing extended paid parental leave would be. This is very important in this debate because of the threat of a financial veto that hangs over the head of this bill so I do want to take a little bit of time to share with the Committee and with the country what the costings were because they show how affordable it is.The officials told us that for the financial year we are about to enter into—that is financial year 2016-17—the effect of this bill would be a gross cost of $12.7 million. That is the impact of Part 1 on the budgetary year that we have just finished debating in this Parliament. I note that because it in fact equates to only 0.7 percent of the additional spending that this Government has already committed to the Budget for 2016-17—0.7 percent. That is no justification for a threat of financial veto. When the Government has already seen fit to pour $1.8 billion additional spending into next year’s Budget and this bill would take just 0.7 percent of that additional funding to fund it it is clearly not an issue about unaffordability. The Government is spending in that same budgetary year $12 million on new charter schools—you know those charter schools that are failing; the ones where the people operating the charter schools when they fail get to keep the taxpayer money. That is $12 million in the next Budget year on that initiative. This bill would cost the same amount but this bill would actually impact on 30000 babies and their families in the next 12 months. That is the estimated number of families that will be using paid parental leave in that budgetary year—30000 families will benefit from this. That $12.7 million in Labour’s view is a great investment in the future of this country.We know that if we can extend in the first instance paid parental leave to 22 weeks by 1 April next year as Part 1 asks then those children will have that ability to get that bonding and attachment going well between parent and baby. If the mother has already established a great breastfeeding regime that will not be interrupted by her having to go back to work due to financial constraints. That is going to be to the benefit of us all because the other thing the officials gave us advice on at the select committee was that when we get those things right we save money in a whole lot of areas. In fact what they told us was that we are going to save immediately $28 million as a country if we implement this bill. That is cost savings on things like not having to spend taxpayer money on early childhood education subsidies—the taxpayer paying for other people to look after those children as this Government would have it rather than mum or dad being able to be at home on extended paid parental leave able to get that bonding attachment happening and able to make sure that the bills are getting paid the financial stress is not so great on the family and all those things that submitters came and told us about at the select committee.One of the things that really stood out for me this time around in the select committee process and the submissions and why we do need to get to 22 weeks’ paid parental leave by 1 April next year is that families came and told us that this generation is having to make choices between whether they save to buy a house or whether they have a baby. Those are the sorts of decisions that people in well-paid jobs are now having to make in John Key’s New Zealand. In John Key’s New Zealand housing prices have increased so much that the families—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I am going to remind the member again that this is a narrow debate. The House has accepted at the second reading the principle of this bill; all we are debating is whether these clauses implement the principles that the House has agreed to.SUE MORONEY: Thank you Mr Chair. So 22 weeks is what we are seeking in Part 1 of the bill. It is part of a stepped approach and the approach of making this affordable so that we can get to 26 weeks but we will talk about that more in Part 2. Part 1 should be supported by parties right across this Parliament. I look forward to hearing the further debate on that and I look forward to hearing votes in support of this important measure and this important investment in New Zealand’s future.Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): Thank you for the opportunity to contribute in the Committee of the whole House on the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill. I am not on the Government Administration Committee but I have contributed on this bill in previous readings so it is really good to have this opportunity.Speaking on Part 1—as we know Part 1 is about affordability and also about extending paid parental leave to 22 weeks. As I said I am not on the select committee so I did not hear the member Sue Moroney who spoke before me on this bill explain why she proposes that paid parental leave should be extended in two stages. That was one of my questions I wanted to ask the member: why did she decide to propose that we should extend paid parental leave in two stages? That first stage is extending it to only 22 weeks.There is a resemblance to what the Government has done. We increased paid parental leave in two stages. We increased it from 14 weeks to 18 weeks over 2 years and the reason was affordability. We wanted to make sure that what we are doing is affordable. We also made sure that we were not just increasing the length of the paid parental leave but including other workers. We included other care arrangements along with extending the length of paid parental leave. So—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I am going to interrupt this member as I interrupted the previous speaker twice. This is a debate on this bill and not on previous bills. So members going over what happened previously might have been relevant at the second reading and might be relevant at the third reading but it is not at this Committee stage.Dr PARMJEET PARMAR: Talking about affordability that was my question to the member: why did the member decide to propose this extension in two stages—that is going to just 22 weeks in the first stage? If it is about affordability I want to ask the member—the cost of this is going to be close to half a billion dollars. Where will the member get that half a billion dollars? Where should we cut that expenditure all the investment that we are currently making in order to increase paid parental leave to 22 weeks?We know that the intention behind this bill is good but it is about affordability and it is about timing. We know that in 2007 the Families Commission recommended increasing paid parental leave to 13 months and then the Labour Government decided not to because it knew that it was not affordable. So my question to the member is still how are we going to afford to increase paid parental leave so quickly when we have already increased paid parental leave to 18 weeks from this year. It is a long-term view. It is not a short to medium term view. It is not something that we can start this year do for a couple of years and then decide that it is not going to work. We need to see what will be the cost of this policy when we implement it in the long term.It is important that taxpayers understand why we are doing it. We are answerable to taxpayers and I would like to know from the member how she is going to explain to taxpayers that it is a good measure to increase paid parental leave so quickly when we have already increased it to 18 weeks—to increase it to 22 weeks. I do understand that the reason is bonding. I also see that—Carmel Sepuloni: You know what it means?Dr PARMJEET PARMAR: I do understand that this is about bonding and yes bonding is important but that does not mean that if parents go back to work after 18 weeks or 22 weeks or 26 weeks there is no bonding or no opportunities for bonding with their children.I also want to know why the member decided to increase it to only 22 or 26 weeks. Why not go longer? Because there are other proposals in different countries that want to see paid parental leave be longer. It is not that we should be comparing our paid parental leave with other countries because if other countries are doing something that is not a statement to us that we should follow. We have our own things to look after. We have to see what is affordable in our country. Given that we have just come out of a huge global financial crisis and that we had the Canterbury earthquakes we need to be very careful in terms of how we manage our finances. We need to see what is affordable. Looking at the timing this is not affordable and I still ask that question to the member as to how she thinks spending close to half a billion dollars on this is justified. How will she justify it to taxpayers? Going around talking to people they think that as we have already increased it to 18 weeks we need to see the impact of that before we jump on to the next step. It is something that we need to be very careful about how we invest our money.A member spoke about cutting spending for charter schools. That is very ironic—PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): E Te Kaiwhakahaere tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou katoa e ngā mema o Te Whare. I am sure that the member Sue Moroney has brought this bill to the House with very very good intentions but I do want to I suppose respond to some of the comments she has made during the first two calls that she took in this Committee stage debate and also perhaps pose a couple of questions to the member in the chair as well.I think that despite the good intentions of this bill if we look very closely at Part 1 and some of the amendments to the principal Act that are proposed in that part—namely the extension of the duration of paid parental leave—the extensions that would be provided for in Part 1 obviously are only those that take effect on 1 April 2017 and subsequent parts deal with the subsequent tranches or phases of extension of parental leave. The figure that she quoted was a figure I did not catch exactly. Maybe she would be able to just confirm. It was something like $10 million or $11 million worth of costs—Sue Moroney: $12.7 million.PAUL FOSTER-BELL: —$12 million worth of costs in the first year. The question is whether that figure is actually an accurate portrayal of the real costs of the provisions provided for in this part given that other estimates that we have seen show that those costs are actually compounding. They are not a one-off. They go on year after year and they will compound up to a cost of something in the order of $445.8 million a year—at least that was the figure that the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment has provided as an estimate.I would also like some clarification from the member. She said that there would be significant cost savings which from memory were roughly twice as much as the costs of this bill and that would be met by the taxpayer. Would she be able to provide I suppose some clarification for us of how realistic she thinks those cost savings calculations might be?The other question I have came from the select committee stage. We heard evidence from a range of submitters many of whom were in favour and I will concede that. I think actually that for people on this side of the Chamber there is no inherent opposition to the concept of providing paid parental leave as Part 1 does. Actually this Government has been progressively extending paid parental leave not only in duration as Part 1 provides for but certainly in breadth of availability to those who are self-employed seasonal employees—people who traditionally were not receiving this sort of paid parental leave support.The question comes from the submissions particularly the submission of Mr Paul Clark who is the managing director and owner of the New Zealand Ammunition Co.—it is a small business that provides essential equipment not only to our police force but also to our Defence Force. He is also the chair of the Council of Licensed Firearms Owners so he is someone who is well versed in the recreational shooting and hunting industries. He made what I thought was a very good submission which does have some material questions that are relevant to this part around the costs on small businesses. So far in this debate we have talked about the costs and the impact on the Government’s fiscal outlook potentially and the figure that I have quoted is in the order of $450 million going forward. That is a 4-year cost.That is not over the lifetime of this policy but that is just within 4 years.The points made by Mr Clark which I actually think do deserve a response from the member in the chair are around the cost to small businesses—the calculations made by small-business owners; not only the financial calculations but the employment decisions that are influenced—under the understanding that they will be required by the law to take on a considerable financial expense should one of their staff have children. So I would like some responses from the member on those questions.As I have said on the side of the Chamber we are very very hesitant. In fact we are opposed to the provisions provided for in Part 1 because we believe that they do represent going a little bit too far that there is a balance to be achieved here and that a reasonable amount of paid parental leave is something we can all agree to. But when the costs rack up into the hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars per year then that is an issue that I think we need to look at very seriously.JACINDA ARDERN (Labour): Obviously given how particular the Part 1 clauses are this will be a reasonably short and concise contribution to this part of the debate. But some of the questions that were raised by the last speaker Mr Paul Foster-Bell were I thought worthy of response.One of the turns of phrase that he used when talking about the general support that this House has for paid parental leave was that we all support a reasonable amount. Part 1 sets out what a reasonable amount might be from the perspective of the majority of the House and it is based on an evidence base rather than on a finger-in-the-air test of what might be reasonable. We have traversed those various reasons why 26 weeks is what is internationally considered as a reasonable amount and obviously it is for health and wider beneficial reasons but Part 1 then sets out how we would stage towards those 26 weeks.One of the other members in this Committee just raised the question as to why it was only 26 weeks and why not 12 months. Well that actually proves a point that Labour has been trying to make throughout this debate which is that Part 1 is not staged to 12 months because of financial considerations. It is Labour’s policy that that in an ideal world would be where Part 1 would take us—in fact Part 2 takes us all the way through to 26 weeks—but we have taken into account issues that were raised on the other side of the House around the financial viability of going to that point at this stage and we fell after consideration on a staged approach that first said “Let’s at least get to 26 weeks.” which is why Part 1 takes us first to 18 weeks and then beyond. But covering off—because so many people have raised in Part 1 the costings question which is relevant to Part 1—I do want to just clarify that the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment (MBIE) itself has anticipated the cost of the first staging of this bill to be roughly 0.7 percent of the additional net spending budgeted for 2016-17.So it seems completely inconsistent to me to hear from that side of the Chamber that there is an issue around the affordability of Part 1 when in question time today we had Gerry Brownlee who was asked by our finance spokesperson about the $20 billion I believe it was roughly required for the Defence Force as to whether he had spoken to Bill English about that massive amount of spending. If I remember correctly his words were that there was an absolutely stupendous surplus that was available to the Government because of its pristine financial management which meant that it was possible that that $20 billion could be invested in the Defence Force. So how is it that we do not have enough within the Budget to allow Part 1 to be enacted—0.1 percent of spending relative to the 2016-17 Budget—but on the flip side we can not only afford $20 billion for the Defence Force but also afford tax cuts next Budget as well? So this is not an issue of it not being in Part 1—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): I am going to ask the member to narrow up things.JACINDA ARDERN: I just wanted to respond to the issue that has been raised there but also I want to come to the work contact hours which no one has raised so far. Within Part 1 we did originally have a raft of provisions around maintaining work contact hours during parental leave. It has not been removed because that is not a good provision; it has been removed because that was picked up in the Government’s bill where it extended paid parental leave to 18 weeks after of course we had had this debate in the House extensively prior to it which led of course the Government to finally accept that the general public wanted to see that extension. So that is why those provisions have been removed and I think rightly so.I think it is fair to say that we could talk at great length about the trade-offs or the costs that come with not having paid parental leave that are not factored into MBIE’s calculations. We could talk at great length around the different stages of development for a baby from 18 to 22 weeks but actually all that Part 1 is doing essentially is setting out the phasing in of those two stages of paid parental leave. It is a very narrow part and I think probably everything that needs to be debated has been. Clearly on this side of the House there are simply different priorities and that is why we have prioritised the idea that this could be done it could be staged and it could be made effective—SARAH DOWIE (National—Invercargill): It is a pleasure again to take—it is kind of a bit like the never-ending story actually. I keep being brought back to this Chamber to take a call—or maybe it is just because it is about paid parental leave. But regardless it is a pleasure to take this call on the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill.Obviously Part 1 is one of the operative sections that looks to extend paid parental leave from 18 weeks to 22 weeks and there has been some debate already on this provision in respect of cost. I understand that Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment figures have said that it is at $445.8 million over 4 years. I guess what I bring this back to is that when you are in Government it is about swings and roundabouts and it is about a suite of measures to give children the best start in life. So from my perspective I believe in paid parental leave—I am going to put that on the table. Obviously I am a mother of two myself and I believe in the benefits of paid parental leave.But as has been mentioned before there was a Government bill in this House prior to this one the Employment Standards Legislation Bill which extended this leave and Part 1 at this point in time is redundant in that it is really about a suite of measures to give young children the best start in life. I do want to put it to the member that I am surprised that the keeping-in-touch hours—or work contact hours as they are called in this bill—were not explored further and were not left in this bill. I think that work contact hours and keeping-in-touch hours are an exceptionally good idea that has been supported by this Government as was mentioned by the member opposite as well.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! The member can discuss what is in the bill not what was taken out of the bill—all right? So this is about the bill as it has emerged from the select committee in the second reading. It is about the bill now.SARAH DOWIE: Thank you Mr Chair. So back to the operative section of Part 1 the extension of 18 weeks’ paid parental leave to 22 weeks—this is a matter of cost. Like I say the Government looks at cost—and it was mentioned prior by the member opposite. Look just because we do have a surplus at this stage it does not mean that we spend it. You know the Opposition would be well advised to take account of saving for a rainy day and there are all sorts of situations that come up when you are in Government and you are managing this fine country of New Zealand—horrific instances such as the Christchurch earthquakes—that require attention and require money to help support people moving forward.So it is one thing to single out parents and babies as to the best start in life—yes in a world where we had unlimited funds extending paid parental leave with all of the benefits that ensued from it would be fantastic—but this is a Government that has got us back in black. We have brought our books back into surplus and we are looking at pragmatic management of this country looking at all different aspects of equality of life in New Zealand and spending this money wisely and in a measured way moving forward.So as I said I support paid parental leave. It is a fantastic concept and there are benefits with it. We talk about bonding with baby. One of the best parts of my life was obviously having children and being a mum and being on paid parental leave. It was not as broad as it is now and it was certainly not the 22 weeks that Part 1 looks to extend it to but it is a time to bond with baby and it is a time to look at encouraging mothers to do things such as breastfeed. Breastfeeding is seen as—breast is best. Breast milk provides all of the nutrients that are best for baby but notwithstanding that if you cannot breastfeed it is still an important time for mum to take the time to properly bottle-feed baby.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Before I call the member I am going to reiterate a ruling I have made now I think about four times to remind members about relevance and repetition. I actually came very close to terminating the member Sarah Dowie’s speech for both. Being repetitious with irrelevancies is not helpful.DENISE ROCHE (Green): I rise to take the first call in the Committee of the whole House stage on Part 1 of the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill. Part 1 refers to—and it has been amended to ensure that it is up to date—replacing 18 weeks’ paid parental leave with 22 weeks. That reflects the decision from the Government Administration Committee—and I had the privilege of sitting on the select committee—that first of all we needed to update it to take into account the changes that were made last year basically as a result of Sue Moroney’s previous bill. But also 22 weeks is one baby step—excuse the pun—towards 26 weeks. Part 2 which I will not discuss now talks about extending that further to 26 weeks from 2018.The progression towards paid parental leave is an essential part of what we should be doing in this country to ensure that we do have a stable economy. People across the Chamber have been talking about costs and I think we need to bear in mind that the costs are actually more than covered if we look at the longer-term view. If we look at paid parental leave being at 26 weeks—although this Part 1 talks about 22 weeks which as I said is the baby step on the way—we are looking at a way of addressing the pay gap between men and women. We are looking at a way of ensuring that women who are having children are able to stay in the paid workforce and it addresses some of the inequities that occur in the workforce around pay. That is one area where it is good for the economy.The other place where it is good for the economy—22 weeks and then 26 weeks but ideally we would like to see 13 months which would bring us into line with many of the other OECD countries but let us focus on 22 weeks in Part 1. The other thing that this would be good for the economy around is the area of ensuring that newborns and their families are able to connect and make solid connections. It ensures that there is ample time for breastfeeding and it gives a startout that is a bit of stability for the family. When you do that you start to offset some of the potential problems that can occur further down the track. This is research that has been traversed time and time again. It is irrefutable. It is evidence-based that if we invest now in ensuring that we have stable families there are savings down the track in terms of the health system in terms of the corrections system and in terms of education failings—for all of those things there are savings there. So this short-term approach from that side of the Chamber saying “We are not going to support it because it costs this much.” is not taking into account the longer-term savings.The other area where this bill—and particularly this part the extension to 22 weeks and then to 26 weeks—is good for the economy is around the employers. We have now got a global labour market. We have got a situation here in New Zealand where in order for us to compete globally we need to be having a skilled workforce and employers are having to compete in that labour market to ensure that they get them. Our parental leave does not make it attractive for those skilled workers to remain in this country. Certainly if there are better family-friendly provisions in other countries and companies based overseas then we start to lose those people who could be contributing their expertise and their innovation to our economy which desperately needs that. We need that to solve some of the immense problems of the day—for example to address some of our issues around climate change. So it makes sense to extend paid parental leave as it says in Part 1 to 22 weeks and then to 26 weeks so that we can actually be an economy that can compete internationally.I think it is very short-sighted for the other side to suggest that this is going to cost too much when in fact that side has directed enormous amounts of funds at areas that we would see as not a priority—areas that do not have short or long-term benefits basically—things like roads of national significance which was an issue that was traversed a little bit today during question time.Iain Lees-Galloway: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I apologise for interrupting my colleague but she is ranging quite some distance from Part 1—DENISE ROCHE: Oh I did stray—you are quite right.Iain Lees-Galloway: —of this bill and in fact was talking about 26 weeks which is in Part 2.DENISE ROCHE: I was talking about 22 weeks.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! Roads of national significance are not part of this bill.DENISE ROCHE: Sure back to babies. No you are quite right and I do apologise. I thank members this side of the Chamber for that. So basically 22 weeks in Part 1—we support that. We support it because it is a sensible progression from where we are at the moment which is 18 weeks through to 22 weeks and I will talk a little bit more about 26 weeks when we get to that part of the bill. Thank you.MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney): I have to say that I am very surprised that the Labour whip took a point of order against a Green member—Iain Lees-Galloway: Point of order Mr Chairman.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No no. I have ruled on that matter and that is the end of it so we will not get into this cross-play. I have ruled on that matter. I told the member who was speaking at the time Denise Roche that that was what the member should do. She came back to the bill so we cannot relitigate those points that I have already ruled on.MARK MITCHELL: Thank you for clarifying that Mr Chair. I am very happy to take a call on Part 1 of the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill.Hon Member: Say it again. Say it again.MARK MITCHELL: I want to acknowledge—I will probably come back to it—Ruth Dyson the chair of our select committee the Government Administration Committee. She has done a very good job of chairing the select committee and taking this bill through and I hope that she takes a call in the Committee tonight to speak to the bill. I want to acknowledge the member Sue Moroney of course. And of course I have got some questions too and I hope that the Chairperson will allow me a little bit of latitude to address some of the issues that were raised by the Opposition members during our speeches on this part.Cost keeps getting raised and I want to speak about cost because we have got the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment which has worked on the costings and has come back and was able to report and inform the select committee that the cost is going to be $445.8 million over the next 4 years. That is a significant amount. Anyone sitting at home who is in charge of their own household budgets knows that if you take money from somewhere then you have either got to replace it or one of the family is going to miss out on something. I am really interested to hear and I would ask the member when she takes a call—and I am hoping that she takes the call after mine—to run through again and explain to us where the money is going to come from over the next 4 years.Carmel Sepuloni: She already answered those questions. She doesn’t need to take a call on it.MARK MITCHELL: Well it would be good for her to highlight that again and talk us through that again—where the money is going to come from and where the savings are.One of the interesting points that was raised and I am sure that the member in the chair Sue Moroney would agree with me on this one is that by extending paid parental leave somehow we are not going to have to build any more prisons so there is going to be a big saving in the construction of prisons. I cannot see that. I would like to know the rationale. I would like to know the methodology behind that statement because personally I cannot see that.I am going to come back to cost but I want to talk about small business because my colleague and the deputy chair of our committee Paul Foster-Bell raised a very good point and that was the fact that we heard submissions from small-business owners. Actually when you look at the New Zealand economy 70 percent of our economy is made up of small to medium sized business. When you actually delve into it when you have a look at our small businesses out there that are always passionate about what they are doing and are always looking for the ability to be able to grow often cash is king—right? They want to make payroll every fortnight they want to make payroll every month and their employees are extremely important to them. So we as a Parliament—and we are not the ones out there every day working hard and toiling hard trying to grow these businesses and trying to make sure that there is a strong cash-flow—are very careful about what we do in here. The decisions that we make in here will have a direct impact and can have a direct negative impact on what our productive part of the economy is trying to achieve and do. So a policy like this needs to be examined very very closely.I just want to highlight and come back to the comment that my colleague Sarah Dowie made. It was very good in the sense that we do support paid parental leave and this Government has got a proud record of having extended that and taken a round of policies that actually provide more support to new parents. I think a very interesting point that came up during our select committee process was that we assume that it always relates to mothers; actually it does not. Having been a single father myself it actually relates to fathers as well. That brings me to another point that I would like to highlight and that is one of the issues that was raised the last time—IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): I move That the question be now put.JAN LOGIE (Green): I will keep this short and sweet because we have traversed the content and the detail of this bill significantly already in numerous debates. I would just like to speak to Part 1 and put on record the Green Party’s support for this bill but also acknowledge that the 22 weeks of paid leave that is in Part 1 is an accommodation that has been made by this member. I doubt that anyone on this side of the House would think it is ideal. With the amount of time that this House has been discussing the need for 26 weeks I think that actually everyone on this side of the House is probably ready to go straight to 26 weeks to give the country what it has asked so clearly for.However the fact that we have 22 weeks’ paid leave in Part 1 of this bill is another demonstration of the absolute willingness of the sponsor of this bill Sue Moroney to bend backwards to do everything in her power to try to persuade this Government to give the country what it wants. In the last iteration of this bill she confined it down to significantly premature babies and children with very significant disabilities—down to very significant measures. She brought it right down to try to get it over the line for even one group of people and still this Government just pushed and pushed and was so mean that it could not deliver it.The truth is Part 1 of this bill is another reflection of this Government’s meanness and how far this member has had to go to try to get it over the line. It is a real shame because actually all the evidence supports 26 weeks and we will speak more to that on Part 2 of the bill.BRETT HUDSON (National): It is a pleasure to rise to speak on Part 1 of the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill. It will be a relief when we do eventually get on to clause 1 and can talk about a different title—a slightly shorter one—for this bill. But the main points that we have traversed in Part 1 have been around cost so I would like to raise just a few items. One is the cost that the member sponsoring the bill raised and then some consideration of cost and affordability which a previous Opposition speaker Ms Ardern raised.Ms Moroneywhen she was having her first call on this bill pointed out that in the first year the cost impact of Part 1 would be $10 million—I think that was what she said. That is not quite right for one reason and is very very wrong for another. The reason it is not quite right is that the latest edition of figures from the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment (MBIE) actually says it is about $12 million through until the end of the current financial year—so until the end of June this year. The reason for that which is relevant to the cost consideration as Ms Moroney put it is that officials of course had to give advice on the bill as it was introduced to the Government Administration Committee and not on the amendments or the recommendations that we finally arrived at.Originally what was going to happen was the first increase in weeks of paid parental leave was going to take place in the past—they were going to take place a couple of months ago in this year. Of course officials made some estimates based on the remainder of the current financial year before then projecting forecasting costs into the future. The bill as has been reported back to the House which is under consideration in this the Committee of the whole House has actually shifted the start date from 2016 to a full year up to April 2017. What will happen in that year of course is that when it does come into force on 1 April 2017 should it pass—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! That is in the commencement provisions of the bill. We are on Part 1. You will get a chance to talk about the preliminary clauses that come into force on 1 April 2017 later on but I just ask you to focus on Part 1.BRETT HUDSON: The implication of Part 1—of moving to 22 weeks—will see an increase in costs of about $12 million from 1 April 2017 through until the end of June 2017. From that point on each year of paid leave at 22 weeks doing a rough mental calculation—because MBIE rated the total costs of the full bill across 5 years plus the few starting months to be $466 million. Very roughly if it was only at 22 weeks—which of course is all that Part 1 does—then fundamentally half is going to be in the order of around an additional $230 million over that period of time. The Government’s point has always been—and this did not seem to be grasped by the submitters at the select committee—that it is not one additional dollar of paid parental leave that is necessarily the problem but the total cost.In the course of the consideration of both this particular bill as drawn and the previous iterations of bills in a similar vein the Government has taken steps to increase paid parental leave. It has increased it from 14 to 18 weeks—Iain Lees-Galloway: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. The member appears to be straying into other pieces of legislation not Part 1 of this bill.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I am listening very closely. In fact I have Part 1 in my hand. Being able to refer back is OK so long as one does not dwell on it. I am listening very carefully. I have the bill in front of me and I ask the member to concentrate on Part 1.BRETT HUDSON: Thank you Mr Chair. Exactly the point being made is that the Government’s position has been that it is the complete cost of the change that is the issue. The Government has made the affordable steps already. The most recent Budget of course in which the Government has not made a further extension shows that within the current fiscal envelope there is not the headroom right now to increase paid parental leave further—that the Government has many responsibilities above and beyond simply paid parental leave. We have got schools’ infrastructure we have got additional money—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order!BRETT HUDSON: We have got issues that the Government spends money on that mean that if we are expending money in certain areas then that money is not available to be expended in this coming year on an extension to paid parental leave. So the position for the coming financial year still remains and is very clearly evidenced by that current fiscal position that a move to 22 weeks is not affordable.Another member opposite Ms Ardern made a point about large surpluses. They are actually a future consideration. They are not relevant to Part 1 but she did get to talk to them so I just want to cover them. Her point was simply this: if in an answer to a question in the House today we can talk about spending a sizable amount of money on defence then we can spend that amount of money on paid parental leave. The point is that the forecast of those large surpluses will not see them realised and growing in size for about another 2 financial years and then a further 2 years beyond that. That is well outside the scope of Part 1.What the member was trying to do is spend money we have not yet earned on something that would cost us money in the next 12 months. It is not exactly unusual for the Opposition to do that—in fact it is pretty much what it always campaigns on—but what it is not is evidence of money available today to put into force the effect of Part 1 which would be to add a further 4 weeks of paid parental leave. To claim that statements made in the Budget or that answers to questions in the House today are somehow evidence of affordability could not be further removed from the actual situation. It may be—and I am not going to speculate on what our Minister of Finance would do in that position—that with those surpluses in the future there could be headroom to change but it is not in this coming financial year.I just want to mention—and I will not dwell upon this—another reason for the overall picture that we would take which has an impact on our position on Part 1 and why we oppose it. Care and support for families with newborns can take a number of different forms. This bill would propose simply extending additional weeks of paid leave. But what the Government has done and still looks at doing further is actually broaden the eligibility for the level of paid parental leave that exists today. We look at seasonal workers employees with more than one employer different family caring arrangements like whāngai parents or grandparents caring for children—family and care arrangements that are relevant and meaningful for the parents but that previously would not have been eligible under a paid parental leave scheme. The Government is expending finances to deliver those services and to broaden the eligibility but a dollar spent in doing that is in effect a dollar that is not therefore spent on Part 1—on an additional 4 weeks.When we look at this and say “Are we prepared to make this extension?” it is important that we look at the additional expenditure in the area of paid parental leave—not just in the number of weeks but in the different eligibility broadening. It is important that we look at the total cost rather than just look at very simplistic things like how many weeks and the total number of weeks. I think this Government has very clearly expended a great deal extra as I have said in moving to 18 weeks from 14 weeks and also broadening the eligibility. So we take the position that we show care and support for young families—we are putting the things in place to help them get the best start—for a broader section of the community in fact than this bill would give that to because this bill does not have anything to do with other care arrangements or anything to do with employment arrangements. It is simply about a number of weeks. If it had not been for the measures the Government is looking to put in place this bill would not apply to those people; it would actually leave them out in the cold so to speak.We take the view that there are a couple of ways you can address the whole issue of caring for young families: you can simply take a simplistic approach of increasing the number of weeks or you can do it via other means. We have been doing it through a balance of both—increasing the number of weeks of support but also broadening the eligibility. On the whole our view is that that gives a far better outcome across a broader group and is affordable in our current fiscal conditions whereas to accept Part 1 as it stands would simply be to put in place something that is not affordable in the coming year or the coming couple of years given the projected surpluses.Even if we were to consider it further in our forecast surpluses I would caution the House that a Government has more responsibilities than simply the services or the costs under this bill. When we do look at larger surpluses in the future we have to think about the other pressing needs across society around the services and the infrastructure that a Government is duly responsible to deliver and make sensible and pragmatic decisions about that are relevant to all of those factors. Right at the moment our position remains that to support Part 1 and to increase paid parental leave by this amount so soon is unaffordable and it is something that we cannot and will notsupport.CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): I move That the question be now put.A party vote was called for on the question That the question be now put.Ayes 58New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12.Noes 63New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.Motion not agreed to.PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): Kia ora e Te Kaiwhakahaere. In the earlier stages of this debate I posed a number of questions to the member in the chair Sue Moroney and I am disappointed they have not actually been addressed and responded to. A few more have come to mind during the subsequent course of this debate. It has been focused solely on Part 1 which deals with the first tranche of expansion in the weeks of paid parental leave. One of the assertions made by the member during her speech at the very start of this debate was that it would have a positive effect on the breastfeeding of New Zealand children. This is a topic that I never dreamt for a moment that I would be addressing here in our House of Representatives but it is something that actually is very pertinent if you are interested in the health and well-being of New Zealand children—our mokopuna young New Zealanders. It actually has a lifelong effect on the health the well-being and actually the other social outcomes for young New Zealanders if they have the maximum opportunity to have exclusive breastfeeding—that is to be fed only human breast milk for as long as possible in their childhood.Of course we on this side being scientifically minded and a Government that is based on rationality and logic accept the research in that area but what has yet to be I think demonstrated completely—and certainly to the level where I am totally convinced you can claim an extension in paid parental leave to the 22 weeks provided for in the first tranche of this bill as per Part 1—is that it will have I think the transformative effects that the member was alluding to particularly among some of the more vulnerable communities in New Zealand.We saw statistics that came from empirical studies in other countries. We saw studies conducted in Norway that were providing arguments in favour. We saw studies from the United Kingdom and America—very different cultural contexts. When the Ministry of Health came in to talk to the New Zealand example which is very different to those Nordic Scandinavian North American or European examples the evidence was a little bit less clear. So the questions I suppose I have for the member are about what weighting she puts on the figures that actually show that Māori and Pasifika people do have a significantly lower rate of breastfeeding—particularly exclusive breastfeeding—and how she thinks the extension of paid parental leave to 22 weeks will have a significant or transformative effect on those communities where there is a major underrepresentation of exclusive breastfeeding.Similarly I would also like to know whether she thinks that there might be I guess in some ways negative consequences by saying that you have to stay at home—you have to be on paid parental leave—to be able to breastfeed or to be able to exclusively breastfeed. This is actually sending a negative signal out there to say that this is something that should not be encouraged in companies. Even in this place when I first started working for the National Party I actually worked for Katherine Rich who was a very fine list MP based in Dunedin at the time and she was one of the few members who actually had a baby while she was in Parliament. She was one of the pioneers I suppose in that regard and was provided with a room near the Chamber so that she was able to—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! It is interesting but Part 1 is about 22 weeks. So tie it back to 22 weeks.PAUL FOSTER-BELL: I guess the point I am making is that breastfeeding is a fundamental premise of why the member is arguing for an extension to 22 weeks. The evidence was significant but not entirely conclusive that extending paid parental leave to 22 weeks would have that transformative effect on the levels of exclusive breastfeeding and whether there would be a knock-on effect particularly to private companies but also the Public Service where we are saying you actually have to go home—you have to be on leave to be able to do this. It is a natural function but it is also very important for the health of children. It gives them that immunological nutritional—every advantage in health even educationally and going on into rates of offending.We did have a significant range of evidence. I want to commend the members of the Government Administration Committee who looked at it very closely and scrutinised that. I want to commend our tenacious committee clerk who did a wonderful job of ensuring that we followed up with officials to get access to the evidence we needed. But is the member convinced that that evidence is as clear as she seems to want to have the House believe?Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for the Environment): There is little debate in Parliament around the merits of paid parental leave. The core issue in this part is whether there is some magical number of weeks in which falls the line between good Government policy for families and children and where it does not. The member in the chair for the bill puts that line at 26 weeks or half a year. The—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No no. Part 1.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Part 1. As I understand it Mr Chairman—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Twenty-six weeks is in Part 2.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: —the duration of the extended leave is covered in this part Mr Chairman. Am I not correct? [Interruption]The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! We are on Part 1 and that refers to 16—[Interruption] When I am ruling we will have some silence please. We are on—if the member would like to sit while I just rule on this.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Certainly.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): We are on Part 1 and Part 1 refers to 22 weeks. Part 2 refers to 26 weeks so I will ask the member to come back to 22 weeks in Part 1.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Indeed Mr Chairman. As I was saying there is an arbitrary argument around the exact number of weeks of paid parental leave that should be provided.Carmel Sepuloni: Like the number of houses that Minister was supposed to build—arbitrary number.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Well actually we are building double the number of houses—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! Now relevance here. We are not talking about roads of national significance and we are not talking about houses; we are talking about 22 weeks.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Speaking to the point of order Mr Chairman.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No no I have ruled so just carry on with Part 1 please.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: If members opposite interject on a completely different topic—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I am ruling. You have got the call and it is Part 1.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The debate around the number of weeks that it is appropriate to provide for paid parental leave effectively comes down to an issue of fiscal prudence. This Government stood on a platform of living within its means. Although paid parental leave has been extended we have worked very hard as a Government to ensure that we balance the booksbut let nobody misunderstand the surplus is absolutely wafer-thin. In fact every time there is a new level of forecasts there is a bigger difference from month to month in the size of the surplus. So for instance last year this Parliament debated back and forth and I do not think any Minister including the Minister of Finance knew whether it was going to be a black number or a red number. And even the 2 financial years where we are looking out in out-years those numbers are under 1 percent of what the Government spends.The problem is that in every single area of Government endeavour there is an argument from the Opposition that it is not enough. Paid parental leave is no different to any other area. Whether it is issues of mental health whether it is issues in the broader health care sector whether it is issues of housing or whether it is education medicine or whatever including paid parental leave the Opposition always says: “It is not enough.” And that is where the Opposition is in paid parental leave. The Government’s position is quite simple and is this: if we spent in every single area including this one where members opposite want to spend we would be back in the position we were in when they left Government—of horrendous and increasing deficits increasing debt.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Come back.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Well at the core of the issue at the core of the debate about paid parental leave is the issue of affordability. The reason that members on this side of the Chamber say yes we are in favour of extending paid parental leave but at a rate that is affordable is that if we go down the road proposed by the Opposition—whether it be in this policy area or any other—the level of increase in expenditure will just get New Zealand into the sort of financial pickle that other Governments and previous Governments in this country have got themselves into. They know how to spend but they do not know how to earn and they do not know how to live within their means.So I simply come back again and say that paid parental leave is a good thing. This Government is proud of its record but what differentiates this Government from members opposite is that we know how to live within our means.Phil Twyford: You’ve borrowed more than any other Government in history.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Members opposite clearly do not know. I am simply saying I am very proud. Members opposite are questioning the Government’s fiscal record. I think the fact that we have produced three consecutive very small surpluses—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No. This is getting very wide. I would like to hear about 22 weeks. That is what Part—[Interruption] Order! The member will sit while I am ruling. It is all very well talking about surpluses and talking about deficits and talking about other things but this is really quite a narrow debate that talks about 22 weeks and I would actually like the member to mention somewhere 22 weeks.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I am very happy to mention 22 weeks and the reason the Government does not support the extension of paid parental leave is that when we are running wafer-thin surpluses when we have worked so hard to get New Zealand back in the black when our Government has campaigned election after election successfully on a message of living within our means—PEENI HENARE (Labour—Tāmaki Makaurau): I move That the question be now put.A party vote was called for on the question that the question be now put.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): We will have silence when votes are taken thank you.A party vote was called for on the question That the question be now put.Ayes 60New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2.Noes 61New Zealand National 59; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.Motion not agreed to.MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney): I am very pleased to take a second call on Part 1 of the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill in relation to 22 weeks of paid parental leave. I do want to come back to the cost and I do want to talk about that because it is significant. It is the primary reason why we are opposing this bill. It is not that we do not support paid parental leave and I support the comments of Minister Dr Nick Smith who took a call before me on that. He outlined that very clearly.I want to talk about some of the submissions we heard and some of the concerns I had as a Government Administration Committee member. I know the last time I took a call when I sat down one of the Green Party members got up and said I was—I forget the term now but it was something like mansplaining—Hon Member: Manscaping?MARK MITCHELL: —man-something. Basically it was an attack on me because I am a man and I dared to take a call on this bill.Brett Hudson: Did you apologise for it?MARK MITCHELL: There was no apology that came. I was highly offended by the comment but I am actually used to that. I understand why the Labour whip would take a point of order. That is something that a National Party member would never do against another National Party member.Iain Lees-Galloway: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. You have ruled on that matter and matters of procedure are not part of Part 1 of this bill.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I do ask members to come back to the part. If you are serious about the relevancy of Part 1 I would ask you to come back to the part. It is a very narrow debate. It is about 22 weeks. You can refer to what happened in the select committee and how you came to report back to the Committee of the whole House but I do ask that you concentrate on Part 1 and specifically on why it is important that it is now 22 weeks or otherwise.MARK MITCHELL: Let me come back to the 22 weeks and also let me come back to the point that I was going to make.Hon Ruth Dyson: What do you mean “come back”? You have to have been there to come back.MARK MITCHELL: I am sure the chair of the committee Ruth Dyson will get up and take a call and support me on this. She supported me in the committee when I raised this issue. My concern is that I think we all accept breastfeeding and breast milk—if a new mother is able to do that it is definitely the best thing for her child without a doubt. I do not think we challenged the science around that or the submissions that were made to the committee. The one concern I had with some of the language that was being used and some of the discussions in the committee—the risk is that if a new mother for whatever reason whether it be medical or physical was unable to actually breastfeed her baby somehow her role as a mother was diminished. If a mother—Iain Lees-Galloway: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. This discussion about the merits of breastfeeding although interesting is well wide of Part 1 of this legislation.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): If it was part of the submissions that were heard and it relates to why 22 weeks is important then that is fair enough. But I do ask the member—this is my second time asking the member to concentrate on Part 1. Otherwise I will terminate his speech.MARK MITCHELL: The point I am trying to make as it relates to 22 weeks of paid parental leave is the fact that we just have to be very careful that as part of the debate we do not send a message to new parents that if they are not taking 22 weeks’ or if they are not even taking 18 weeks’ paid parental leave actually it does not mean they are not able to form a strong bond with their child. It does not mean that somehow their role as a parent is diminished. I know that in my own circumstances with my mother she was not in that position and yet I feel my siblings and I have got a very strong healthy bond with my mother. She has been an outstanding mother.I do want to come back to the cost. I know there has been significant focus on this but I do want to discuss it because the fact of the matter is that if we take half a billion dollars over the next 4 years—and I think the Minister highlighted the fact that although this Government has been very successful in its economic management with a finance Minister who has delivered us back into a situation where we have surpluses—albeit thin surpluses—when we came into Government we were projected to have 10 years of deficits at least. That is an achievement in itself and it puts us in a better position. Ultimately it may put the Government in the position where it has got additional funds to be able to decide where in the economy it is going to be best used for everyone for all of us as Kiwis. But at the moment we are facing a bill for an additional half a billion dollars over 4 years.I guess I will take it back to my own electorate. A fortnight ago we were very lucky to open a complete new rebuild of the junior side of Warkworth Primary School something that—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No. We are not talking about education; we are talking about this.MARK MITCHELL: OK. I understand Mr Chairperson. I guess I am trying to use real examples in terms of the fiscal impact of an additional half a billion dollars of spending over the next 4 years which is significant. So let me be more general in my comments. When the Government makes its decisions around appropriations then of course we have to be very focused—CARMEL SEPULONI (Junior Whip—Labour): I move That the question be now put.A party vote was called for on the question That the question be now put.Ayes 60New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2.Noes 61New Zealand National 59; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.Motion not agreed to.Hon JO GOODHEW (Minister for the Community and Voluntary Sector): I am really pleased to take a call on this Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill. In using the full title of the bill I particularly want to refer to Part 1 where we are looking at the changes between the number of weeks. Included in Part 1 of course there are the amendments around paternity leave entitlements and partners and around work contact. But philosophically the philosophy behind the Part 1 changes is around extending paid parental leave out to 22 weeks. Behind that philosophy and I am sure through the submissions to the Government Administration Committee what was heard was the difference it would make to extend through this bill paid parental leave to 22 weeks.In recognising what stage a baby is at and its attachment to its mother or in fact parental leave for its father between the difference of what this Government has done—taken14 weeks up to 18 weeks—and the suggestion in these amendments to the Act that it be taken out to 22 weeks what we have philosophically is a belief that it must be done for the good of the baby and the mother irrespective of the half a billion dollars of cost that has been projected over 4 years. The debate today in this Committee stage is about whether one is more worthy than the other. We are saying as a Government that we cannot afford to take it to 22 weeks at this time despite the philosophy of the bill’s sponsor that it must be taken at this time to the detriment of expenditure on other matters.I am remembering back to when our twins were 18 weeks old and the difference between that and 22 weeks. I think the philosophy behind paid parental leave and the importance of where we were some 8 years ago at 14 weeks and now at 18 weeks—that is a phenomenal difference in the age of a child or children as it was in our case.That has been with the full support of the Opposition a good move to have made. However there comes a time when it is really important to determine whether in fact the additional fiscal burden should be taken right at this time. That is why Part 1 and the amendments that Part 1 makes to the current Act taking it out from 18 weeks to 22 weeks is philosophically about whether now is the right time. As a Government we are saying “Not yet. There are other priorities for us.”but it must be remembered that we are completely committed to children having a good start in life to the development of that bond between the parent and the children and we have consistently said that we will extend it further than the 18 weeks which it currently is out towards 22 weeks at a time when this Government can afford it. In fact we have been consistently in favour of paid parental leave as evidenced by our extending it from 14 to 18 weeks.In addition to that the important thing that has been achieved before now instead of taking it to 22 weeks is the modernisation. In this particular part it is all about 22 weeks but the modernisation that we have done of paid parental leave to understand that there are some families who need it to be longer for a very good reason—and we have budgeted and provided the funding for that in legislation that has already modernised it.So my premise here is that this is a philosophical difference about whether now is the time to take it as Part 1 suggests out to 22 weeks. I sought today to be on my feet to say that I believe in paid parental leave but that now is not the time. We have competing interests as a Government and the half a billion dollars that this will cost over 4 years is not for just now. Thank you.Hon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills): I move That the question be now put.A party vote was called for on the question That the question be now put.Ayes 60New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2.Noes 61New Zealand National 59; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.Motion not agreed to.DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): The proposition in Part 1 of this bill is that the length of time for which paid parental leave is paid to new parents should be extended from what it presently is—18 weeks—to what the bill proposes which is 22 weeks. That is the question to be debated.If you will forgive me I have a recent experience on behalf of a friend who had a baby quite recently and had it very near to the time—1 April of this year—when the entitlement period under the current legislation was changed from 14 weeks up to 18 weeks. She was also aware at this time of other changes that were being made to paid parental leave on which I will not dwell as members are well aware of what those are. It is interesting to just get an insight into how much this change actually makes to the people watching this debate on TV or listening at home on their crystal sets because ultimately these bills are about the people of New Zealand and the access that they have to the resources of Government. It is interesting because she was quite keen to hear when the amendment would go through and the changes would occur and whether or not they would occur at such a time that if her baby was born in time she would access an additional 4 weeks’ leave. Who would not want to attract an extra 4 weeks of payment when they have just had a baby at a time when they are under some financial pressure?We can actually backcast what a 4-week shift from 18 weeks to 22 weeks might look like by looking at the experience of a person who had a baby right around the time there was a similar law change to what this amendment would propose occur on 1 January 2017 which occurred on 1 April 2016—to increase paid parental leave by 4 weeks. As I said she was interested in this change and in this occurrence but not wholly interested. I can tell you why that might be and it goes to the heart of the fact of this issue and it questions the reason why Parliament has devoted so much time to debating this matter because as an expectant mother she was embarking upon a voyage that will last for around about 20 years. As soon as one begins to debate the correct length of time for the Government to offer some support the question immediately turns to “Is 22 weeks the correct length of time to pay paid parental leave in the year of 2017?” which is as long as it will continue if indeed this part and Part 2 of the bill are passed by this House.It leads you to ask about other stages of development that we might equally have used to make an argument for the optimal length of time for the Government to use scarce taxpayer resources to give money to parents. Parents sitting at home might ask what about 22 weeks is so substantial. Is it not more important to extend paid parental leave to 40 weeks? If you get to 40 weeks you are at the stage when babies begin to crawl when they can pick up objects when they can wiggle. This is actually important because this part is fundamentally about a debate about what the optimal length of time is.What is on the table is 22 weeks. I would like to illustrate by contrast that there are some other developmental stages that are important in a baby’s life that might bring into question for members in the Chamber and those listening at home whether or not there really is so much wisdom—as the Opposition and the member in charge of the bill claim—in picking this time of 22 weeks for the bill. So I do think it is germane to raise the question of whether or not it should be 40 weeksbut what about another critical time to be at home with a child? That is the time of 52 weeks the time when a baby begins to understand simple instructions. That particular period is absolutely critical in a child’s development because so much of our brains and the way that they have developed and the reason that our brains are so much larger than other animals of similar size is that we have developed such complex language.Processing and developing language is actually a task that is critical to our development; in fact it drives much of our development. If we accept the premise of this part—that we must increase the entitlement of paid parental leave from 18 weeks to 22 weeks in order to improve the quality of children’s development—then we might ask why we are prepared to extend it only to a time that will not allow parents to benefit from this bill when children are developing language which is so important to our entire species and the development of our brains.But there are further stages in a child’s development that might equally have the question asked of them. Once you start to ask about 22 weeks you come up with so many other milestones that parents sitting at home know are equally important. They might ask about 104 weeks—that is language again so critical in the development of a child—when children are expected to join sentences together. That is a critical stage because the ability to formulate full sentences is absolutely critical in the development of any child. There is much research showing that the children who are confident and articulate are those who are able to succeed in a whole manner of ways in life and that might well be a good use of scarce taxpayer resources under a bill such as this. But again parents might ask if that is really the correct balance.You can actually carry on this debate quite extensively—perhaps as far as a child’s 260th week or 5 years of age when they begin to attend primary school. I have heard it debated that there should actually be 260 weeks of paid parental leave. Why stop here? If we accept the premise that parenting is so dependent on having paid parental leave then why stop at 22 weeks? It appears to be—Sue Moroney: Then any step toward that is a positive.DAVID SEYMOUR: I hear—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member. The time has come for me to leave the Chair for the dinner break.Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Kia ora tātou. The House is resumed. Members prior to the dinner hour we were debating Part 1 of the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill. David Seymour had the call and he has 2 minutes and 11 seconds remaining should he wish to avail himself.DAVID SEYMOUR: Thank you Mr Chairman and I do indeed wish to avail myself of this remaining 2 minutes and 11 seconds or whatever is now left of that as my contribution to the Committee stage debating Part 1 of this bill.Mr Chair when one of your fellow presiding officers was here I was just making the point that there are actually very interesting stages of development throughout a child’s life and the question of whether we should be voting in this Committee to extend the eligibility for paid parental leave from 18 weeks to 22 weeks on 1 January 2017 is really a question that has to be put in the context of those other developmental stages. Just to give you an idea I was referring to the development of language and the various stages of a child’s development at which language becomes an important factor because a child has reached a milestone in linguistic development and the way that that affects the development of brain capacity. Indeed language is very important as an explanation for why humans have much larger brains in comparison with their body size than other species.I would also preface that by talking about the very real personal experience of a close friend of mine who gave birth at or near 1 April this year when there was a 4-week increase in the period of eligibility for paid parental leave and the effect that that had on her. I just make the point that ultimately that particular increase although attractive was really not critical because it occurred in such a long context. The reason for that might be that this particular amendment will not affect the overwhelming majority of parents because as it has been noted in earlier debates there are approximately 60000 children born in New Zealand each year and only approximately 26000 parents actually take advantage of paid parental leave.The premise that we have been asked to accept by the Opposition and the member in charge of this bill is that paid parental leave makes such a substantial difference that it is critical to the upbringing of a child—that it is critical tonight that we increase the period of time for which a child qualifies as rapidly as possible and that we do that in time for 1 January next year. Yet how can it be simultaneously true that this 4-week increase is so important to the welfare of children and yet at the same time we find that the majority of parents will not be affected whatsoever because they do not take up any amount of paid parental leave for any length of time?The other interesting thing about this particular amendment to move from 18 weeks to 22 weeks is that it actually is very poorly targeted at people who really need additional care and additional resource. You might contrast that with an amendment the Government has recently made to paid parental leave that extends it for babies who are born prematurely. You can look at the data that this Government increasingly has when it chooses to direct the State’s resources to increasing outcomes for children. What we find—for instance from the outcomes of the Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Study which was presented in an excellent lecture to parliamentarians over the dinner break and it is a shame that more did not take advantage of it—is that actually this bill would make an extension of State resource to around about 45 percent of kids born in an indiscriminate manner.In reality this Government now has a lot of data through its social investment framework to show that rather than applying wholesale increases and extra resources for an additional 4 weeks to the 45 percent of children whose parents have self-selected to apply for and receive their paid parental leave entitlement this bill is actually going to lack the targeting that could be so much better in terms of getting outcomes by applying resources to those who are in greatest need. Let me give you a few examples from this rich data set that the Government now has available and that we should be applying scarce resources to rather than applying them wholesale—Iain Lees-Galloway: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. Although the member is speaking about the bill in broad terms he is not really addressing Part 1 which I think he should be doing at this point.DAVID SEYMOUR: Speaking to the point of order Mr Chair I can absolutely assure you that I am speaking to the question of whether this part which extends resources wholesale to a wide range of the population is the most efficient way to apply resources.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): OK well I am ready to make a ruling. The member will know I have already given one signal to keep it narrow. Although the member may well have been speaking to that up here in his head it needs to be delivered because it is not what he is thinking that is in or out as far as relevancy goes; it is what he says. If he can keep bringing that back to his 22 weeks over the next minute and 14 seconds he will be doing great.DAVID SEYMOUR: Thank you Mr Chair. I suspect that my greatest challenge of all is to ensure not only that I am thinking it here in my head and speaking it here with my voice but also that you Mr Chair are hearing it there in your ears.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Don’t go there OK?DAVID SEYMOUR: Let me continue by saying that it has been raised in this debate—by members who are in favour of the bill and members who are opposed to the bill and opposed to this part and in favour of this part—that it is the best or in some speakers’ cases an inefficient use of the Government’s resource to have a wholesale increase in the entitlement for all parents from 18 weeks to 22 weeks when arguably given the resources that the Government has in terms of data it could be better targeting that resource. That is a very important consideration for members of this Committee listening to the debate but also for those people at home and those parents at home who might ask: if we are going to have a social contract where we pay an amount of tax—[Bell rung] Mr Chair?The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): David Seymour final call.DAVID SEYMOUR: If we are going to have a policy where a scarce taxpayer resource is utilised in order to achieve better outcomes for all of our children in this country then would it not be better to ensure that that investment is informed by the best data that we have? Simply saying that we wish to extend leave from 18 weeks to 22 weeks on 1 January 2017 is far too arbitrary given that there is so much need out there and we need to do so much better for our children. Yet we find ourselves with an Opposition that is not prepared to use the relevant data and is not prepared to target resources towards need but is instead content to rather arbitrarily—and as I said in the case of my friend it does seem rather arbitrary in the wider consideration of parenting that is required—try to extend paid parental leave to 22 weeks on a particular day.Why might that be? Well we actually can look at the motivations behind a part such as this and the history of those who have proposed such parts because public policy exists in a political context. Public policies that are not politically sustainable will not be sustained in a country so it is worthwhile examining what previous speakers have said about initiatives such as this and their attempts to justify them.As far back as 2002 Labour introduced paid parental leave—I think it was to only 12 weeks. Labour members would have argued at that time that it simply was not fiscally responsible to further extend paid parental leave. Of course what is interesting about 2002 is that it was an election year so I am building the case that we are not talking about extending paid parental leave from 18 weeks to 22 weeks because there is any evidential basis that this is the best use of taxpayer funds for making children better and for allowing them to develop into stronger and better citizens. There is a history where actually this type of policy has been proposed in years such as 2002 which was an election year. Labour again moved a change in the law similar to this in 2004 at exactly the time that there was a major change in the polling fortunes of the party that year. The interesting thing is that those were quite modest extensions of paid parental leave. They got us from zero to 12 weeks and 12 to 14 weeks. But the interesting thing is that at that time the Government had much much much larger fiscal surpluses than it has now.This is why targeting is so important. Today we live in a time when compared with 2002 or 2004—when we had large fiscal surpluses and political pressure on Labour in Government—there have been modest extensions. The extensions today are constrained by there being a much much smaller amount of fiscal headroom and frankly a lot more pressure on taxpayers who have suffered from acute fiscal drag since that time. When we look back at the history we can unpack some of Labour’s motivations.It is not about the welfare of children. If it was why do only 46 percent of parents who are eligible actually take it up? It is not about stages of development because as I have argued there are so many other critical stages of development that 22 weeks or even 26 weeks—which I am looking forward to debating in Part 2—will miss. It is simply about political posturing on behalf of the Labour Party to attempt to raise the age of entitlement and when you gather up the evidence that we have seen throughout the history of this particular topic when you gather up the evidence from child development and when you gather up the fiscal record of various Governments when they have attempted to increase the eligibility for paid parental leave what you find is that—[Bell rung]Iain Lees-Galloway: Thank God for that.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): No I pushed the button all by myself.A party vote was called for on the question That Part 1 be agreed to.Ayes 61New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; United Future 1.Noes 60New Zealand National 59; ACT New Zealand 1.Part 1 agreed to.Part 2 Amendments to come into force on 1 April 2018SUE MORONEY (Labour): It is a pleasure finally to rise to speak to Part 2 of the bill. This is the part that brings in 26 weeks’ paid parental leave and it brings it in on 1 April 2018. So for all of those members who debated the bill without having read it naming different dates that are completely wrong can I encourage them please to read the bill. It is 1 April 2018 when this bill proposes that New Zealanders should be able to embrace 26 weeks’ paid parental leave. And why 26 weeks’ paid parental leave? Well it is not just a figure plucked out of the air; it is not just a figure that is an excuse for trying to filibuster a bill. It is a number that is based on—Hon Member: Politicise—politicise.SUE MORONEY: No no it is not politicising the issue of children and their families as the Government is so interested in doing. It is based on what the World Health Organization says actually. So I would like Government members to listen up to that. The World Health Organization recommends exclusive breastfeeding to 6 months. It recommends this not because it is its personal view but because of the research and evidence that says that if as a country we can support women to be able to achieve that—and I acknowledge that not everyone can; but where we can we should—that will reduce the amount of money the rest of us have to pay on hospital admissions.Even if we were to be completely selfish about this that would be a good enough reason in itself. But I am not prepared to be completely selfish about this because it is also about the health of that child—the health and well-being of that child throughout their entire life from the age of 26 weeks right through their adolescence right through their adulthood—and the ability for them to lead the most fulfilling life possible. Is that not what we should all be embracing? Is that not what we here in this Parliament should be dedicating our time towards? I certainly believe that is what we should be doing.So 26 weeks has not been plucked out of the air and yes there are arguments as it becomes affordable to this country to look to extend it further at other times. But that is not the argument that Labour Party members are mounting at this point in time. We are saying right here right now that in fact in 2012—right there right then—it was affordable and it still is today. How do I know this? How ironic is it that we are having this debate here today on the very same day that the Government has plucked a figure of $20 billion out of the air for defence? Here we have the Government MPs today saying that 26 weeks’ paid parental leave is unaffordable but on the very same day $20 billion is magically plucked out of the air for defence—well that is affordable. I think that tells us everything we need to know about the Government’s priorities: defence spending over children. Is that not what we expect to see from a National Government? And it has been played out again today.I want to put on the table the agreed figures—not the made-up figures not the trumped-up exaggerated ones that the Government MPs have been using tonight but the figures given to us by officials and agreed to by the Government Administration Committee. Around that select committee table we were able to get rid of the politics for that nanosecond of time and focus on the things that mattered and here is what we agreed to:we agreed that to reach 26 weeks’ paid parental leave in the next financial year—that is financial year 2016-17—it would be $12.7 million. In the Budget year 2017-18 it would be $65.4 million additional. At full implementation in the year 2018-19 it would reach $107 million. That sounds like a lot of money when you are working on your household budget but here is the other element: we also agreed—because officials gave us research and evidence and data that supported it—that on full implementation there will be around $30 million worth of immediate savings. That is not even going near the big cost savings out in future years which all the experts tell us are where the big cost savings are to be had. That is on day one—on day one—of implementing 26 weeks’ paid parental leave which Part 2 brings into law. Then we would save in the order of $30 million every year.We need to think about this in context because these are big numbers. What does it mean in the context of Government spending? For next year it would mean just 0.7 percent of the additional money that the Government has already committed in the Budget. That is not of the entire amount that the Government is spending—that is such a small decimal point I cannot even get my head around it—but just of the additional spending the $1.8 billion of additional spending this Government did without raising anyone’s taxes and without causing any major drama; 0.7 percent of that amount is what this bill would cost in that year. Let us go to the 2017-18 Budget year. It would be 3.6 percent of the additional spending that the Government is planning for that year. Then as I said before finally we would get to the gross amount of $107 million.People might wonder why there is a bit of disagreement going on between the National Government and this side about what the costings are. There should not be any room for disagreement because the officials’ figures are the official figures. But here is the game that the Government is playing. What it is doing is it is adding all of those years up together for 5 years and then it is adding a bit on the top as well. That is what it is doing because I heard several of those members say $500 million dollars.Brett Hudson: It’s $466 million.SUE MORONEY: It is not even $466 million either Mr Hudson.Brett Hudson: Yes it is.SUE MORONEY: No it is not. What we have agreed in the select committee is to work on the return to work assumptions. What this means is that not everyone is going to take—Paul Foster-Bell: Assumption. It’s a word.SUE MORONEY: No they are—well they are not assumptions because they are based on what actually happens right now. It is based on what actually happens right now. Not every single woman—when they take their 18 weeks’ paid parental leave they do not all take 18 weeks. They do not all take the 18 weeks. So it is based on real-life data—what we know. I am surprised that members who were on the select committee do not understand this because we went through it and dotted the i’s and crossed all the t’s on it. We had a lot of debate about it and they still do not seem to get it.What we know is that 2 months before the paid parental leave provision runs out around about 5 percent of women will return to work. Why will they return to work? Well there are a number of different reasons. More and more frequently it is because the payment for paid parental leave is nothing near their ordinary wage which means that they cannot afford to stay off work for any longer. As that Government keeps putting housing costs up all the time they are struggling to pay the rent. They are struggling to pay the mortgage. They are never going to be able save to get into their first home. So people are returning to work sooner and 5 percent of them will come back in the fourth month. A further 10 percent of them we know will come back at the fifth month. By the time we get to the sixth month—the 26 weeks—another 15 percent of them will have already returned to work.Those are the figures that the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment (MBIE) used—“MoBIE” sorry; I should call it by its correct name. “MoBIE” used those figures to inform the select committee. Now that Government is using other figures to try to trump it up to make it sound like it is more expensive than it actually will be. What is its motivation? What could possibly be its motivation? It is trying to give some sort of bizarre justification to a financial veto. That is why it is using trumped-up figures. It is disrespectful to families it is disrespectful to the select committee process it is disrespectful to all of the submitters who came and talked to us and asked us to make sure that we got it costed properly and it is disrespectful to the officials who worked hard on providing this information for the select committee.I urgeGovernment MPs not to continue to play politics with this bill not to continue to exaggerate the figures when they know the truth of the cost and not to try to give themselves an excuse for the embarrassment that they are now bringing upon themselves to suffer of putting a veto against the democratic process in this Parliament. That is the position they are putting themselves in. They are arguing against the majority of New Zealanders. They are arguing against the majority of MPs. I want to say to those MPs who are taking this seriously who are giving it the due respect and the scrutiny that it deserves that those MPs have made this decision after giving full scrutiny to the research and evidence and to the financial information looking at the broader picture and saying yes this is affordable for New Zealand now. Not only is it affordable but also if we do not do it then we are choosing a future that is not good for New Zealand.PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): E Te Kaiwhakahaere tēnā koe. Thank you for this opportunity to contribute to Part 2 of this Committee of the whole House debate. I want to pose a couple of questions to the member on Part 2 of this bill. I do not have high hopes that they will be answered or even addressed given what happened with my questions on Part 1 but I am going to ask them anyway. I have a couple of comments to make first though on the contribution of the member in charge of this bill Sue Moroney.Firstly I think that the comparison that has been drawn between the extra funding that has been sought via this measure and the $20 billion investment into our Defence Force which is being considered in the white paper process is completely fallacious and specious and I think quite misleading to the public. I think Governments over a number of generations now have accepted that the defence of the realm is the first and absolutely primary responsibility of any Government. No child in this country—Richard Prosser: We haven’t seen any proof of that out of you lot.PAUL FOSTER-BELL: No child in this country Mr Prosser is able to live a happy and healthy and productive life in this country if they do not live in a safe country that is well guarded and well defended and that is why that investment in our Defence Force is required.Secondly the term over which the member is talking is quite different. She is comparing apples and pears. That is an investment to be considered over a 15-year period whereas the costings that the Government side has been quite correctly using—and let us point out that these are Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment costings and I think it is disrespectful to the officials who did their very best work and submitted those figures—in some cases they were estimates Ms Moroney and in some cases they were forecasts. They are predictions; they are guesses because this is something that might happen in the future. Those very best guesses that the ministry was able to give us were in the range of just under half a billion dollars but over a 4-year period once this policy takes full force. So she is comparing something over a 4-year period with something over a 15-year period. I think that that is a very false comparison to make and it is quite misleading to any of the poor unfortunate viewers who may be following this debate this evening.Thirdly I want to turn to the fact that there was a split view—in fact a mixed series of opinions—given to us as we heard submissions on the Government Administration Committee. I want to reference in particular the submission made to the committee by the Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) because I think that evidences very much the fact that there is not universal agreement on this among the NGOs and those who care very deeply about the well-being of children in New Zealand. In referencing the submission presented by Associate Professor Susan St John the respected professor at Auckland University I would like to quote directly from the submission if I may.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): You are talking about 26 weeks now.PAUL FOSTER-BELL: So in terms of the 26 weeks what the Child Poverty Action Group had to say was “Extending the duration of [paid parental leave] will have no impact on child poverty which is the most critical issue at this time and a stated priority of the Government.”—Carmel Sepuloni: Nothing the National Government has done has had an impact—PAUL FOSTER-BELL: —contrary it seems to what the Opposition whip is screaming out at the moment. “In fact”—it went on to say—“spending more on PPL may preclude other more vital spending for the 250000 children in New Zealand enduring poverty such as extending the full Working for Families package to all the low income families with children as CPAG has recommended.”.So in its submission No.1 the Child Poverty Action Group submitted that the extension of paid parental leave to 26 weeks as is proposed in Part 2 of this bill be delayed until there is adequate recognition of the needs of all newborns. This I think backs up some of the points that members on this side of the Chamber have been making thus far in the debate. There are always competing priorities for precious taxpayer dollars. This is one very important area—looking out for our youngest and most vulnerable citizens—but it is not only this measure that is competing for those precious taxpayer dollars and to divert resources from our hospital system from our education system and even from the defence of this country in order to extend this measure to something that we are not able to afford is in my view the wrong path of action to take. It is not just members on this side of the Chamber who are saying it. There are other people saying it including some whom we would often disagree with such as the Child Poverty Action Group which I think gave quite a persuasive submission to the select committee.So I would like to hear from the member in the chair the sponsor of this bill what her view was on its submission and why she thinks it is important that we ignore that and actually proceed with 26 weeks which she argues is not an arbitrary figure but is a World Health Organization - mandated figure.IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): It seems to be my lot in life at the moment to follow Paul Foster-Bell in this debating chamber which is fine by me because he gives me plenty of material. So what this comes down to is whether the Government will support extending paid parental leave to 26 weeks or whether it will not and it comes down to priorities. We have heard from the Government that it is not prepared to spend the money on extending paid parental leave to 26 weeks. That is all it comes down to.Then we heard from Paul Foster-Bell: “Well if we did that we’d have to take the money from health or we’d have to take the money from education or we’d have to take the money from some other part of the welfare State.” I have got a suggestion. The Prime Minister says we can afford $3 billion worth of tax cuts—not $3 billion over 15 years or $3 billion over 20 years but $3 billion year after year after year. The Prime Minister says we can afford $3 billion worth of tax cuts. Take it from that. Take it from that.I am not even sure what the percentage is because it is so minuscule. It is such a tiny number—far less than 1 percent of what the Prime Minister says we can afford in tax cuts—that we could use to extend paid parental leave to 26 weeks. That is a far better use of that money. The return we would get on that investment is far better than simply handing out $3 billion and we know where it goes when the National Government gives tax cuts. It goes to the people at the very top. It certainly will not be going to the people who would benefit from getting paid parental leave extended to 26 weeks. So there is the solution.Paul Foster-Bell has been asking questions. He wants to hear the answers. Where is the money coming from? There is—Paul Foster-Bell: What’s the answer?IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: There is the answer Paul Foster-Bell. There is the answer—0.03 of a percent. So the Prime Minister can still have his tax cuts and we want just 0.03 percent of that to extend paid parental leave to 26 weeks. There is the answer—there is the answer. I get all these spurious questions and Paul Foster-Bell laments the fact that he is not getting answers from Sue Moroney in the chair or from the members opposite. There is the answer. It is very straightforward.This Government can find money for its projects that it prioritises. It has already accepted that paid parental leave is a good investment. It took it a while. It took a long time to catch up. It insisted back when Labour and the Greens—and I am not sure what New Zealand First’s position on it was at the time so I will not put words in its members’ mouths but back when paid parental leave was first introduced back when we had those surpluses David Seymour was talking about earlier on National members said it was not affordable then. So they have never thought it was affordable because it has never been a priority to them.The money can be found. It can be found from all sorts of different places if we just set this as a priority if we just make children a priority. But the easy answer is to take 0.03 percent of the tax cuts the Prime Minister says are going to be affordable. Take that money and extend paid parental leave to 26 weeks. It is not hard.MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney): It is my pleasure to take a call on Part 2 of the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill and to talk about the proposed 26 weeks of paid parental leave. I was a bit worried about Mr Prosser because a burst blood vessel is actually really bad for your health Richard. I want to acknowledge Clayton Mitchell and the contribution he has made. I would invite him to get up and make another one.Iain Lees-Galloway: It’s not the Academy Awards. Just talk about Part 2.MARK MITCHELL: I just want to—oh Mr Lees-Galloway is getting excited over there again.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): So here we go.MARK MITCHELL: Sorry Mr Chair you are right. What I would like to do is just address some comments that the sponsor of the bill Sue Moroney made in her speech and that was around the third time tonight that I have heard her talk about the announcement that was made today about the defence white paper—and if you will bear with me Mr Chairman these comments were made by the sponsor of the bill—and the fact that the Government has committed $20 billion over the next 15 years to invest back into our New Zealand Defence Force. But I just want to highlight the fact that in actual fact in terms of spend in New Zealand we commit about 1.1 percent of our GDP annually to our New Zealand Defence Force and if we compare that to say the US which—Richard Prosser: That’s not the net figure though is it? Take off depreciation and take off the capital charge it’s about 0.87. More disingenuity from National.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Order!MARK MITCHELL: I have not fact-checked this—I am concerned about the blood pressure as well Mr Chair—but I have not fact-checked this and I think the US is about 3.4—Denise Roche: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. In the previous parts we have had lots of instruction to keep our comments to within the part in the bill that we are discussing and I really think that the speaker on that side has gone off point.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Well thank you for your guidance. Relevancy is a matter for the person in the Chair at the time. I had the privilege of listening to that debate on the radio as I was driving down—which says more about me than anything—but I invite the member who has the call Mark Mitchell to continue and make his point succinctly.MARK MITCHELL: Thank you Mr Chair. So if we look at Australia—and again I think the Minister of Defence commented today at his press conference—it is about 2.1—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Yes OK. You are not doing it so move on.MARK MITCHELL: —and Canada is pretty close to us. But I want to make reference to the fact that the sponsor of the bill highlighted the investment into the New Zealand Defence Force as if to say that if we can make that type of investment as a country then we should be able to take that money and allocate it to paid parental leave; but they are two totally different separate issues. Actually if you are talking about the health and well-being of our children the security of our country and our economic zone is actually pretty important to the health and well-being of our children. I watched with great interest the debate in the House of Commons in the UK towards the end of last year when the chairman of the Defence Committee got up and made a very compelling argument for increased spending actually in the UK’s defence forces because the threats and the security situation—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Order! The member has been given as much latitude as he is going to get. He either gets to Part 2 or he sits down. I notice he is currently sitting down.Hon Members: He’s coming in to land.MARK MITCHELL: I am coming in to land—I am coming in to land.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): No he cannot come to it eventually;he has got to come to it now.MARK MITCHELL: Thank you Mr Chair. So my point is that I cannot make the link between saying that the Government has committed to an additional $20 billion of funding over 15 years for our New Zealand Defence Force and money that we are talking about now over the next 4 years for paid parental leave because the reality of the matter is that—and we spoke about it earlier in the night—when this Government came into office we were facing deficits for a decade. The Minister of Finance and our economic team in Cabinet and caucus have been fiscally disciplined around making sure that we get the country back into surplus which is what we have done. It might be a thin one but it is growing every year. That will provide opportunities and that will provide in the coming years decisions for the Government to make about where that additional money and funding will be spent. Of course the decision will always be whether we will continue to pay down debt because if we are talking about kids the last thing I want is our children or our grandchildren inheriting a debt that we have built up over time because we have been irresponsible in the way that we have spent the money that comes in.I think that the argument that the Opposition whip put up around tax cuts is—let us understand one thing. If we make a tax cut—Iain Lees-Galloway: I’m not a whip. I am just sitting here.MARK MITCHELL: Well he is pretending. Maybe he is the pretend whip—I do not know. He seems to be a lot more vocal than the whip tonight—I will put it that way. But the point that I would make is that if the Government decides to make a tax cut—CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): It is wonderful to take a call on Part 2 of tonight’s bill the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill. I have to say to Mark Mitchell: “Mate you were putting a glass eye to sleep with that speech.” Let us just try to bring some context back to what we are here to talk about which is the extension of paid parental leave from 22 weeks out to 26 weeks.What I am hearing over there—although it is a bit of fluffery and a little bit of pokery—is that the Government members would like to support this because they can see the sense in it “But you know what we just can’t quite afford it at the moment.” This is what the discussion is all about. Yes we are right on the mark are we not? Except you are not very good at articulating that tonight—the National members just seem to be fighting over a chip like seagulls mate—so let us try to put it very clearly.The reality is that it is going to cost around $100 million per annum to extend paid parental leave out to 26 weeks. If I look at that—$107 million I think somebody is giving me the nod for but we all agree that it is around the $100 million mark. I think the honourable member Iain Lees-Galloway does make a very valid point: building up to the election we were talking about tax cuts that we could no longer afford and they are likely to be on the table for next year—and 0.03 percent of the tax cuts that have been put forward for next year’s Budget is more than enough to pay out on $100 million of paid parental leave.You might not think that that is enough money to find but if you go back through the coffers of the National Government’s decisions over the years you will see that when times were tough when we had a global financial crisis this Government which sits across from us today and says it cannot afford $100 million a year found $1 billion to bail out its South Canterbury Finance mates—$1 billion. When times were so tough and businesses were hitting the wall the Government found $1 billion to go and do that. Just this year when times were so tough it found $27 million to do a flag referendum. It found $16 million to go and invest offshore over in Saudi Arabia in the Middle East there to build an abattoir that gives no benefit to New Zealand businesses. It has found $140 million to go and invest in China’s infrastructure. When this Government decides to find money it knows exactly where to find it.What this comes down to is the Government’s mean-spirited nature in stopping a bill going forward that is going to benefit families and our communities in this country. That is what it comes down to Mr Mitchell not this: “Well we can’t quite afford it.” If I could just bring people’s attention—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Just come back to the bill.CLAYTON MITCHELL: Twenty-six weeks—that is what it is about and the affordability of it.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): And the movement to 26 weeks from 22. That is what this part is about so let us—[Interruption] Clear the hell out of that. Go on.CLAYTON MITCHELL: I do want to note that when we talk about the OECD when it suits the Government members are the first people to jump up and say: “OECD figures show that we’re at the top 4 percent when it comes to jobs.”The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): This does not really sound much like the part we are talking about. [Interruption] You have spent two-thirds of your time talking about the other bit.CLAYTON MITCHELL: When we talk about paid parental leave the Government says: “It is not in our interest; we are not interested in what the OECD is.” But it is interesting to know that when you look at the 41 countries here New Zealand is currently in the bottom seven when it comes to paid parental weeks given—18 weeks. But in actual fact by the time you look at the average payment rates of all of these countries in the OECD we are in the bottom three countries. We pay out only 47 percent of the average of the rest of the world. These countries that pay out 16 weeks’ paid parental leave or 14 weeks’ paid parental leave invariably give 100 percent of the national average annual salary to take home which doubles that figure. We are still even going to 26 weeks going to be well behind the rest of the world when we compare ourselves with countries in the OECD.This is affordable. This is about our communities. This is about connecting our families. It is about putting priorities back into from the Government’s position actually holding privileged positions to make sure that our families can look after themselves properly. We need to get back to enabling one-income families to support themselves moving forward. We need to get back to families being given the time to spend to connect to bond with their children and to nurture and to breastfeed them. This is what this bill does and I cannot see any justification from this Government’s position to say otherwise.JAN LOGIE (Green): I would like to speak to this Part 2 of the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill brought forward by Sue Moroney. Others have spoken I think quite coherently about and demonstrated quite clearly the meanness of this Government in refusing to support this. So in this contribution I am actually going to try to dwell on the benefits of 6 months—of the 26 weeks as opposed to the 22. I am hoping the Chair is going to appreciate that effort.There are very significant reasons for the 6 months. The first one which was already mentioned by the sponsor of the bill is that the World Health Organization recommends exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6 months of a baby’s life. Anyone who listened to the submissions and anyone who has been in a family who has had a baby and who has tried to juggle work and the needs of their baby and breastfeeding will know that it is an exceptionally difficult thing to do. We certainly heard from people presenting to the Government Administration Committee about how they were unable to manage work and breastfeeding and their sanity so they left their jobs because they could not manage those things and they had to put their child first by continuing to breastfeed. That had a very significant financial cost to those families and it had career consequences for those women.It was a demonstration of a time when they were trying to juggle those things. The stress on them and their baby was unacceptable. That is ultimately what this bill is about—removing that stress and ensuring those babies and those families are supported by our employment laws to be able to work and maintain attachment to the workplace and have a family. You know that is how most people live. As a country we have a responsibility collectively to our children and our employment law is one way we can demonstrate that.Another reason for the 6 months—the 26 weeks—is that actually employers told us it would help them manage workflows and leave. It is much easier to find somebody to fill in for 6 months. When it is a shorter period they typically fill in and have other people cover that person’s job and it is actually much more difficult to manage. Also the other benefit of the 26 weeks is that when they employ somebody on a contract to fill in for those 6 months somebody else is getting access to the job market who was not in it earlier. There are so many benefits that kick in at 6 months and they do not kick in earlier.The Green Party’s policy is for 13 months and I do not think that is unreasonable when I consider that booming economies like the Czech Republic and Estonia somehow manage to offer 3 years of paid parental leave. It does just kind of grate a little bit to hear from this Government that it thinks 26 weeks is just too much of a stretch and out of our affordability range. I am personally more aspirational for New Zealand. I think we can do 6 months. I think that with the will of the people and with our economy—you know the resources we may have as a country—we can cover it.When we hear the arguments about the in-work tax credit and how that should be more of a priority—I absolutely believe we should extend the in-work tax credit to people. I do not think that it should be either/or; I think it should be both and that we will be better off as a country and that our children and babies will be better off if we do both. But strangely this Government has voted against both of those things repeatedly. So it is telling us that an argument against this is the in-work tax credit—hmm! Strangely it has a record of not supporting that either.SARAH DOWIE (National—Invercargill): Ms Moroney it is an absolute delight to take a second call on Part 2 of this Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill. Part 2 as we have heard is about extending paid parental leave from 22 weeks to 26 weeks on 1 April 2018. Notwithstanding the arguments about the finances and the fact that this side of the Chamber believes that our funds are better spent elsewhere at this time and that it is about a suite of measures to give children and families the best start in life and given that this side of the Chamber actually agrees that paid parental leave is a good idea and that I myself have put it on record that the concept of paid parental leave is a very good thing I am going to focus on what the 4 weeks from extending the 22 weeks to 26 weeks would afford to mothers and/or fathers because of course paid parental leave now extends to both parents and to carers.We have already heard in Part 1 about the benefits that paid parental leave affords for breastfeeding. As a mother who could not breastfeed paid parental leave was still very vital in respect of bottle-feeding. We cannot forget that. Yes breastfeeding is considered best—the right vitamins and nutrients provided for baby—but it is still a very intimate experience to bottle-feed your baby and that should not be lost or criticised. Some women cannot breastfeed or choose not to but it is still a very valuable time to bond with baby and an intimate experience to feed baby.Moving on from that in respect of the increase from 22 weeks to 26 weeks those extra 4 weeks afford more than just bonding with baby. It is something that I have focused on in other speeches on this subject. It is the factor of isolation and the part that isolation can play in a young mum’s or young dad’s life or in a first-time mum’s or dad’s life when they first have baby. It can often happen if a person is isolated geographically but it can also happen in cities if people are isolated from family members. For example when I first had my child I had a friend who had migrated from Australia to Southland who did not have the luxury of family and wider whānau support and because of that she was isolated. Coming back to what that increase of 4 weeks from 22 weeks to 26 weeks would afford it is extra time to get involved in community activities with that extra financial support provided through paid parental leave and to get involved with groups that provide support.When you look at groups like Plunket—and for me I have often talked about my involvement with SPACE through Playcentre Supporting Parents Alongside Children’s Education a course for first-time parents—it is about getting involved with those people who are going through the same changes as you: raising baby looking to bond with baby going through the challenges of the child’s development—Richard Prosser: You’re sounding like you’re wanting to vote in favour.SARAH DOWIE: Well I will round it off Mr Prosser. I will round it off. The extra 4 weeks afford that time to bond with other mothers or fathers and they in turn give support to those parents—that parent who could be isolated. That is a positive thing that the increase from 22 weeks to 26 weeks allows. It extends the paid parental leave period and gives that extra financial support to that family to enable them to do that.CATHERINE DELAHUNTY (Green): Kia ora Mr Chair. I almost feel like allowing the previous speaker another call because she was making such great arguments—fantastic arguments for extending paid parental leave from 22 to 26 weeks because it makes so much sense. It is a pity that people in this House do not really have the choice to vote for what they believe in sometimes because I think that member Sarah Dowie was expressing a real belief in the importance of relationships with babies and the importance of parents having strong relationships with babies. Good on her for standing up for that because one thing we know about our kids and relationships is that the thing we can give them that is of most importance—which is why Part 2 is so critical—is our time.Our kids need our time and if we have to go to work we cannot give them that time. After the initial insanity of becoming a parent particularly for mothers—because really you have no idea what is happening the first time—we need a lot of time to recover. I would argue that 6 months is a minimum—6 months when one’s life has completely changed and has been completely turned upside down by physical emotional economic and social status changes—because we do not actually value parenting in our society and every decision that I see made by the Government does not value parenting. We need to support this bill because it is going to give people time.I will tell you why going from 22 weeks to 26 weeks is such a brilliant idea. As we have heard tonight it is because it is good for employers it is good for employees it is good for babies it is good for mothers it is good for fathers it is good for communities it is good for the future health of the child it is good for the future education of the child it is good to break the isolation of parents it is good for relationships it is good for bonding at all levels and it is good for sanity. There is nothing more insane as I am sure the Government Administration Committee heard than being torn in 1200 different directions because after 22 weeks you were the person—the mother or the father—who was still feeling that they were just adjusting to this new little person or people in their life plus to all the other people whom they are responsible for. But no they had to go back to work.The Green Party is incredibly proud to support this bill. We think that Sue Moroney has shown—in all the parts but particularly in Part 2 because that is what we are talking about—incredible tenacity in holding on to every opportunity and in keeping the community of parents with her. Every step of the way parents are with Sue Moroney and they are with all of us who support the bill because putting aside all the financial fiscal discipline and weirdo arguments that I have heard tonight—which are really just about meanness and refusing to prioritise children—this is a positive step. As Jan Logie so rightly said we live in a country that can do this. The only reason we cannot do it is that the Government is too mean to do it. Other than that the arguments have been made the evidence has been presented the support has been demonstrated in the community the logic has been shown and the need is there.When our children are babies—whether they are breastfed or bottle-fed—they need us. I think that 13 months which is the Green Party policy is a fantastic idea and that Sue Moroney has done amazingly well to get from 22 to 26 weeks as a step towards what I know she really believes in. What she really believes in is that people should have as much time as they want—not just people who are wealthy but everybody who has a job and a child should have these options. The Government whose mantra of “choice”—it is constantly using the mantra of “choice” until honestly I feel like if I hear the word “choice” again then I am going to strangle myself with my own “choices”. Honestly if I hear that once again because if there is one thing I know—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Back to the bill.CATHERINE DELAHUNTY: —it is that in Part 2 this bill acknowledges that parents should have the choice. That is what I am standing up here tonight to say. If we are serious about anyone having any choice about anything and that actually matters then put babies and children first for once. Stop being so mean and mean-spirited and put babies and children first and allow parents to stay at home for 6 miserable months—well hopefully glorious celebratory participatory amazing months but they are quite often quite intense months. Allow parents that choice. If this bill is not to succeed never fear. The women of New Zealand will never give up. Kia ora.TRACEY MARTIN (NZ First): Kia ora. I was not going to take a call this evening but this will be the only opportunity I have to speak on this bill because it no longer falls inside my portfolio area; my colleague Clayton Mitchell will actually be taking the call in the third reading.I must speak in this Chamber because it will be a historic moment when this bill gets through this stage—which we hope is prior to 10 o’clock this evening—and when it finally goes through its third reading and when the Government fulfils its promise to veto what the majority of the elected members of New Zealand have voted for. That will be an amazing moment in the history of New Zealand because it will send such a striking message. I must stand as a woman as a mother as a New Zealander and as an elected member of this Parliament to speak to Part 2 of this bill.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): And the 26 weeks.TRACEY MARTIN: Exactly and how important 26 weeks are. I am going to speak personally about why I—not New Zealand First but why I—believe it is important that this goes to 26 weeks. It is because I believe that by extending it to 26 weeks we may just see for the first time in our history in some sort of mass movement men pick up the opportunity to take at least the last month—the last 4 weeks—of those 26 weeks and stay at home with their babies to be able to participate and to bond in the way I believe that the mass majority of young current New Zealand fathers wish to participate. They will value that time with those children and finally we will have a larger number of men who truly understand the unpaid work that is done by women over the period of time when they stay home and raise the next generation.When a young person gets in trouble in this country women and parents are the first people whom the media look for and ask: “Where are their parents? Where are those who raised them?”—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Not in the first 26 weeks they do not—come on.TRACEY MARTIN: “Where are those who bonded with them?”. If those parents are there for the 26 weeks at the beginning of that life how that story might be different. If men have some opportunity in those 26 weeks which are in Part 2 then how different might our society be. If men are able to truly feel valued inside the home as much as they feel valued inside the workforce because of the 26 weeks that is here in Part 2 how different might our society be.So I take this opportunity to support the bill that is being put forward. “Tenacity” is a word that should be tattooed somewhere on Sue Moroney because of the way she has stuck with this issue. Do not give it up; we will not.I call on the Government to think hard before it declines 26 weeks in Part 2. The majority of New Zealand’s representatives support this bill. There is only a one seat difference between that side and this side. Think hard before you decide to cast your veto.PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): Thank you for the opportunity to take a further call on this. There has been quite a lot of wide-ranging debate since I made my last contribution but I actually intend to pick up where I finished off on the question of 26 weeks. Actually I think that in this Committee we are not debating whether paid parental leave is a good thing. We are not debating the benefits. We are debating the duration when it comes to this particular part of the bill—26 weeks. The member who is sponsoring this bill Sue Moroney told us when she made her introductory comments to this part of the Committee of the whole House debate that these are not arbitrary figures that they are not random figures and that it is not her 26 weeks that she came up with. This was the World Health Organization’s mandated recommended research figure. Well is it not a bit suspicious that 26 weeks is also half a year? It seems like a very rounded-off amount of time to come to. Is the member quite sure that it was not 24 weeks or that it was not 25.7 weeks? It does seem to me a little bit suspicious.But also the World Health Organization’s members are not the only people with an opinion on this matter. I back the United Nations system but we do have to acknowledge that the World Health Organization is an inherently political organisation. It is a committee of the UN with representatives elected from a range of countries who get themselves on to the various committees. So I think the member needs to look closely at that source for her suggestion of 26 weeks. It is not the be-all and end-all. As I have said there are other organisations in this country including the Child Poverty Action Group which made a very cogent coherent and I think persuasive submission that as good as parental leave is there are other priorities that any other Government has to consider.Tracey Martin: Oh my goodness. They’re going to really dislike you.PAUL FOSTER-BELL: It is a little bit rich actually from Mrs Martin I have to say—it is a little bit rich to be lectured from across the aisles by Mrs Martin because Mrs Martin does not have to consider the other priorities that Governments do have to consider. This is the very reason that a financial veto exists Mrs Martin. You make some interesting allegations but of course the previous Labour Government exercised its financial veto 31 times during—David Seymour: No!PAUL FOSTER-BELL: Yeah actually—31 times. So I think we on this side of the House should not be lectured. But we are not even at that stage yet; that is pre-empting business that is yet to come. We are yet—Tracey Martin: It’s because your finance Minister said it in the paper. I do apologise! I won’t take his word for it.PAUL FOSTER-BELL: —to see how the cards fall in this part and in this Committee at the end of this Committee stage and at the third reading when that is even a consideration Mrs Martin. I think the member is getting a little bit ahead of herself at this stage.But look there was so much. Actually I am going to agree with some of the things that the member Catherine Delahunty said about this part of the bill—the 26 weeks not being one of them but many of the benefits of paid parental leave are. I actually do want to commend Sue Moroney. There will be some people who say that this is a highly political bill and that she is playing politics with quite an emotive issue and who will accuse her of cynicism but I actually want to commend her for what I think is a well-intentioned attempt to raise this issue twice in 2 years. Well done Ms Moroney on the luck of having it drawn I suppose.But I do agree with some of the things Catherine Delahunty was saying. The bonding between a parent and child that happens in the first few weeks months and even years of life is very important. I think it is a little bit arbitrary though that we have settled on 26 weeks in spite of inconclusive evidence from the breastfeeding experts particularly in the New Zealand context as to the ideal time to be given for leave to encourage breastfeeding. A point that I think has been made earlier but which I want to emphasise is that suggesting and allowing this idea to get out there that the only way a mother can exclusively breastfeed—or in fact breastfeed in part or breastfeed her child in any way—is if she is on leave from the workforce completely is sending the wrong message to employers. Employers in this country should be aware that they do have a responsibility to make facilities available for mothers so that they are able to appropriately breastfeed their children.I also back up the comments made by my colleague Mark Mitchell who I think very sensibly pointed out the important role of fathers here. It is not entirely about the role of mothers—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): No it is about the 26 weeks.PAUL FOSTER-BELL: I think we have to think of both parents in the arrangement and actually 26 weeks in my view—Kris Faafoi: Well done.PAUL FOSTER-BELL: —is not the right balance. It is wonderful to see Mr Faafoi is going to make a contribution—DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): It gives me great pleasure to rise on behalf of the Speaker—sorry on behalf of the ACT Party. I would never purport to rise on behalf of the Speaker but you know a little bit of ambition can go a long way.I am struck by the fact that many of the arguments I made in Part 1 in respect of the extension of paid parental leave entitlement from 18 weeks to 22 are also quite relevant to this particular part too on the extension of paid parental leave to 26 weeks.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Does this mean we are going to have four calls repeating them?DAVID SEYMOUR: How many would you like?The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): One good one.DAVID SEYMOUR: If I cannot do that would you take four bad ones?The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Go for it.DAVID SEYMOUR: OK thank you Mr Chair. There are actually a number of topics but thankfully Tracey Martin has given me fresh material in her contribution which was around gender equity. Her claim was that the extension of paid parental leave by 4 weeks from 22 to 26 will be mainly occupied by fathers. Her claim can be further extended in that it will actually lead to a cultural change in gender relations in New Zealand.In other words she believes that men hitherto somewhat unfamiliar with domestic chores and duties will find themselves taking that extra 4 weeks off and discovering a whole lot of things about parenthood they would not otherwise understand. Give me a break! Never has there been somebody so out-of-touch with the modern reality of New Zealand. That might be the 1950s world view that we hear from New Zealand First but the reality is that my friends who are parents fathers are deeply involved in every aspect of childcare and they do not need an extra 4 weeks of paid parental leave to achieve that. As usual Tracey Martin is an inspiration. I wish I was as clever as she thinks she is but few of us can ever be.The reality is if you go a little bit deeper into her argument it is not entirely obvious that an extension of paid parental leave really would lead to men—or fathers—taking a larger role in the household. It might well be—and I would be interested to hear from the member in charge Sue Moroney whether she has considered the implications of this bill for gender equity—that an extension from 22 weeks to 26 weeks would actually lead to women taking more time off work and men being even further shut out of parenthood. It is really not obvious what the real effect would be on the roles of different parents even if we buy into Tracey Martin’s rather imaginative and out-of-touch version of gender relations in New Zealand in 2016.On behalf of the fathers in New Zealand who are intimately and deeply involved in their children’s upbringing I say to her that it is frankly a little bit offensive that the only way we will be kick-started into fatherhood is by an extra 4 weeks of paid parental leave extended from 22 weeks up to 26 weeks.Tracey Martin: You have no concept of what you are talking about you typical man.DAVID SEYMOUR: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. The Standing Orders require that a running commentary is not allowed when members are barracking. I have not had a moment’s respite from Tracey Martin’s screeching. I wonder whether you could call her into line.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): I would like to sustain that point of order. In fact the member may well have been reading my thoughts. The member interjecting constantly—a constant flow across the Chamber—is contrary to the Standing Orders and just a little bit more than the rest of us can stand.DAVID SEYMOUR: Thank you for sustaining that point of order. It might interest you to know that as one ages one’s ability to hear higher frequencies diminishes which is why the leader of New Zealand First has been able to tolerate that member for so long.Tracey Martin: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. Are you going to allow that sort of sexist comment to be made in this Chamber?The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Firstly I did hear a number of the interjections that the member made to the member who currently has the call and I understand that we have been having quite a robust debate. I do not believe as the Chair that was a sexist remark and so I am not going to take issue with it at the moment. I would like all members to be a little bit more sensitive as to what may cause offence within the Chamber.DAVID SEYMOUR: Speaking to the point of order—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): No I have ruled on the point of order. Get on with your speech.DAVID SEYMOUR: That is exactly what I will do but I will just point out that elderly hearing loss occurs in men and women. I was not being sexist towards the leader of New Zealand First.There are a number of other matters in this part of the bill that I think deserve attention other than gender equity and the role of fathers in New Zealand. One of them is the universality of the uptake. I think this is important. If it was important in Part 1 when we discussed the fact that not every parent takes up paid parental leave then it is even more important when we extend it to 26 weeks. We understand that every year in New Zealand approximately 60000 children are born—LOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa): It is my pleasure to take a call in this Committee stage of the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (6 Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill. This Part 2 debate is about extending paid parental leave from 22 weeks to 26 weeks and I would like to really focus on the rationale for 26 weeks. The proponent of this piece of legislation Sue Moroney has been very clear that it is linked to the World Health Organization (WHO) and evidence about the optimal duration of exclusive breastfeeding. For the information of other members of the Committee WHO has actually looked at 14 research publications and that optimal duration of exclusive breastfeeding has been determined for the first 6 months of life. It is considered a global public health goal that is linked to a reduction of infant morbidity and mortality especially in the developing world. So there is actually a rationale around the 6 months and why 6 months is so vital and a link between this specific piece of legislation and the breastfeeding of our children.It is also relevant in the debate to look at article 24 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. That particular convention states that children have the right to good quality health care—the best health care possible. What we know is that “Breast is best” and for the first 6 months of life children having an opportunity to be breastfed is incredibly important. So the rationale for the 26 weeks comes from that piece of research evidence the World Health Organization and an array of research and publications about how important and vital it is for the growth and development of our babies.For people listening out there the 26 weeks was also part of a recommendation of a November 2013 report by the Health Committee. That select committee was chaired by Paul Hutchison. That Inquiry into improving child health outcomes and preventing child abuse with a focus from preconception until three years of age (Volumes 1 and 2) actually had a section about paid parental leave. I am sure the National members of Parliament would be really interested in the inquiry and this piece of evidence that I am about to propose. Actually Dr Hutchison was a huge champion particularly of the rights of the child making sure that every child in New Zealand had the best possible start.On page 39 of that report under the heading “Social economic determinants of health and well-being” there was a section about extending the duration of paid parental leave to between 6 and 12 months. The rationale for that really was again about breastfeeding because it helps baby form positive attachments with their primary caregivers. To quote from that report it also said this: “common sense suggests that a non-stressful relaxed environment for as long as possible after birth fosters breastfeeding and helps babies form positive attachments with their primary caregivers.” In fact the proposition for extending paid parental leave in that report was from 26 weeks at a minimum to 52 weeks.It is interesting when we look around the world. When this bill passes—and I want to congratulate my colleague Sue Moroney—we will join Chile Mongolia and Hungary. Poland actually allows 26 weeks the Czech Republic 28 Bulgaria 32 Slovenia 34 and Norway between 35 and 45. Ireland allows 42. It is 52 weeks in Albania Montenegro and the UK. Croatia allows 58 and Estonia 62. The champion around the world is Sweden at 68 weeks. So what we are actually doing is creating a minimum level of paid parental leave which so many international organisations around the world have said is incredibly important if we want to focus on the health and well-being of our children. I think what we have heard tonight really is procrastination on that side of the Chamber and a focus on what is important to them versus what is important to us. I think the compelling arguments from our side of the Chamber really have put children and families at the centre of a piece of public policy and legislative reform. Kia ora.A party vote was called for on the question That Part 2 be agreed to.Ayes 61New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; United Future 1.Noes 60New Zealand National 59; ACT New Zealand 1.Part 2 agreed to.Schedule 1PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): I want to reiterate some of the arguments that have been made earlier in so far as they apply to the schedule of this bill. We on the Government side do not have—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I apologise. I have fouled this up by giving the member a call and a bit of extra time. We will go straight to the question. We have of course debated schedules 1 and 2 as part of the earlier debate.A party vote was called for on the questionThat schedule 1 be agreed to.Ayes 61New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; United Future 1.Noes 60New Zealand National 59; ACT New Zealand 1.Schedule 1 agreed to.A party vote was called for on the questionThat schedule 2 be agreed to.Ayes 61New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; United Future 1.Noes 60New Zealand National 59; ACT New Zealand 1.Schedule 2 agreed to.Clauses 1 to 3PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): E Te Kaiwhakahaere tēnā koe. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to take this call on the title and commencement clauses of the bill. This bill in Sue Moroney’s name is called the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave) Amendment Bill. It is quite a mouthful and it does to some extent I suppose do what it says on the label: it is about paid parental leave. It is about protecting the employment of those workers who are on parental leave so that they have work to come back to. But where I take some I suppose contention with the proposed title is the “6 Months’ Paid Leave”. That is not actually what the bill does—not initially anyway.When this bill was first looked at at the Government Administration Committee it came in three tranches. There were the parts of the bill that were supposed to come into force on 1 April 2016. Of course those were overtaken by events and we have amended the bill accordingly. Although there was no agreement in the select committee on the bill as a whole we did agree it would be patently ludicrous to have a commencement of some clauses that had been overtaken by events. There had already been an increase delivered by this Government in paid parental leave duration but also the work contact hours although not under that name—the staying in touch provisions to allow parents on parental leave to keep in touch with the workplace to keep up to date without losing their entitlement—had already effectively been enacted by this Government.In the bill as it stands now when it comes into force there will not be 6 months’ paid parental leave—or 26 weeks as it is described in the bill. Initially when the bill first comes into force as of 1 April 2017 there will be 22 weeks of paid parental leave. This does not then increase to the 26 weeks so the extra 4 weeks is added on on 1 January 2018. In my view this is not an entirely accurate description of what this bill does.The bill should perhaps be called the “Parental Leave and Employment Protection (First 22 Weeks Next Year and then 26 Weeks the Year After That) Amendment Bill” because that would be I think a more accurate description of what it actually does. I know it does not exactly roll off the tongue but it would at least portray this bill in a faithful manner. I think that is something that we should consider in this Committee stage so that it is fully understood that as of the moment it is signed into law by the Governor-General it will not deliver 6 months’ paid parental leave—that is something that is coming down the track.When one gives it seems little consideration to the fiscal impact of what one is doing one does wonder why you would simply stop at 6 months when you are in the position of the Opposition of being able to promise very much and not consider too much what else has to be sacrificed to pay for those promises. One does wonder why you would simply stop at that 6 months or 26 weeks and why you would not keep on going. But anyway that is my suggestion—that we bring some accuracy to the naming of this bill and make it very clear to the New Zealand public that it is in fact not 6 months’ paid parental leave that they will be entitled to from the commencement of this bill on 1 January 2017.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Can I just check: did the member move an amendment then?PAUL FOSTER-BELL: No.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): No he did not. Right.BRETT HUDSON (National): I rise to speak on the title clause. I think the point here is more than just the fact that the Government Administration Committee recommended that we strike out “and Work Contact Hours”. It is more to the point of the significance of why that has come about. In its most obvious sense it is because the select committee recommended that the work contact hours provisions that were originally in Part 1 of the bill should be removed. But the real heart of the reason for that is that they are no longer required. That speaks to one simple fact that a measure that this Government has put in place actually provides work contact hours to the same extent or near to the same extent in another piece of legislation that has passed through the House and is now an Act. The Government has undertaken those measures which means that the provisions already exist in the law and therefore there is no need for them.But it speaks to more than that. What it shows is that while this bill and maybe other previous similar pieces of legislation have been in the House in the past the Government has been acting. The removal of the work contact hours from this particular member’s bill because the Government has already done something that means they are no longer required—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I am going to require the member to resume his seat. I remind him that we are now debating the bill as it was passed at the second reading. The words that the member is debating are not part of the title and therefore are not part of the debate.Hon Ruth Dyson: A page a day. Get some advice from Paul Foster-Bell.BRETT HUDSON: One page a day—thank you Ms Dyson. In that case we will instead move on to the commencement date. The commencement date would see the first tranche of 4 additional weeks from 1 April 2017. As my colleague has noted originally that was going to be 1 April 2016 which of course would have been a bit of an impossibility so it was a very sensible decision and recommendation to move that forward to next year and then the further 4 weeks in 2018. But what that does is bring expenditure into those specific time periods and as we have heard through the debate the officials gave advice to the committee that the total expense over a 4-year period would be about $466 million additionally and these commencement dates would lock that in. It became very clear that through to the fiscal year of 2020 that would see an additional cost. These commencement dates in this bill would commit the Government to that sort of expenditure.The implications of that have been reverberating around the Chamber this evening where people are very strongly suggesting that the fiscal conditions of today when we could potentially enact the legislation simply do not permit for that increased level of expenditure. Although Treasury may be forecasting some surpluses—some incredibly good ones actually in the years to come—they are quite some years in advance and further ahead than even the commencement date of Part 2 if this bill were to be enacted. So both commencement elements of both Part 1 for an additional 4 weeks and Part 2 for a further additional 4 weeks would commit the Government to expenditure that does not easily fit inside the current fiscal envelope as projected by Treasury over the next couple of financial years—the period when each of them would come into effect.That is the heart of the Government’s position and has been throughout debate on the bill—that it is not about an additional dollar of paid parental leave; it is about the total cost of a programme. It has been the position that the total cost of 26 weeks is not affordable in what we have today or can see in the immediate term of the commencement of Part 1 and Part 2 and that remains our position. So as we come near the end of the discussion on these preliminary clauses we would restate that were these clauses to be passed or agreed to by the Committee at this stage and to progress to a third reading then they would be effectively seeking to commit the Government to expenditure that does not readily fit within the envelope today. It is expenditure that we say we should not be now committing to for this purpose. The Government has many responsibilities to meet and to expend more in this area would require a change in another area of expenditure. It is our view that what we have mapped out—at least in the Budget for the coming 4 years—is a better use of those projected funds. So the Committee will make a call shortly but it is our view—A party vote was called for on the question That clause 1 be agreed to.Ayes 61New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; United Future 1.Noes 60New Zealand National 59; ACT New Zealand 1.Clause 1 agreed to.A party vote was called for on the question That clause 2 be agreed to.Ayes 61New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; United Future 1.Noes 60New Zealand National 59; ACT New Zealand 1.Clause 2 agreed to.A party vote was called for on the question That clause 3 be agreed to.Ayes 61New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; United Future 1.Noes 60New Zealand National 59; ACT New Zealand 1.Clause 3 agreed to.Bill to be reported without amendment presently.