Lotu-Iiga Sam: Home and Community Support (Payment for Travel Between Clients) Settlement Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeLotu-Iiga Sam: Home and Community Support (Payment for Travel Between Clients) Settlement Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 11 February 2016. Volume:711;Page:8949. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon Peseta SAM LOTU-IIGA (Associate Minister of Health): It is a pleasure to speak on this the second reading of the Home and Community Support (Payment for Travel Between Clients) Settlement Bill. It is in the name of the Minister of Health Dr Jonathan Coleman but as his Associate Minister I have responsibilities for the areas in which this bill will have a huge impact particularly for those community health workers and carers who have been mentioned in this House this afternoon.I also want to commend the Health Committee particularly the chairman Simon O’Connor for his work as well as the cross-party support for this bill because I think we all understand the importance of these workers in our communities right up and down this country. They do an invaluable job to help with our elderly our disabled our whānau and our aiga right across New Zealand.Government agencies understand that there is a time and distance between patients and their carers and it is only right and proper that this workforce should be compensated for the time that they spend travelling between their clients. The bill arises out of a settlement agreement between service providers the support workers and their unions as well as the many district health boards across the country—and the Crown obviously playing a focal point in those negotiations.What the bill does is it creates an affordable and sustainable framework to compensate the longstanding issue of in-between travel. It addresses an issue that has to be fair been a little bit of a sore point and importantly it ensures that people can continue to receive quality care in their own homes. Let us not forget while we are compensating the workers that it is about those people whom we are serving in their homes up and down this country allowing them to have a better quality of life. So by implementing this settlement and setting out an agreed process for investigating and moving this workforce forward to a more regulated employment model the Government looks ahead to ensure that the service can attract recruit and retain a high-quality workforce to meet the demands of the changing demographics and the increasingly ageing population.It is important because in order to increase workers’ incomes—reimbursing their vehicle use—it increases their certainty of hours of work and provides for more stability in that workforce which again I cannot re-emphasise enough just how important it is in caring for the elderly and the disabled. What it also does—a knock-on effect if you like—is it reduces the high staff turnover in this sector and it eases the pressure on recruitment and retention of these very important workers. Ultimately again it does benefit those who need care and need help.I believe that it is a responsible approach and one that will give the industry some sort of long-term skilled workforce and certainty to support our elderly and support our disabled to live in their own homes which is really important because that is the general desire that they have: to remain part of our wider communities and to remain part of their families in those communities.So it is about an investment; $96 million over 4 years was announced in Budget 2014 to support this with a further $14 million in the last Budget going forward. It is part of an investment into making sure that we support this important population so that they live longer and so that they live better-quality lives. It ensures that our health system is able to cope with the increased pressures around the demographic changes but also around just the increased demand for these services long term. We know that an ageing population will present challenges to our system. The Government will continue to invest in these areas to make a difference and meet some of those particularly difficult challenges that lie ahead.In Budget 2015 we also invested $98 million to improve people’s prevention and treatment of their conditions and another $50 million over 3 years to support extra surgeries and interventions for the elderly. There is also an investment into hospice and palliative care. End-of-life care is again something that is important to this Government; $76 million was announced over 4 years in the last Budget and again these workforces in the aged-care area are particularly important. They make a difference particularly to those who are suffering terminal illnesses.I just want to quickly wrap up by saying that we are reviewing and updating the Health of Older People Strategy. There are currently workshops going on out there to engage with our communities to engage with those in the sector and to engage with those who use these services. That is particularly important. I encourage those who want to make an input into the strategy—it is being updated for the first time in 13 years—to put their hands up come forward and take part in this very important strategy going forward.I again commend this bill. I support what has been said around this House this afternoon. Those workers are an important part of our workforce and they should be duly compensated for the work that they do. Thank you very much.