Dowie Sarah: Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeDowie Sarah: Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 25 May 2016. Volume:714;Page:11280. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]SARAH DOWIE (National—Invercargill): Just when the Government Administration Committee thought that they had seen the back of me I rise to take a call on this Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill. I just want to take it down a notch and pay tribute to Ms Moroney. This side of the House agrees with the spirit of the bill and I have had the pleasure of working with her on the Government Administration Committee for this bill for a short time before I was moved on under the able chairmanship of Ms Ruth Dyson.Hon Ruth Dyson: We miss you—we miss you.SARAH DOWIE: You do miss me and I miss you too. The Government Administration Committee actually does—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I am not involved in this and do not want to be drawn into it. Thank you.SARAH DOWIE: Sorry Mr Assistant Speaker. We do get some very interesting bills including this one and I also have had the pleasure of sitting with Ms Moroney on the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee which heard the Employment Standards Bill that extended the paid parental leave concept as well. I do have to pay tribute as a mother of two premature babies to the concept of paid parental leave and to the benefits that it provides for women for parents and for dads—connecting them to the workplace and of course allowing time to bond with baby without the financial stress that often having children can bring.Before I begin I think it is probably important to talk about the history of paid parental leave because if you think about the evolution of it throughout time it started as an almost primitive concept. When it first came on to our law books—I think it was in 2002—it was simply providing protection for somebody’s job and that was the extent of it. Since then it has evolved and we have seen financial assistance. We have seen it extended to more than just the mother and that has been a good thing.It has slowly evolved. It has been a long row to hoe in respect of the lobbying but as part of that as each Government has extended it what both Governments of the day had to do was look at a suite of measures in managing this fine country. You have to prioritise given that you have limited funds and limited taxes to go around and spend on social initiatives. You have to decide what you spend it on. On this side of the House we are about providing a suite of measures to best provide for children—to allow them to thrive in our community and grow—and for families. As such we do oppose this bill and the extension that it sets out.But I come back to the benefits of paid parental leave. We have heard from some of the previous speakers that it is about breastfeeding and yes certainly that extra time and alleviating the financial stress on parents allows a mother the biological mother to bond with the child. It does alleviate the stress which allows a mother to breastfeed and of course breastfeeding is acknowledged as providing the right mix of vitamins for baby. But also I acknowledge that breastfeeding is pretty hard so having that time to bond with baby and do that—hey that is brilliant if you can actually breastfeed and that is wonderful. But if you cannot the time still affords some benefits through bonding with baby. It helps mothers’ and carers’ mental health when the new baby comes into the home. It prevents postnatal depression in women. Postnatal depression can have really devastating effects on families and family members so it is quite a significant thing to overcome and to have that time and the financial stress alleviated really does make a difference. There is the physical health of the mother—they do not call it labour for nothing.Paid parental leave certainly allows mum to rest and come back to physical strength after having a baby and it allows for a connection with wider community as well. That is one of the things that I want to focus on because a connection in isolated areas with the wider community is something that paid parental leave allows and enables. I had the privilege of attending as the MP for Invercargill the Mums ‘n’ Bubs Expo in Invercargill recently. That was an initiative—an inaugural event—that was put together by two young mums to bring people together with their young babies and families to discuss the challenges of having babies in the modern world. One of the risks that was identified was actually isolation in a community. So if you are away from family members if you do not have the support of your wider whānau paid parental leave allows you that time to get involved with community groups and to strike up camaraderie with other mothers or fathers or families who have young children and learn from them. Again it alleviates the pressure or that psychological stress of having children.I talked about this in the first reading—that one of the things I did as a young mum was to join the Supporting Parents Alongside Children’s Education (SPACE) group which was facilitated by Playcentre. That was a group of first-time mothers who came together with babies aged between zero and 4 months. We met weekly and it allowed us to form great bonds together as our children went through the same developmental processes but also it facilitated learning about those processes as we had guest speakers come in to speak to us about different things different aspects of a child’s life. So not only did we have the education about children as mothers and fathers—because there were some fathers who did that course as well—but the camaraderie really was a great support for me and for others in that group. As I look back on that course—it was one of the courses that I recommended at the Mums ‘n’ Bubs Expo—some of those people with whom I went through that SPACE group are my best “mum-friends” now moving forward and we still have that connection and the children still have that connection.As I come back to the bill although this Government opposes the extension as it is set out we do believe in having a suite of measures that we need to put in place to support children. It is not just about paid parental leave. Some of our policies such as free doctors visits and prescriptions for under-13-year-olds go to the heart of making sure that our families are well taken care of and that our children get the medical help that they need early on in the piece. So we are taking that financial burden off families so that they can get their children to the doctor early if there is some sort of health issue get them taken care of get them the medication that they need and get them well to set them on the right path to thrive and become productive members of society. There are many other policies that we have in place that look to care for children and families—some of our key performance indicators in respect of immunisation making sure that the information is out there for parents in respect of the pros and cons of immunisation and making sure that the bulk of our kids go through being immunised against some of those really serious diseases so that the effects of that are avoided and mitigated.So look this is a Government that definitely cares about children. It cares about families but it is about a suite of measures not just paid parental leave. Despite and notwithstanding the benefits of paid parental leave—which are recognised by this Government given that we have extended it from 16 weeks to 18 weeks; or 14 weeks to 16 weeks and then to 18 weeks—we do need to look at the raft of different measures the suite of different measures that need to be put in place to care for our families and our children. So I certainly support the concept of paid parental leave and acknowledge Ms Moroney’s tenacity in raising this again in the House. It is an important debate to have but look at the end of the day we have competing priorities and as such we oppose this bill.