Stewart Barbara: Child Support Amendment Bill (No 4) — First Reading 
Stewart Barbara: Child Support Amendment Bill (No 4) — First Reading 
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BARBARA STEWART (NZ First) 
: 
 On behalf of New Zealand First I rise to support the Child Support Amendment Bill (No 4) going to the Social Services Committee. One of the bill’s purposes as outlined in the explanatory note is to improve compliance with financial support obligations so that children receive the financial support to which they are entitled and so that the cost of State provision of financial support is reduced. As Judith Collins said earlier that is basically a cross-party issue. 
We all know that the actual costs of raising a child or children are huge. Children particularly teenagers are really expensive in today’s world. I know from first-hand experience that school trips school fees school books and clothing are all very expensive. Of course there is always the pressure for children to have labelled clothing because they tend to be isolated these days if they do not and it is very very expensive to have. We also know that children can be totally disadvantaged in the short term and the long term if they do not receive financial support from both their parents. It is very unfortunate that in those cases it is the children who become the innocent victims. A father should always contribute to a child’s life financially as well as emotionally and of course with his time. There is no greater obligation for us than to be as good a parent as we can be. I know for a fact that parents often contribute financially right throughout a child’s life. Even then as many parents including many of us in this House would say we are never not responsible for our children no matter how old they are and no matter how old we are which is probably until the day that they become responsible for us in our old age and in our rest homes. 
Last year in this House we passed legislation to ensure that solo parent beneficiaries applying for the domestic purposes benefit had to name the liable parents of their children before they could receive assistance from the State. As we see it this bill is the second part of that legislation—to ensure that children receive what they are entitled to. Last year in the previous Parliament all parties stated on many occasions and particularly throughout the debate on the Social Security (Social Assistance) Amendment Bill that the courts should hold accountable parents who abscond from their financial responsibilities and that is exactly what this bill is attempting to do. Likewise as members of Parliament we have all had cases referred to us where liable parents pay the absolute minimum for their children yet those parents have funds tied up in ways that do not make them liable for a realistic amount. I think that the bottom level of $10 or $11 per week sometimes paid by a liable parent is absolutely outrageous. At the end of the day the child pays for that lack of responsibility. We are pleased to see that the parents’ child support liability will accurately reflect their ability to provide financial assistance for their child or children because that is what should happen. 
Quite often we hear about cases where a woman finds that the responsible father has gone to Australia or somewhere else overseas. We have heard at various stages that attempts have been made to try to bring such men back into line. We know that those attempts happen but mostly they appear to be too small and usually absolutely nothing happens which is a real shame. In 2000 a reciprocal agreement was signed between New Zealand and Australia and we all support that. For that agreement to be worth anything though it has to be enforced so hopefully this legislation particularly when it goes through the select committee will be a positive step towards that enforcement. It is essential that as far as possible parents’ child support liability accurately reflects their ability to provide financial assistance for their children whether they are overseas or here in New Zealand. It has been suggested on more than one occasion that there may be many more people than we know about who have absconded and are resident across the Tasman and who are not paying child support. If we can ensure that the number of people doing that can be significantly reduced or if those people can be tracked down then that should be done. 
One of the purposes of this bill is to provide flexibility in the legislative provisions for dealing with incremental penalties so that those measures to improve the level of compliance with financial support obligations will be enforced. We know that that will be welcomed by all parties in this House. I note that the bill clearly states that the new provisions will be available to liable persons with existing repayments if they continue to comply with all their financial support obligations. 
The new temporary exemption for young people under the age of 16 who do not have sufficient income to meet even the minimum liability is interesting and that was raised by Dr Hutchison. While we can understand that that will allow young parents to focus on their education rather than on having to earn an income—even on the weekend—so that child support obligations can be met we will be very interested to hear about it from the various submitters. 
This bill does appear to be a solution to the problem that New Zealand has with arrears in child support. As the Minister has outlined almost $1 billion is outstanding in arrears and penalties and that is a significant sum. We support this bill going to the select committee. We want parents to be responsible for their financial liabilities in respect of their children. We want to improve the effectiveness and the efficiency of the child support scheme so we will look forward to this bill returning from the select committee.