Whaitiri Meka: Social Security Amendment Bill (No 3) — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWhaitiri Meka: Social Security Amendment Bill (No 3) — In Committee[Sitting date: 25 March 2015. Volume:704;Page:2638. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MEKA WHAITIRI (Labour—Ikaroa-Rāwhiti):Tēnā koe Mr Chair. Tēnā tātou katoa. I am happy to take a short call on the Social Security Amendment Bill (No 3). I was not a member of the select committee but probably more important as a mother of two teenage sons about to enter university next year I feel it is appropriate that I get up and make a contribution.I would like to talk specifically around—I have papers for Africa here—section 61EA of the principal Act which ensures that students who would be eligible for assistance from the student allowance scheme including its extra accommodation component but who choose not to apply for that assistance will be excluded from receiving the accommodation supplement.I am a firm believer that investing in our young people in this country is definitely the role of the State. There is plenty of research around showing that our student population across the country is struggling. This is an opportunity to address that and I am rather disappointed from listening to all the contributions tonight that the benchmark has been set at the student allowance rate rather than at the accommodation supplement. I would be keen to hear from the Minister herself as to why the benchmark has been set low rather than high.I understand that there have been two contributions to the select committee from the Dunedin Community Law Centre and from the New Zealand University Students’ Association which I am sure many of us in this Chamber have been members of. They do a fine job and they clearly have got recent research that shows there is hardship faced by many of our students around the country. Again I would be really interested to hear the Minister’s response as to why an organisation with the history of the New Zealand University Students’ Association was not consulted on amending this Act. Clearly the association probably had a major contribution to offer and it would have meant that we would probably have a more robust bill brought before the House to be discussed.From reading this bill like many of the previous speakers I am still of the view of wanting to hear the rationale behind incentivising our students to stay in tertiary education as opposed to opting out because they can get more from the accommodation supplement. I support that the bill is trying to address some of the loopholes but given the 4 years since it has been brought to the Government’s attention I would also be keen to hear how many students have been caught up in the loophole. I guess given that this is retrospective legislation there are also the unintended consequences of passing retrospective legislation. I would be keen to hear from the Minister herself on what would happen to those students. I am interested to know how many students are caught up and what will actually happen to those who have received the accommodation supplement as opposed to the student allowance.Yes I support the contributions of this bill but I caution the Minister and the Government around ensuring we are investing in our students perhaps more than what I see with this bill before the Committee given the pressures that students are under not in terms of completing study but with having a very low student allowance the cost of fees rising out of proportion to other supplements that may assist them and also in terms of GST which has risen.