Shaw JamesJAMES SHAW (Co-Leader—Green): I would like to speak to a couple of the amendments—first of all the amendment in Marama Davidson's name which would bring forward to 1 July this year the effect of the Working for Families changes. I just wanted to say why we feel that is necessary—and I just wanted to acknowledge and appreciate the support for that amendment from New Zealand First. The reason is that what we are trying to do is to ensure that families who have missed out on the gains of productivity and economic development over the course of the last 8 years receive that support as fast as is possible. It is in line with the amendment from Jacinda Ardern to distinguish between the Working for Families reforms in this bill and the tax amendments in this bill as well.I think one of the scepticisms on this side of the Chamber is that this entire package is really designed by someone who is both the Minister of Finance but also the campaign manager for the National Party's re-election campaign. So this package has been designed really for political purposes rather than to support families who are really doing it tough in New Zealand. So Marama Davidson's amendment here would ensure that the benefits to those families that this package is at least theoretically designed to support actually do start to support them before the election happens rather than afterwards when as we know anything could happen.I just wanted to table that amendment and then turn back to Jacinda Ardern's amendment on separating out the Working for Families components from the taxation components of the bill. I wanted to pick up on some comments by Alastair Scott who spoke earlier about the taxation components and the thresholds there. I think he revealed really what the National Government's motivation is here because the majority of his comments spoke to why it is that people should get a tax cut rather than focus on whether or not the package as designed in this bill is actually going to support families who need it most which is the stated intention of the bill—whereas the comments that I heard were saying: Well actually if you ignore what the actual bill says its intention is then actually the real intention is to offer a tax cut."The Government's own fact sheet that was distributed yesterday which this bill gives effect to has been quoted a couple of times and I think a few people have sort of lost the thread on this. If you look at the tax component which is why that needs to be separated out then it is actually a regressive tax package. If you look at families who are earning $24000 a year or less when you take the tax component and the removal of the independent earner tax credit (IETC) then those families receive $5.34. That is their average change as marked out in the Government's information sheet. For families that are on $127000 or more the benefit from the tax package and the IETC change actually means that they are $33.22 better off every week. So as a result of this they are actually six times more well-off than families who are earning $24000 a year or less. That is why we are so concerned that yes while obviously it is good that families on those very low incomes will receive $6.10 more in Working for Families that they do not currently get and that is obviously very helpful they will also get an additional $3.81 from the accommodation supplement and that is very helpful. But the combined effect of all of those things is that families on $24000 a year or less will receive $15.11 as a result of the changes in this bill whilst families who are on $127000 a year or more will receive more than twice that $33.22 a week in the hand. I believe that is why the Committee should support Jacinda Ardern's amendment to separate those two things out because what we want to do is we want to make sure that those people who are up for increases in Working for Families support and the accommodation supplement support actually do receive those. That is critically important and it is critically important that they receive those as soon as possible which is why Marama Davidson's amendment is also important whilst we can then separately debate how you design a tax package that is actually progressive rather than regressive.Just returning to Marama Davidson's amendments some people will ask: "Why 1 July rather than say today?". That is simply a pragmatic measure. The problem that we have got of course with the IETC the tax system Working for Families the accommodation supplement and so on is that it is a mind-bogglingly complex tax and welfare system that we have created over the course of the last two to three decades in this country really since the Bolger Government introduced the IETC back in the 1990s. It actually takes quite a long time for the Inland Revenue Department and the accounting profession to get their heads around these kinds of changes as demonstrated by the A1 sheet of paper that the Government distributed yesterday that had the combined effect of all of these changes.So we felt that while we wanted to make sure that families did start to receive their Working for Families benefits before the election it would actually make sense to give the IRD essentially you know a month or two to adjust to that. But the point about the complexity is that there is an argument again for why it is that the Government needs to go back to first principles particularly on the tax component of this because it has created such a complex system with people who are falling through the cracks—and I know that we have referred earlier in the debate to families who do not have even one parent who is in any form of work and thus are really falling through the cracks as well. There is an argument there for a more universal much simpler to administer and much cheaper to administer system.So I would like to ask the Minister whether he would be prepared to bring forward the start date to ensure that you know the families who are really doing it tough actually start to receive the additions that are outlined in clause 6 of the bill and also whether he can speak to why it is that the threshold changes have been designed in such a way as to deliver the greatest benefit to those families with more than $127000 a year of family income rather than those who are on $24000 or less.In relation to that there have been some comments made by Government members earlier about comments made on this side of the House referring to those on incomes of more than $50000 a year as wealthy. I mean I do not think anybody here is claiming that. That is simply the median income. But if you are referring to a family that is earning $127000 a year or more then yes that is starting to creep into the higher-income brackets. It is hard to justify in my mind why it is that families that are earning more than that number would be receiving $33.22 benefit out of this rather than families who are on $24000 a year or less who are receiving only $15 in total and in fact only $5.34 from the tax changes that are being debated in the bill. With that I would just like to support both of those amendments and ask for the support of the House to bring both those amendments through."