Severin ToniTONI SEVERIN (ACT): Thank you Madam Speaker. I stand on behalf of the ACT Party to oppose the second reading of the Social Security (Subsequent Child Policy Removal) Amendment Bill. I'd like to thank Karen Chhour our social development spokesperson for her help and wish her well in her Auckland lockdown. In a time when child poverty and hardship has been in the spotlight as a major issue in this country removing policies that were put in place to help tackle this seems to go against what this Parliament is trying to achieve. ACT believes we are sending the wrong message. We have a Government talking about wanting to solve child poverty and one of the biggest causes of child poverty is being born into it. Why are we focusing on making it a priority to create ways to keep people dependent on the State instead of helping them gain their self-esteem gain their sense of independence gain some skills to get out into the workforce and help them drive our economy? Working parents get 12 months' leave and have to go back to work but Government want to pay beneficiaries three years looking for work. This seems to me unfair. Many who choose to have these children in families don't necessarily have the choice to stay at home either. Many couples wanting to start these families in order to ensure they can afford to feed clothe house and support these children—nope. That's a lot of sacrifice that a lot of the lower-paid income people are doing and this Government wants now to give beneficiaries more of an opportunity and a hand up than what hard-working people are. For many couples they have chosen when they have another child as well because of the affordability where this by taking this substantive piece out of this bill gives women mostly—that of course have babies—the opportunity to have another one quite quickly in some cases where a lot of families cannot do that. They cannot afford it because of their wages. There should always be a safety net but welfare dependency should never become a lifestyle choice. This bill argues that these parents should be chosen to stay home for like the first three years which is what the rules currently are but if you have another child—you are on the benefit—the subsequent child defaults to the time of one year. Well it's a bit confusing here because as you can guess it's not my area but—Hon Member: It hasn't worked so it's not confusing.TONI SEVERIN: It is very confusing because many as I know employed women and husbands or some solo mums that were under circumstances weren't necessarily able to have that choice of whether or not they could stay at home and look after their child. They did not want to go on benefits; they wanted to work. They wanted to prove to their children that working hard is a way forward for anyone that is in financial difficulty. One out of every 10 children is born on to an existing benefit. One in five babies is living in benefit-led households by their first babies. This is not helping our poverty problem if we are continuing to have children being born in these houses. These children face a bleaker future than children born to parents in work. They face worse outcomes on nearly every social indicator. We think that those who select to continue to rear children while receiving a benefit should be considering the welfare of their children first and foremost. ACT has a policy that puts the welfare of the child at the front and centre introducing the electronic income management card which would help to ensure Government benefits are supporting the family in the right places at the right times. We can't afford to keep going down having more children stuck in this poverty gap not being able to afford the basic needs if people are continuing to have children while they're on this benefit. We have made very good progress. The other side of the House would say that it has not made great progress but we have reduced the number of children being brought into dependent households. However that seems to be now rising again which is very sad. We should not be encouraging more. It is very sad that there are many people that this occurs to. However we shouldn't be rewarding one side of the coin without the other where many families who struggle to have children and put them off for many years cannot afford to have multiple children. Why should we then take this subsequent policy away and allow beneficiaries to do it? I oppose this bill.