Wagner NickyHon NICKY WAGNER (National): In contrast I rise to support the Social Security (Stopping Benefit Payments for Offenders who Repeatedly Fail to Comply with Community Sentences) Amendment Bill. It's been a really interesting debate tonight. There's been an enormous amount of emotion and there have been two distinct points of view: one that this bill provides an unreasonable punishment and the other that it provides a positive intervention that can allow people to have another chance. I think we should reflect on where this all comes from because I think New Zealanders are justifiably proud of our social security system and the policies that underpin our idea of a welfare State.We're basically a compassionate and generous people and we value fairness in life and we want to make sure that our fellow citizens are never left out in the street without means of support and that's a very good thing. But we also believe that it's fair to expect our citizens to be part of the community to be basically honest and to live by the laws of the land and if people choose to break the law and victimise other New Zealanders there should be some consequences. Now there are always consequences in life and learning to understand those consequences and manage them responsibly is really a part of being good New Zealanders. So providing realistic consequences is another way to try to stop offenders reoffending and then creating more victims of crime.This bill is about giving corrections an additional tool. It doesn't have to be used for everybody. It's not something that is compulsory. It is an additional tool to incentivise compliance from offenders—those ones which are subject to community-based sentences. Now there are about 28000 offenders who get community-based sentences in any year in New Zealand and the interesting thing here is that 95 percent of them approximately front up and can fulfil their obligations. But about 5 percent don't and it's this 5 percent that if they don't front up at the moment are liable for prosecution for breaching their community sentence and can be sent to jail. This bill provides an alternative to prosecution. It provides an alternative that might end up with people in jail and I think everybody in this House knows that sending people to jail is not necessarily a good answer. So it provides an alternative to prosecution as a last resort when offenders are not prepared to meet their obligations imposed by the courts.There's been quite a lot of discussion tonight about the people who may get one of these sentences but let me make the point clear that when a court imposes these sentences it takes those things into account and the fact that 95 percent of people can manage to front up and fulfil their obligations means that it's working. Now there's also been talk that it discriminates against beneficiaries but there's a flipside to that too. It also means that beneficiaries have another chance before prosecution. They have a chance to work their way through the process and to comply. What it means is that after two warnings not one—two warnings—and an extra 14 days for people to be able to have that discussion to look at the consequences if they still don't comply they may get their benefit cut or if they've got a family half of their benefit may be cut. I think that's pretty reasonable as a tool in the tool kit for people who haven't managed to front up like 95 percent of the offenders do. So I support this bill. I see it as an opportunity to give offenders who do not attend their community-based sentences another chance to avoid prosecution and to end up in jail. Thank you Madam Assistant Speaker.