Delahunty Catherine: Social Assistance (New Work Tests Incentives and Obligations) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Delahunty Catherine: Social Assistance (New Work Tests Incentives and Obligations) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:665;Page:13178] 
CATHERINE DELAHUNTY (Green) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Chair. I feel it is really important that we look at the context when we start debating the Social Assistance (New Work Tests Incentives and Obligations) Amendment Bill. I heard a lot of rhetoric back in my room listening to the TV with everybody claiming to have been abused. But the people who are actually being abused are not the people in this House. The voices of the people who are being abused are not being heard. The people who are being abused are vulnerable people as Nanaia Mahuta just said and our responsibility as legislators is to look at the context and at the situation we face in this country in terms of employment unemployment sickness and caring for children. 
This bill should be contributing to positive change. I am sure there are people in National who believe that is what they are doing but I say in all sincerity as somebody who has spent 5 years working with beneficiaries that it will not work. We can do what feels good and what is ideologically consistent with party policy but if it will not work then all we are really doing is compounding the issues. 
A wider debate is going on that affects this bill and that is the debate involving the Welfare Working Group and the Alternative Welfare Working Group. Those parties are debating the wider issues. The Alternative Welfare Working Group is coming up with recognition that the Social Assistance (Future Focus) Bill as it used to be called—and I cannot remember what the bill is called now but I know that it is a bill about sanctioning work testing—will not work. It simply will not improve conditions for people at the bottom of the heap. 
We know that the bill will not work because we know that the disabled cannot get employment that is suitable for their disability. We have only to talk to the disability advocate groups. It is not rocket science. We have only to talk to the Disabled Persons Assembly which is represented on the Alternative Welfare Working Group by Wendy Wicks. Members should ask Wendy why people with disabilities have so many challenges in finding appropriate work in the workplace and why her position is not being heard by the other working party and is not reflected in this bill. Ask her that question. If we want to know about other vulnerable people we should talk to the staff of Caritas the Catholic social services organisation. They do not have a desire to attack the Government. They do not want to be seen to be supporting any political party. They do not have an axe to grind about poverty; they have a spiritual and moral commitment to look after the most vulnerable. So perhaps their voices alongside beneficiaries’ voices might be worth hearing as well. 
I stand here proudly to acknowledge my former colleague Sue Bradford who has given most of her life to this issue and who is on the Alternative Welfare Working Group. Her voice should be heard by the other working group and be reflected in this bill. But we are not hearing the voice of experience; we are hearing the voice of ideology. 
It is random to start talking about work testing people when work testing is a failed experiment that other countries such as Australia are moving away from not because of their moral and spiritual commitment to the poor but because it simply has not reduced the number of people on benefits. If we want to be pragmatic about this we have to look at what actually works to reduce the number of beneficiaries. If we are about cutting costs we should be pragmatic look at what does not work and not reintroduce it into Aotearoa New Zealand when Australia is walking away from it. It is not a logical process to be following. We should look at the people on the Alternative Welfare Working Group and ask for the views of its members such as the Rev. Muru Walters who is tangata whenua and is representing his Church. None of those people are speaking lightly out of some sectarian desire to attack the Government’s position. They are doing it because they are very concerned that the most vulnerable people will be retraumatised. 
Hon Annette King 
: And they’re experienced. 
CATHERINE DELAHUNTY 
: And those people have spent their lives doing what we in this House do not do. They have spent their lives at the front line without any recognition status or necessarily salaries such as we get paid. Every day they are trying to feed the people who are the most vulnerable. 
The Green Party is really concerned about this legislation. We were hopeful that it would be amended but when it came out of the select committee process it had not been amended so we are very very disappointed. We should not entrench injustice when we have the opportunity for change. We might all be on the same page about wanting to create real jobs so that people have better lives—we might all agree with that—but at the select committee group after group and person after person from Sir Geoffrey Palmer who said the legislation was ridiculous right through to all of the advocacy groups said that the legislation was unfortunate.