Collins Judith: New Zealand Superannuation and Veterans’ Pensions (Entitlements of Spouses and Partners of People in Long-term Residential Care and Remedial Matters) Bill — First Reading 
Collins Judith: New Zealand Superannuation and Veterans’ Pensions (Entitlements of Spouses and Partners of People in Long-term Residential Care and Remedial Matters) Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:629;Page:1632] 
JUDITH COLLINS (National—Clevedon) 
: 
 It is with pleasure that the National Party supports this bill. It is a very good provision and it actually looks to recognise the situation that has been highlighted by my colleague the Hon Nick Smith. He took up the issue of a Nelson couple. Mrs Page had to go to a rest home. She and her husband have been married for 70 years and Mr Page applied to Work and Income for the living alone payment—because he was of course living alone—but he was declined under the previous Labour Government because his wife still recognised him. 
 So the situation was that because Mr and Mrs Page could recognise each other and were not divorced they were told by Work and Income that if Mr Page wanted to get the living alone allowance he would have to divorce his wife. That is the sort of callous situation that we found people in. 
I was on the select committee that looked at the petition the Minister referred to and it was certainly one that we took very seriously and I recall looked at very favourably because it actually addresses a very cruel situation for people who in this day and age have to be separated at such a time in their lives. I note that the bill was in fact introduced on 21 February this year 1 week after my colleague the Hon Nick Smith who was very frustrated with the lack of work the Government had put into this area lodged a complaint with the Human Rights Commission on behalf of Mr Page who is now aged 91. I am very pleased to see that the Government has finally moved on it. We have to wonder why it took so long. With all the talk about petitions and everything else the Government knew about this problem. The Government has been in power for over 6 years and it could very easily have fixed this issue very quickly. 
When we look at the bill itself we see that it is a matter of only a couple of pages. So given that there was pretty much across-the-board and cross-party support for the bill one would have thought that a bill of six pages might have been introduced with somewhat more speed once this problem had been recognised. However we should be very grateful that despite the mad situation we have had and still have in law at the moment we are finally getting some action because if this couple Mr and Mrs Page aged 91 and 88 respectively had been either a de facto couple or a gay couple or if Mrs Page had dementia or was in prison then Mr Page would have been able to get the extra money. 
 Finally we are getting some action and really only after my colleague the Hon Dr Nick Smith took a complaint to the Human Rights Commission. Frankly the Ministers involved should be wondering why they could not have brought the matter to the House earlier. So we are very pleased to be able to support the bill. We do not want to be too nasty about that fact that it has taken so long because finally something is happening. We are very pleased to be able to say that the Government has finally got itself together found some legislation to bring to the House and can finally get a bill passed—even if it had to get a hurry-up from Nick Smith. So we are very pleased to support the bill and we are delighted to see that something will finally be done for Mr and Mrs Page and for couples like them.