METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister for Social Development and
Employment: Does she agree with the authors of the Children's Social Health
Monitor baseline report, launched today, that New Zealand's current benefit
provisions are unlikely "to protect a large proportion of our children from
severe or significant hardship"?
Hon PAULA BENNETT (Minister for Social
Development and Employment) : Yes, I agree with a lot of what the report says.
What I do not agree with is where it states that the number of children in
families on benefits is likely to rise. Work and Income is working very hard to
help people into jobs so that they can build better futures for themselves and
their families.
Metiria Turei: Does she think that $110 billion over the
next 40 years will be enough for her department to make sure that no New Zealand
child goes without fruit, veges, raincoats, shoes, or visits to the doctor,
which this report shows many are doing today?
Hon PAULA BENNETT: What I
will say is that it is not just about the money. Research by the Ministry of
Social Development in 2002 showed that for two families on the same low income,
one on a benefit and one in work, the one in work had better outcomes every
time.
Catherine Delahunty: Tena koutou. Is she aware that many vulnerable
families are not accessing the basic support that Work and Income should be
providing now, such as the hundreds of people in Rotorua who are asking national
beneficiary advocates for help this week because they have not been able to
access basic support such as food grants?
Hon PAULA BENNETT: I can tell
the member that the number of special-needs grants has gone up considerably this
year, so more people are accessing them via the department. We certainly
encourage anyone who is having problems to go to Work and Income. Emergency
payments and supplementary money can be made available to them; it is
there.
Catherine Delahunty: Is it acceptable that a solo parent raising
five children in Rotorua is able to access only $70 from Work and Income to feed
them for a week; and does that not show that the benefit system is failing to
meet the needs of vulnerable children?
Hon PAULA BENNETT: It would be too
hard to make an assumption based on what the member is saying that that is the
level of support available to them.
Metiria Turei: How will her plans to
force single parents out to work when their youngest child turns 6 relieve
severe and significant hardship for those children, when the number of full-time
jobs for women is declining; the market for part-time work is highly
competitive; hours of existing jobs are being cut back, threatening in-work
payments; and rental housing prices for our most vulnerable families continue to
rise?
Hon PAULA BENNETT: It would be fair to say that we start from
different assumptions. The Green Party assumes that people do not want to work,
that those on the domestic purposes benefit are happy to stay on it, and that is
how they want to survive. National believes that a lot of them want to work. If
the incentives are right and the jobs are right, they will go out and take jobs,
and that is what we are focused on.
Hon Annette King: If she is serious
about helping children in New Zealand, why did the National Government recently
turn its back on a suggestion by the Every Child Counts organisation to
establish a multiparty working group on children's issues in Parliament? Instead
of agreeing to work with other political parties, the Government refused,
stating that Parliament already had enough processes in place to consider issues
relating to children. And can she tell the House of the success of one of the
processes?
Hon PAULA BENNETT: Because for 9 long years we had a lot of
talk, and now this Government has decided that it is about action. We have seen
already this year a number of initiatives that target the most abused and
neglected children. The Never Ever Shake a Baby campaign starts on 6 December,
the first response to a non-governmental organisation that will be going out to
those businesses, with an independent experts forum delivering actual responses
on what we can do. This Government is focused on action, not on a whole bunch of
chit-chat that gets nowhere.
Hon Annette King: Does she believe that her
naming and shaming of two solo mothers earlier this year who had the audacity to
speak out on the impacts of the cuts she had made to the training incentive
allowance, which was helping them to get off the benefit, has made it harder to
assist beneficiaries and their children, because of the venom and vitriol her
comments generated out there in the public?
Hon PAULA BENNETT: That is
another example of recycling old arguments. One of those women did not feel it
was naming and shaming; she was quite happy with having the information, which
was correct, put out there. I make no apologies for telling a true story of
where our welfare state is.
Hon Annette King: I seek leave to table a
letter to me from the Prime Minister, dated 3 November, in which he turns down
the suggestion, not from me but from an organisation that does not just do
chit-chat, asking—
Mr SPEAKER: The member should not make that kind of
comment when seeking leave to table a document. Leave is sought to table that
document. Is there any objection? There is no objection.
Document, by
leave, laid on the Table of the House.
Metiria Turei: I seek leave to table
the New Zealand Children's Social Health Monitor released today.
Mr
SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There
is no objection.
Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.
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