Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill

I present a legislative statement on the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill.

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: That legislative statement is published under the authority of the House and can be found on the Parliament website.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I move, That the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

This bill seeks to improve financial assistance for caregivers of children who are unable to be cared for by their parents. The proposals in the bill extend financial assistance to support children being cared for outside of the State care system. And, whether a child is inside the State care system or outside the State care system, I believe that there should be greater equity in the payments given to their caregivers. Around 15,000 people throughout Aotearoa New Zealand have stepped up to take on the day-to-day care of children whose parents are unable to care for them. This may be for reasons such as the child’s parents have passed away, or there’s been a significant breakdown in their immediate family and the child’s parents are no longer able to care for them.

So I take my hat off to caregivers. It is a substantial commitment to take on somebody else’s children and care for them and love them as if they were your own. But whatever the case or the reason that caregivers have to take on someone else’s child, they have made a significant decision and are playing a critical role, having opened their homes to provide awhi and aroha to our tamariki.

Many of these caregivers are whānau caregivers—that is, members of a child’s family, their whānau, their hapu, or their iwi, and many whānau do feel that they’re being asked to do this for little more than aroha. Often these whānau members are stepping up in difficult situations where there is little choice. For example, if I was a grandparent in straitened circumstances and the choice for me was either to take in a grandchild whose parents couldn’t care for them or to see my grandchild go into the care of strangers, I know that I’d take the former choice.

So this bill is part of the Government’s response to the review of financial assistance for caregivers undertaken by Oranga Tamariki in 2019. I need to acknowledge the work of the former Minister, the Hon Tracey Martin, and thank her for the work that she put into this. As part of the review, caregivers told us that they were under significant financial pressure. They told us that the payments they received were not enough to meet the needs of the tamariki in their care. The review also found that there was a lack of equity in the payments and support that caregivers outside of the State care system received compared to caregivers of children within the State care system. As far as I’m concerned, whether a caregiver is a caregiver inside the State care system or outside of the State care system, or a child is within the State care system or outside the State care system—regardless—they need to be supported. There needs to be equity in the support.

So those caring for children outside of the State care felt that it wasn’t fair, they were put at a disadvantage for taking the initiative, and they prevented children ending up in the care of the State in the first place. So this bill seeks to help address those disparities. It does this by firstly extending eligibility for the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit to caregivers who may provide care for less than 12 months, and also establishing a birthday and Christmas allowance for caregivers receiving the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit.

Can I take this opportunity to commend the Social Services and Community Committee for its consideration of the bill and also acknowledge all of the members of the public who took time to consider and to submit on the bill. The committee received 31 submissions and eight of those submitters made oral submissions. Many of the submissions received were from individual caregivers or organisations advocating on behalf of caregivers. It was encouraging to see how many submitters supported the intent of the bill and the specific proposals. Submitters made it clear that financial assistance plays an important role in enabling caregivers to care for tamariki. We often say that it takes a village to raise a child, but also adequate financial support also makes that role a lot easier.

The committee has recommended a number of amendments to the bill, and I’ll briefly describe the main amendments as they relate to each proposal. The first proposal in the bill extends eligibility for the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit to caregivers who may provide care for less than 12 months. This will ensure that caregivers can access financial support where the care arrangement is short term or for an unknown period of time. To ensure that caregivers will be eligible for these benefits, the committee recommended including a new definition of “principal temporary caregiver” to be eligible for the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit. The committee also recommended consequential amendments to the Social Security Act 2018 and the Social Security Regulations 2018. These amendments extend eligibility for the child disability allowance, the childcare assistance, and the temporary additional support in respect of the child to a temporary orphans benefit or unsupported child’s benefit caregiver who is caring for a child for less than 12 months. These amendments will ensure that all caregivers in receipt of the orphans benefit or the unsupported child’s benefit will have the same access to these forms of supplementary assistance.

The second proposal in the bill is to establish birthday and Christmas allowances for caregivers receiving the orphans benefit or the unsupported child’s benefit. In response to the suggestions raised by submitters, the committee recommended that the Christmas allowance be renamed the holiday allowance. This is to recognise that Christmas may not be observed by all whānau and to be more inclusive of other cultural and religious celebrations, but caregivers can still receive some support and make another day special for the child. The holiday allowance will still be tied to eligibility for the orphans benefit or the unsupported child’s benefit on 25 December of each year and paid in advance of that date.

The committee has recommended further minor and technical amendments that improve the workability of the bill to ensure that the bill can be implemented in line with the policy intent. I’ve provided further detail on these amendments in the legislative statement that I presented to the House in advance of this second reading.

The Government is committed to reforming the system of financial assistance and support for caregivers. This bill puts in place measures that are just one step on that journey. It will provide more support for children living with caregivers outside of the State care system and support more whānau, hapu, and iwi to care for their own. And once again, I just would like to take my hat off and thank all of the caregivers for the amazing work that they do, caring and loving other people’s children as if they were their own. So, I commend the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill to the House.

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I also stand tonight to speak to the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill in its second reading.

I’ll start my contribution by acknowledging all of those carers around New Zealand who take children into their own homes. They provide stability, they provide security, and they provide love to over 22,000 children in this country. Thank you for what you do. Not you, Mr Speaker.

💬 Hon Member: But still thank him for what he does.

But thank you for what you do, anyway.

I also acknowledge, as the Minister has mentioned, the former Minister—the Hon Tracey Martin—for the work that she has done on this bill. She was a fine advocate, a very passionate advocate for the children in this country.

Now, as we heard, the bill is a result of a review that was done in 2019 about the way Government payments are made to carers—those carers that provide for the 22,000 children in their care here in New Zealand. It was apparent that the financial support for carers who look after children in foster homes was different to those who look after children on unsupported child benefits, or on the orphans benefit. So what this bill basically does is correct that disparity between those three different types of benefits, and it gives it some equity. So this bill will remove those disparities.

I’d like to just outline the different types of payments and the reason that we’ve got this inconsistency. It’s come about over time, as a bit of a piecemeal adjustment is made to benefits and living arrangements over time. At the moment, we’ve got the foster care allowance, which is governed by the Oranga Tamariki Act of 1989, but the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit are governed by the Social Security Act of 2018. Now, the foster care allowance is administered by Oranga Tamariki, the orphans benefit and unsupported child’s benefit are administered by the Ministry of Social Development, and then we have the foster care allowance which is paid for caring for a child or a young person in State care. What that means is that they are subject to an order for custody, or they have sole guardianship, or they have a care agreement under the Oranga Tamariki Act, whereas the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit are for looking after children or a young person whose parents have died, who have a very serious long-term disability, or, in some rare cases—we learnt—whose parents are actually missing.

So as you can see, there are some variations in the different legislation that covers these benefits, and what they’re meant to do is to meet the needs—or the reasonable needs—of a young child. In terms of the foster care allowance, the Oranga Tamariki Act says that it is to meet the reasonable needs of the child or young person, whereas the orphans benefit and unsupported child’s benefit legislation says it is to assist with the cost of caring for a child who is not the caregiver’s own. So one set of legislation meets the needs and the others assist with the costs. So this bill does set out to remedy that disparity between those various pieces of legislation.

In the law as it currently exists, there is a 12-month rule, and what this bill will do is remove that 12-month clause. So what it does, it says that the child who qualifies for the orphans benefit or the unsupported child’s benefit, who is in the care of whānau or extended family, wasn’t eligible for support for one year, and that was brought in originally so that it encouraged long-term caregiving arrangements. But this bill will remove that 12-month eligibility rule, which brings it into alignment with foster care arrangements. I think this is one of the areas that we need to monitor very closely, because without some guarantee of long-term care, we do run the risk of children being moved from one family to another. And I think that that would be incumbent on us to ensure that those living arrangements for those children are stable.

The bill also replicates the allowances that are paid to foster carers for birthdays and Christmas. So that’s a mechanism so that these children, when they have a birthday or it comes to Christmas time, instead of having the carers having to pay for that personally, that there is a small allowance made for foster children. This bill will align that with the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit. The difference between the two benefits over time is around $10 to $30 a week, and so it will benefit the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit. But the care commitments are no different, depending on what, you know, qualification the child has as to what benefit they are receiving, so it does make sense that these are aligned across all of those.

As the Minister, Kelvin Davis, has said, the Social Services and Community Committee received 31 submissions on the bill. It wasn’t too many, I thought, considering 22,000 children are out there in care, but they were quality submissions, as you would expect. Some of the feedback was extremely good and some was quite taxing for the select committee because there were a lot of things—and I can see the chair over there nodding. There were a lot of things we would have loved to have extended into, but, of course, and it’s not unusual, but they did fall outside of the brief or the scope of this bill. But some of them were very sound recommendations, and I think at some point there will be a revisit to some of those recommendations. Several of those submissions raised were related to the wider welfare system and how that could be remedied or improved, and other recommendations suggested that all benefit rates be increased.

One of the things that did come up, and it’s a submission that I’d like to refer back to, came from Age Concern New Zealand and YouthLaw Aotearoa—both of those submissions raised issues around the youth payment. Again, it’s one of those ones that did fall outside of the scope of the bill, but YouthLaw Aotearoa suggested that the eligibility criteria for the youth payment be expanded to provide for young people who may not feel safe living with their parents, even though their parents may want them to stay at home. But there was no mechanism for them to extricate themselves from that situation. So again, it’ll be something that I think Oranga Tamariki will turn its mind to.

One of the things that did tax us throughout all of our discussions on this bill was the name of the orphans benefit. Although we all agreed that it was an unfortunate name and wasn’t completely reflective of the children it always referred to, we just simply couldn’t come up with an alternative suggestion. So it is still here. But I imagine that—if my committee members are still in agreement—if some wise person out there could come back with an idea, we would look to change the name of the orphans benefit.

We’re all in agreement in this House on the passage of this bill. It brings us all into alignment with the various types of support that are available for people who care for children in this country, regardless of whether they are in a foster care arrangement, whether they are supported by the orphans benefit or an unsupported child’s benefit. I have great pleasure in commending it to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It is indeed a real pleasure to take a call on this, the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill. I’d just like to acknowledge the previous speaker, Maureen Pugh, for her good words. She’s made a really good summary of the bill, but there was also the collegial response that we all had to making something better. I’d like to acknowledge the Minister Kelvin Davis for bringing this bill to fruition, and also extend my acknowledgments and thanks to the Hon Tracey Martin, who came and submitted—and it was quite lovely to see her speaking about the original intention. It was lovely to catch up with her again, but it was also, for her, seeing a piece of legislation through as well.

Look, this is a very simple bill, really, in terms of equity. If we think about what this bill’s policy intent is, it is essentially that those who receive the unsupported child’s benefit or the orphan’s benefit didn’t receive the same amount as those children under State care, under the foster carer’s benefit. So, essentially, the work was, as the Minister has said, the same work. Essentially, the value of that good work was exactly the same depending on where you were, but the entitlements were different.

Before I speak more specifically about the bill, I do also want to acknowledge those carers out there. Now, some of us here on this side of the House have been carers and have done some of the work that is needed. Often these children are the children of our own families or they’re the children of close family members or friends. It’s about us putting our time and our energy into—and indeed, I acknowledge, raising children, giving them the love, the attention, and the care that they deserve when things haven’t gone quite right at home. So I would like to acknowledge all of those carers out there. The member who just resumed her seat, Maureen Pugh, talked about 22,000 children, so that’s roughly 15,000 caregivers.

We had a really good process. We didn’t have a lot of submissions on this bill, and I think it could be fair to say that pretty much everyone was very much happy with our direction. Some were asking for further changes, and of course, that moved beyond the scope of what we were intending to do.

As I have said, the disparity between children in foster care and those who are under State care was something that we all simply agreed needed to change. The bill itself extends the eligibility for the OB and the UCB. So I hope that I’ve explained what they are: the orphans benefit is the OB and the unsupported child’s benefit is the UCB. It extends this. Previously, it was for those expected to provide care for 12 or more months, and that meant that some families who were caring for children weren’t certain for how long that child could come, or be with them, and, as a consequence, they weren’t actually eligible to receive this support, even though they were, in fact, taking care of those children. So we basically removed the 12-month rule, as others have said—essentially, we loosened it up to ensure that family members or other people could get access if they were taking care of children and were expected to do so for some time.

We did discuss, at some length, what would happen if—like, for example, when I was a child I spent about six weeks of every year at Christmas holidays with my family in the South Island. We made sure that that was not covered in this part of the legislation. So when you are just going for a holiday and there is no intention that you stay for good there, or stay for a while, then that is, in fact, covered.

So that made it very clear, to ensure that people couldn’t get an allowance for having a child for a couple of weeks—say, grandparents, etc. So we included a new definition of “temporary caregiver” to ensure that they’re eligible. So, again, it could be children turning up one night unexpectedly—it extends for a week, it extends for another week, an agreement gets put in place, and then there’s that eligibility.

And this is really important, because often it’s kin or whānau that are caring for these family members. But sometimes it’s not, and we recognised with this policy change that the family members were themselves going without, and their own children were being affected. So when the report came out, it was very, very clear that families were putting their hands into their own pockets for something that wouldn’t necessarily be fair if you looked on an equity basis.

As I said, there are 15,000 caregivers out there supporting approximately 24,000 children, and we had 31 submissions, eight of them oral, including from the Hon Tracey Martin. As the previous speaker stated, we did have an issue with the orphans benefit. The definition of orphans benefit was parents who have died, or are missing, or not able to care for them—for example, they have a long-term serious disability. So we really struggled with this. We really struggled with the fact that these children weren’t necessarily orphans, and this is a little bit of antiquated language. But, quite honestly, we weren’t able to come up with an alternative. I think that that’s a reflection of the fact that it is quite a difficult situation, but we didn’t feel that calling someone with living parents an orphan was appropriate. Nevertheless, we really couldn’t come up with an alternative.

We also established the birthday and Christmas allowance to be able to be paid directly. So as previously stated, we recommended that the Christmas allowance not be called a Christmas allowance. It gets paid on the 25th or before 25 December, but it is a holiday allowance. So the family who may not celebrate Christmas may celebrate the holiday or save it for another time when they have a significant event.

We also looked at the birthday allowance, and it was quite cute. We have a specific piece of legislation which enables children who are born on a leap day of a leap year to have their birthday recognised on 1 March when it is not 29 February. I have to acknowledge our officials for raising that with us, because it wasn’t something that naturally we thought about—I guess none of us have children born on 29 February, but it was a very small but also useful piece of change.

I’m running very short of time, so I will say that the final thing that we ensured was that when a family member or when a person receives these entitlements and they are not entitled to them, we also ensured that there was an ability to raise a debt and to have that money come back. And that’s really, basically, to enable some flexibility in the system for when these children are moving between families.

So it’s a great piece of legislation. It is very little but also extremely meaningful for those families. I commend the bill.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on behalf of the National Party in support of the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill. Caregivers in New Zealand provide day-to-day care for around 22,000 children whose parents aren’t able to care for them for a variety of reasons. Many caregivers are members of a child’s family, whānau, or extended family and have stepped up to take on the care of a child when their parents are unable to do so.

One of the current criteria for accessing the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit, under the Social Security Act 2018 is that the caregiver must be likely to be the principal caregiver of the child for at least one year from the date of the application for the payment—what is called the 12-month rule. This is what this bill endeavours to resolve. In practice, this rule means, presently, that there are caregivers who take on the care of a child, often in difficult and/or short-term situations where there is little other choice but they are unable to access financial assistance to help them provide care. This is despite the fact that they, like other caregivers, take on all primary responsibilities for the day-to-day care of a child when that child’s parents are unable to care for them.

The National Party recognises that the financial support that this bill provides does entail a fiscal cost, and therefore requires careful consideration in the same way we scrutinise all other policies that spend taxpayer dollars. It is important to National that the bill targets and benefits those who are most in need of support, and we believe this bill does so. It targets and supports those members of the community who have taken on the incredibly important task of caring for children who are, through no fault of their own, in a difficult situation and do not have other members of their family or whānau to care for them. Many children face significant social challenges when instability exists in their home environment and they do not have regular contact with their parents.

This bill is consistent with the National Party’s social investment philosophy of spending early in a child’s life to improve their long-term outcomes. We also believe that it is just that caregivers receive recognition for their work.

There is a disparity that this bill is addressing, as well, in terms of what’s currently called Christmas and birthday allowances to caregivers receiving the orphans benefit or the unsupported child’s benefit. Caregivers receiving the orphans benefit or the unsupported child’s benefit do not receive the birthday and Christmas allowances that the relevant caregivers are receiving—the other benefit. This means that the caregivers receiving it pay for these costs out of their own pocket, or, if they’re unable to, the children in their care go without. This disparity in payments contributes to children missing out on assistance that is otherwise available to caregivers who are in State care.

I just want to make some note that this bill is a good step forward but we must, in this House, also pay attention to the pressures that contribute to families entering a situation where they have difficulties caring for their children. And I certainly want to also recognise and acknowledge those who take on the care of children that I have seen in my life—people who have cared for hundreds of children, and also those who have cared for just one member of their family or whānau. It is a very big commitment that they take on, and it is very good tonight to acknowledge the efforts that they make.

I would note, however, that there are difficulties that are placed on families, and particularly have been placed on families over the last 15 months. Some of those financial stresses lead to other stresses that inevitably end up being experienced by children. Only today, I’ve been contacted by someone who told me a very sad story of her partner losing his employment last year due to the impact on the tourism industry, and she had to then take care of him and her two children, on her reduced income because of our current settings. She said that the system encourages her partner and her to separate—that way he can receive some assistance and a little independence and dignity in his time of hardship that he currently cannot if he stays with her. She said that this is a situation that has placed enormous stress on her family, and I would acknowledge, tonight—that there is a lot more that we can certainly do.

The pressure on families is also from a variety of factors, and in this House we need to pay very close attention to those pressures and what we can do to alleviate them, and one of those, obviously, at the present time is the cost of housing, and the housing crisis. In my electorate, I talked to a camping-ground operator, and 80 percent of the people in his campground are Ministry of Social Development referrals, and that has been the case for the last two years. The continued pressure on families who are in that situation can certainly contribute to children ending up in a situation where others need to care for them. So I strongly encourage all of us in this House to focus on what we can do to resolve that and on the housing policies that we need to ensure that a lot more houses can be built.

I acknowledge that we have a record number of housing consents that have been processed in recent times. However, I wish to point to the huge workforce constraints that we currently have in this country. I’ve been hearing from operators—and I’m sure many other members of this House have—that they simply do not have the workforce that they need to build houses. This is a constraint that I’m seeing right across my electorate, and I hear it is happening right around the country in a variety of sectors, not just in the construction sector.

I would say that the pressure that goes on families—and I’ll just speak to this, and I’d say it relates to this issue. In my electorate, for example, a large number of farming families are under a lot of pressure because they cannot get the staff they need to help them with their duties, so the kids are coming with them to the milking shed, day in, day out, and it is putting a huge amount of pressure on those families. I raise this point because there are a lot of complex factors that we need to take into account to make sure that we look after the children in this country.

Just coming full circle however, this bill is a good one. It is one to ensure that those 22,000 caregivers in New Zealand who are providing day-to-day care for children are properly supported by the Government. I commend the bill to the House.

Kia ora, Mr Speaker. I rise to take a call, obviously in support of the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill. For myself, as a first-term MP, it’s been a real privilege to be on this journey from first reading to select committee and, now, to the second reading. I look around the room and look at the back here, and I’ve got a pretty powerful back row here—

Tāmati Coffey: Yeah, that’s us.

—that is us—and, in fact, almost all of the MPs from the Labour Party who are on the Social Services and Community Committee are in the House tonight to support this enthusiastically, because we need to ensure, as my colleague Angie Warren-Clark said, that this is around equity. For me, this is also personal, as a caregiver myself who has negotiated my way through the different benefits in terms of what we’re talking about tonight.

So it’s been a privilege to listen to our submitters to hear their ideas and thoughts, and to read from a number of them in terms of why they support this piece of legislation. I just want to focus really briefly, because this really stuck with me—and I hope that these two words can stick with me throughout my political career—when the submitter said, “This is everybody’s business.” It’s everybody’s business. This isn’t just around caregivers, it isn’t around Work and Income or the Ministry of Social Development, and it’s not just around children; this is everybody’s business.

So I’m really proud to be here supporting our bill here to ensure equity and ensure that people are paid, and I think, for me, I want to come back to our officials. I want to thank our Oranga Tamariki officials, who presented some amazing information for us, but there was a particular one. This appendix to their advice was around children being cared for inside the State care system and children being cared for outside the State care system, and although I’ve negotiated it myself for a long, long time, I did not realise the lack of equity there was when it comes to the different forms of funding and the allowances. It was really, really clear for us, and it made it clear as a committee that we needed to support this piece of legislation, so thank you to our officials. Thanks also to Kelvin Davis, the Minister for Children, for ensuring that all children, all tamariki, are given a fair deal.

Now, everyone’s mentioned the orphans benefit and how we’d discussed maybe changing the name, and I just want to reflect back that we got to the point where we just wanted the legislation to be right and for people to be paid a fair deal, so we decided that it wasn’t as important to get the name right as it was just to ensure the legislation served our community. So I’m glad that, hopefully, in the future maybe we can rethink that name, but at this point in time, let’s just get the legislation right, and then we can talk about changing the name.

I also want to thank the caregivers around Aotearoa who take care of tamariki. Some, as Angie Warren-Clark said, are whangai-ed, with part of their extended whānau, but for others, they with complete strangers, and let’s just think for a moment around those tamariki and the experiences that they must go through in terms of going to a new placement, going to a stranger’s house, and think how resilient many of our tamariki are.

For me, I was a foster caregiver, or I guess I still am. They’ve just grown up a bit more and I don’t get the payments any more, sadly, but that’s OK—they still cost me money. The foster care allowance—which, again, we’re talking about bringing the system up to match it. I received the foster care allowance for many years for a number of young people. I think of one of those young people who was 11 years old when he first came into my care. I negotiated that experience in terms of the distress and trauma he’d been through, and then for me, I was having to negotiate my way through Oranga Tamariki in terms of the payments system, which, in many ways, is very simple. It was a simple process and easy to do. That young man is almost 30, and he’s doing OK, but I thank the State and I thank the fact that I was able to receive that foster care allowance to support him in his growing up.

Then, I think of another young person, who had been through the youth justice system. He came to stay with me when he was 15, and in that situation, we had to negotiate the unsupported child’s benefit, which was a bit more clunky and a bit harder to access. It wasn’t easy.

So seeing the two systems—the foster care allowance and then the unsupported child’s benefit—it was hard work to get through. Having a young person in my care who was on the foster care allowance, and then having a young person that we had to work through to get him on to the unsupported child’s benefit, I realised the difference. There wasn’t equity in the system, even though I was doing the same role with the same responsibilities and with the same care requirements. So I’m really glad that we’re changing things.

The third one—I’ll hold up three fingers, eh—was around the orphans benefit and, sadly, I’ve had to negotiate this as well. This young person was six years old when his mother dropped dead in front of him. Sadly, his father wasn’t on the scene and wasn’t in the picture, and never has been. So this young person—a six-year-old—had to negotiate. Well, he had caregivers initially, and then it wasn’t until he was 15 that he came to stay with me, and we had to again follow through this orphans benefit for him.

But, again, the good news in that situation is that he turned 30 this year, and he and his partner were able to buy their first house together, which is really exciting. I’m not sure we’ll get on to housing, because that was the previous speaker, but, anyway, that’s my one referral to housing. It’s a good news story, because this six-year-old is now 30 and, through the support of the State and the orphans benefit—terrible name, but it did a job. But, again, I saw the inequity around the foster care allowance, the unsupported child’s benefit, and the orphans benefit.

I just want to say a big thankyou, and I know there are people in this room who are or who have been caregivers, and the role that that plays is massive in terms of our community and our society, in creating homes, because we have to realise that this isn’t about providing just shelter, or just water. I know that in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, that is the most important, But it goes up to the next level, and it’s actually around creating a home—a place for a young person or a child to call home.

So to all the caregivers around Aotearoa, I say a huge, massive thankyou. Keep up the good work, and keep on keeping on, because it’s not easy. You have some days which feel like it’s the end of the road and it’s the end of the line and it’s the end of that experience, and the young person or child is difficult. But then there are the good days, and then there’s seeing the progress and seeing a young person being able to buy their own home, or a young person who didn’t end up in prison or in trouble with the courts.

So I really enjoyed being on the select committee and having the submissions come through. I think of Barnados, Birthright, the Office of the Children’s Commissioner, and Grandparents Raising Grandchildren, who in the last 20 years have just grown and grown and grown as an organisation, and I don’t say that in a positive way. It’s awesome that they’re there. It’s awesome that we have an organisation like Grandparents Raising Grandchildren, but it’s becoming more of a thing that grandparents are in the picture, and grandparents need to be looked after. There needs to be equity so that when they have a young person who’s on the orphans benefit or who’s on the unsupported child’s benefit, they are paid the same amount that a foster caregiver is paid.

I’m really also glad that we talked about what became the holidays payment. Again, it was a no-brainer, and, as a committee, I’m really grateful that we all agreed. Yeah, it was initially a Christmas payment, but we live in 2021 and not everyone celebrates Christmas. We need to ensure that we reflect all people in our community and our society, so I’m glad—I’m so glad—that we did that.

Anyway, in closing, Mr Speaker, thank you so much for allowing me to speak on an area that I’m really passionate about and that I know a lot about. I think we’ve got a really good balance, and I want to support this to the third reading. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It takes a village to raise a child, but our welfare system has made it so that people cannot step in collectively to raise our tamariki, and has created the circumstances where too often the State needs to intervene because the way that our benefit system has been made has created too many barriers for our extended families and communities to look after children.

If I may take a call to speak on the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill. I want to begin, like many speakers, by paying a tribute to the caregivers who ensure that our children have the opportunity to thrive. I also want to reflect on the many comments that have been thrown around this House recently on the impacts of colonisation. I think about our welfare system and the fact that we have a benefit such as the unsupported child’s benefit and the orphans benefit, and one of them requires a break down in the family in order for a caregiver to step in, when for many cultures—Māori, Pasifika, and even for my own culture in Mexico and throughout Latin America—we have a tradition where we collectively raise children very often, and it is quite normal for people to step in, and it’s not always the case that there needs to be a break-down in the family relationships in order for people to become caregivers. It’s unfortunate that a really Western, often heteronormative, system has been put in our welfare system that has created the problem that we are starting to solve through this bill.

The problems that we’re trying to solve in this bill are the differences that exist in the foster care allowance, the unsupported child’s benefit, and the orphans benefit, whether it’s the rates or the fact that people in becoming caregivers and receiving the unsupported child’s benefit and the orphans benefit, had to previously show that they would be looking after the child for 12 months or more. We know that often people are slipping in for short periods of time and our welfare system should enable caregivers to step in for however little or long they need to be supporting our tamariki.

The other issues are around income inadequacy and the fact that people who were receiving the unsupported child’s benefit and the orphans benefit were not able to access a birthday or holiday payment. I want to make a quick pause just to acknowledge the fact that the select committee managed to arrive to a position where we were able to rename what was originally called the “Christmas allowance” to “holiday allowance”. That meant that we recognised the cultural diversity within our caregivers, and that, ultimately, whānau have very different ways of celebrating meaningful religious or cultural events.

The many other issues that we tried to fix that are very familiar for me personally, having worked at the front lines in South Auckland for several years, with people on the benefit, were also raised by submitters. And while this bill doesn’t directly address them, I think the submitters to this bill have laid a really strong mandate for us to, in the future, review the rules around the break-down in the family as well as looking at income inadequacy, because the truth is that for too many of the families that we used to see in South Auckland and Auckland Action Against Poverty, often when they first came in they needed something like a food grant because they were not able to cover things like rent or food. And when we started discussing with the families who needed that emergency assistance, about the make-up of their family, we realised that they were actually looking after several children; it’s just that they were not included in the benefit. The fact that we had to prove to Work and Income that there had been a breakdown, the fact that we had to provide so many letters of support that may have shown that that caregiver was going to look after the child for 12 months or more, just meant that it took sometimes weeks for that person to access the right benefit and therefore be able to cover basic expenses.

Even when they were able to access the right benefit, families too often would still be in debt, would fall into arrears because the baseline benefits are far too low. And I hope that the allowances that whānau on the unsupported child’s benefit and orphans benefit will receive will alleviate some of that income inadequacy. But I think, from what we’ve heard from submitters, there is more work that we need to do to address income inadequacy for caregivers. So I hope that that is one of the steps that this Government looks at as we progress and put through this bill.

I’m quite thankful for the collegial nature we had at the select committee. I think it was an opportunity to look at some of those broader systemic issues, and also, I think, to come together as a committee that it is made up of people from different cultures to address some of the language issues in the bill. I’m also thankful that the select committee identified and talked about the fact that the names that we used to define the unsupported child’s benefit and the orphans benefit do not fully describe the nature of the caregivers who are stepping in to look after children, because, ultimately, the, for example, unsupported child’s benefit does not speak, necessarily, that a child is unsupported; it simply speaks more broadly to a child that is being looked after by a caregiver who may not be their biological parent. That does not speak of a lack of support; it may just speak to a different family configuration as well. We have to acknowledge that language is important and, for far too long, our welfare system has created language that has disenfranchised parents and has disenfranchised children.

In saying that, I want to also acknowledge the submitters who talked about the fact that the way that the rules are right now end up discriminating ethnicities and groups that have already been done hard by our welfare system, including Māori, Pasifika, and migrant communities. So I hope that the issues that this bill is addressing will close the gap of the damage that colonisation has created through our welfare State.

Lastly, I hope that when this bill comes into action and we start seeing the changes and the requirements for children to come into care of people who are receiving a main benefit, we do start seeing a reduction in child poverty, because this should be at the heart of the legislation that we make. We should be working towards ending child poverty, not just simply alleviating it, and this bill will go some way towards that. But I hope that this Government acts a lot faster to put in place legislation that ensures all caregivers have the opportunity to let children thrive and that we implement the many recommendations laid out by the Welfare Expert Advisory Group, the many reports that have already told us that there is a lot more work to do.

So I commend this bill to the House and I look forward to the future contributions from members. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker.

💬 Hon Member: This will be better.

💬 Hon Member: It’s better already.

Thank you, thank you. ACT supports this bill. Our spokesperson on child welfare, Karen Chhour, has given us a good rundown on the issues that were discussed at select committee, including a number of recommended amendments to ensure that eligibility for the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit includes caregivers who are caring for a child unable to be cared for by their parents for a short term or an unknown or an uncertain period of time. Because of the uncertainties that affect so many families in New Zealand, we can only say “There but for the grace of God go those of us who are fortunate enough to be able to care for our own children.” But that’s actually what the role of the State is for: to be that social safety net—in this case, awfully, the ambulance often at the bottom of the cliff. We also understand that the select committee recommended amendments to ensure that the principal temporary caregiver who is entitled to receive the orphans benefit and unsupported child’s benefit can also receive supplementary assistance and can be supported to offer a birthday or a Christmas celebration to the children who end up in their care.

I will admit that my experience with my own child, who has a disability, and meeting families who found it impossible to cope with raising their child and who had therefore, because of a mental breakdown or a break-up of the family, had found that their child was then living with another family—a disabled child in a foster situation—brought home the realities of how challenging circumstances are for many, many families. And so it is correct that the role of the State should be to support children and their carers in that last resort. However, ACT also believes that instead of promoting more people to be on welfare who are able to care for themselves, in fact we should aim to reduce the number of children born into benefit-dependent households and support better income management for beneficiaries. However, the changes in this bill do not undermine ACT’s ultimate objectives to reduce dependence on welfare but it does, rightfully, correct a disparity in the current system.

This was brought home to me again last year. During the 2020 election campaign, I had the privilege of travelling around New Zealand, meeting people from all walks of life, including in Ōtaki, one of my favourite places in New Zealand, and, in fact, a place that has been blessed—blessed by the New Zealand Transport Agency just last week with the announcement of a long-overdue bypass of Ōtaki’s main street by the State highway—

💬 Hon Louise Upston: They’re lucky.

They are very, very lucky, Louise Upston. They are extremely lucky to be gifted a bypass. Now, not every town in New Zealand receives the benefit of that tooth fairy, who normally sits in the seat where I think Helen White sits today, known as the Minister of Transport, but Ōtaki is the main beneficiary. However, Ōtaki is a great town for another reason—

💬 Angie Warren-Clark: Ōtaki.

That is because Ōtaki—Ōtaki, thank you very much, Angie Warren-Clark, thank you. Ōtaki also is the site of the wonderful Swazi clothing company. Now, Swazi, I understand, is short for Swaziland. Now, Swazi is owned by the wonderful Davey Hughes, and Davey Hughes recognises that, in order to be a good employer, he needs to provide his employees with plenty of flexibility when it comes to their home and family situations, because many of his employees are doing what some might think is low-skilled work but from my observation was actually highly skilled work producing high-quality garments for hunting and fishing and outdoors wear. In fact, until recently, we understand that Swazi even held contracts to supply clothing to various New Zealand Government departments—the Department of Conservation, until they picked the lowest price conforming option to import it from some country which probably has human rights issues associated with it.

However, in this case, Davey Hughes introduced us to a number of his staff, and one of his staff was a woman past retirement age who he had welcomed back into the workforce so that she could earn sufficient income to pay for the care of her grandchildren who had been dropped on her with almost no notice when her daughter and errant boyfriend had been caught up in methamphetamine use and their lives had hit the skids. This wonderful woman, who thought that her life of toil had come to an end and that she was enjoying the delights of retirement in lovely Ōtaki, found that she was caring for two grandchildren, and she did not have the means to support them. Worse than that, even though she was able to return to work she was not able to access the carer support or those other types of benefits that were available to the long-term carers or the parents of these children. She was in a situation only months in, finding that she was unable to pay the bills and having to make a choice between going on a benefit or working. So being able to receive—she asked us at that time, “What would you do, ACT Party? What would you do if you were elected to Parliament as members of Parliament?” We said we would do something about it.

So it’s wonderful to be here today to be able to use this opportunity to speak in support of a bill that establishes a stronger social safety net but does not entrench all of the terrible dis-benefits of encouraging children to be born into benefit-dependent households and failing to support income management of people who aren’t able to do it. But this bill, in fact, is a good bill—well, by the standards of this Government, so let’s not get carried away.

I acknowledge—the ACT Party acknowledges—that life is not easy for many and that the role of Government is to be a last resort, the safety net. It is for that reason that we commend this bill to the House and we will support it. Ka pai. Kia ora. Ka rawe.

Thank you, te Mana Whakawā. It’s an honour and a privilege to stand here to make a contribution to the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill at its second reading. I’d like to acknowledge the Minister, the Hon Kelvin Davis, for his leadership in shepherding this bill in the House. I also would like to acknowledge the former Minister that people have acknowledged today, the Hon Tracey Martin.

As we’ve heard today from many speakers, this bill seeks to improve financial assistance for caregivers of children who are unable to be cared for by their parents. I’d like to acknowledge all 31 submitters who submitted on this bill, and as I have always done in my previous speeches, I acknowledge all the submitters because it’s important that they are acknowledged in this House. So I’ve acknowledged the Hon Tracey Martin, Gaylene Rickard, Gene’ Cullen, Helena Stirrup, Karen Kilgour, Leigh Carter, Marie Sharpe, Tracey Cobden, Denise Cosmas, John Asteriadis, Margaret Wilson, Ngatai Huata, Sean Kirton, Shelley Te Amo, Terri Stevenson, Age Concern New Zealand, Auckland Action Against Poverty, Barnardos, Birthright New Zealand, Grandparents Raising Grandchildren Trust NZ, Michael Gibson, Office of the Children’s Commissioner, Parents of Vision Impaired NZ, Poverty Free Aoteroa Charitable Trust, Ronelle Baker, Tracey Wallace-Hutchins, YouthLaw Aotearoa, Eliza Perkinson, and 250 Years of Colonisation the Aftermath, and there were two anonymous submissions.

I want to focus on the submission made by the Hon Tracey Martin where she referred to the matua whāngai principle. In my kōrero about children here in Aotearoa, I always acknowledge Puao-Te-Ata-Tu—Day Break: The Report of the Ministerial Advisory Committee on a Māori Perspective for the Department of Social Welfare, chaired by John Rangihau, Emarina Manuel, Donna Hall, Hori Brennan, Peter Boag, Tamati Reedy, and John Grant. I make mention of that because of the 13 recommendations. Recommendation No. 7 refers to the matua whāngai principle in respect of children. The matua whāngai principle in respect of children returns its original focus of nurturing children with family group.

But particularly I want to make a point on Recommendation 7(c), which we were reminded about at select committee by the Hon Tracey Martin: that “the funding mechanism be through the tribal authorities and governed by the principle that board payments should follow the child and be paid direct to the family of placement, quickly and accurately …”. But I want to go back to Recommendation 7(a) where it talks about its original focus being nurturing children within the family group. So I really want to make a point of that because it’s 30 years down. We are 30 years down the track—35, actually—and we’re finally correcting this fact.

So speakers before me spoke about two changes to the bill which suggest righting the inequities within this bill. For children who are cared for by the State, board payments are paid to caregivers. Also, with that is the birthday and Christmas allowance. What we find with an unsupported child benefit and orphans benefit that that wasn’t the case. What we found in comparing the benefits is that with the unsupported child’s benefits and orphan’ benefit, a caregiver had to care for a child or young person for 12 months before they can be considered for the payment of the unsupported child benefit, whereas for a child in State care, the payments are paid as soon as they are placed with a caregiver.

I want to acknowledge, I was brought up by my grandfather from when I was under one until I was nine. I was brought up by my grandfather, so I understand the importance of being raised by family within the family group. I also understand the responsibility of the State or those to provide support for certain children. My father paid maintenance, so in that way I was cared for by the system in Tonga where I was from.

But 22,000 children are without their parents. Regardless of whatever we name it, we have 22,000 children who are unable to be with their mother and their father. In my working life, working mainly in the Department of Social Welfare and all its many name changes, the number one wish of children is that they are with their parents, and if they can’t, that there is a home provided for them.

Like I said before, there is a disparity between State care and unsupported children and the orphans benefit. We decided to change the Christmas allowance to a holiday allowance, acknowledging the many religions in Aotearoa now, and bringing it forward and modernising it to reflect that the children, regardless of whatever religious holiday we adhere to, all need a holiday allowance.

So I want to acknowledge the select committee in that work, and, of course, the select committee chair, Angie Warren-Clark. Thank you for your chairwomanship of this bill through the select committee, and, of course, everyone in the select committee.

Also, we agreed that the 12-month time frame be removed because a person caring for a child needs—as I’ve said before in terms of the matua whāngai principle, the money should follow the child and the focus is on nurturing. I remember the submission from Grandparents Raising Grandchildren, where they said the majority of their members are Pākehā, then Māori, then Pacific, and then the rest of the population, but those members who were receiving the benefit—the unsupported child allowance and the orphans benefit—are Māori.

I started my contribution by taking us back to Puao-Te-Ata-Tu because it’s just—although, yeah, well. We tend to get tired always echoing those recommendations made to the Crown back in 1986. But when you’re looking at this, one that we could do better is that the State caregivers don’t have to fill in forms to receive that allowance—the social worker helps them. But with the unsupported child benefit and the orphans benefit the applicant actually has to apply for it. So 60 percent of those receiving those unsupported child and orphans benefits are Māori.

I know that the Hon Carmel Sepuloni has actually changed the culture of the Ministry of Social Development to be supportive, to make sure that people are entitled to their entitlements. I just hope that those who work in that space understand the difficulty that caregivers are burdened by, especially grandparents raising grandchildren. If I return to when I was a child, I wasn’t unsupported; I was supported by my family. And if we could just also remind ourselves going forward that it is about focusing on nurturing the child within the family group, or in some cases with—they begin as strangers but they end as family.

I really want to acknowledge the changes made to this bill, in particular, having caregivers on unsupported child’s benefit and orphans benefit receive the birthday allowance and the holiday allowance, because whether the child is in State care or in the care of those who are not their parents, they are entitled to that. We should recognise, again, with the principle of the matua whāngai from Puao-Te-Ata-Tu, that the money should follow the child, and that it is about nurturing. On that note, I would like to commend the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill to the House. Malo.

The next call is a split call. I call Christopher Luxon.

It’s a real pleasure to take a short call in support of the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill. As we’ve canvassed in this House, obviously the bill does some very good things in terms of removing the 12-month rule and, obviously, extending the Christmas and birthday allowances to caregivers who are receiving those benefits to match the foster care system. As I prepared, you know, looked through the notes, it was quite obvious that, actually, the payment system as a whole has never really been fundamentally reviewed, and it’s really important work that we’re doing getting started with that because, clearly, it hasn’t kept pace with societal change over the years.

National is really pleased to support this bill. We think it’s very fair, very common-sense, and a great improvement that’s going to be a really good thing for vulnerable children. I just want to commend Minister Davis and also Tracey Martin for doing the work in bringing this to the House today. It’s really good to be in the House where we’ve got cross-party support for something so important as our children.

There are 20,000 children that are being cared for by over 15,000 caregivers and, for a number of different reasons, whose parents can’t care for them themselves. So we know that many children who have unstable home lives, who lack regular contact with their parents, are just on a setback and are really facing some big challenges financially and socially. We just do acknowledge the huge selflessness, the sacrifice of those caregivers who step into that role and really step up. I just want to commend also—I was listening to Glen Bennett speak earlier in the House, and just thank you for the role that you’ve done as a caregiver as well and, in particular, recognise that many of the people and many of the caregivers, a significant proportion of them, are also Māori women, and that’s a really awesome thing that we’re doing here.

So if it wasn’t for these caregivers, we really know that these children would face greater upheaval. They would have greater uncertainty, and they would be living much more challenging lives. It is interesting, as you take a step back and reflect on it, that two five-year-olds in this country actually start in very different places and don’t have an equality of opportunity. I think it is right that we as the State make powerful interventions in those lives to change the trajectory of where they’re going. I remember hearing Bill English speak about the fact that there were 1,500 five-year-olds in State care in any given year, and over the course of them coming up through the age of 35, we’d spend $550 million in support of those children. That’s a phenomenal amount of money, but it just underscores the need to make powerful interventions early to change the trajectory and the course of where those lives are going.

We know that the chances of going to jail, we know the chances of not completing NCEA level 2, we know the chances of going on to a benefit are much higher as a result of that start in life. So anything we can do fundamentally to make a powerful intervention to be able to get the right outcomes and the right trajectory is really important. In doing so it’s actually good economics, because we end up saving that $550 million in that case, but the principle is very much the same. So spending money now to secure long-term results and really good outcomes for our most vulnerable and the people living the most messy and challenged and complex lives is a very good thing while also giving the Government lower costs for the future.

We also know when you think about children who are in foster care, they grow up to have half the adult income of those that weren’t raised in foster care, and so, again, it just underscores the importance of making those interventions. And as we have talked about on this side of the House, and I know on the other side as well, those first thousand days are just so critical to getting those children off to such a good start in life.

So in terms of the current reality—the situation where these caregivers take on children in short-term situations and then have not been able to access the assistance and support that they are owed and that they deserve, despite taking on those day-to-day responsibilities—this is a very good thing. We know that living costs are really high and it’s a very expensive undertaking, and so anything we can do to offset those significant costs, I think, is very important.

Finally, I just think rectifying the disparity between caregivers in State care and those outside the system is a very, very good thing. So the bill’s a small step in the right direction and it rightly recognises caregivers who are accessing the orphans benefit and the unsupported children’s benefits. I’m very pleased to support this bill and commend it to the House.

I rise in support of the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill, and it’s been a pleasure to sit in the House and to hear so many people actually who are obviously touched in their personal lives by their situations. It has led to a consensus, and I think that’s something we should be really grateful for.

I wanted to hear from Karen Chhour, and although I enjoyed listening to Simon Court, I wanted to recognise in particular that she has been through her own story. She gave it in her maiden speech about being in a situation where her grandmother wanted her and she didn’t get to keep her, and she was in a very stressful situation as a result. I know she would have taken a keen interest. What I got from her maiden speech was that she had lost a lot of faith in the State over that experience and that time. I am very proud of the Labour Party for, hopefully, restoring some of that by coming up with a bill which actually gives people support and recognises and respects those doing that role. It’s a very, very important role and I don’t underestimate the difficulty of it.

One of the difficulties of it is often the temporary situation, because, as Simon Court pointed out, we have a situation where often it is those families that are breaking down because of the distress they face. Often it will be something like a disability or it will be mental breakdown, etc. I’ve had that in my own family when I had, one evening just before Christmas, the arrival of my brother’s wife’s grandchild. He came out with them from England. I had this little boy whose mother had basically broken down in my house, and what actually gave him stability was the love and support of his uncle—my brother—and his wife, who had been there all the way through. I can see that my sister-in-law, who was much older and so was the grandmother, was at a point in her life where it wasn’t necessarily possible for her to provide that kind of financial support. And I am very glad that in New Zealand we are now doing that for grandparents—not dependent on circumstances in that way, that we have made this equal and that we have recognised that at that time it might well be something where we need to provide a lot more support and security.

I’m thrilled to see this. It is a very sad fact that we have 24,000 children in this position. But I think that this sends a very clear message to the people who are doing that work, that very, very difficult work quite often, because often they’re dealing with someone who is actually very damaged and is traumatised and they’re getting that kind of support.

I just want to actually reflect on the speech of my friend Glen Bennett, who has done that role for strangers. That’s the other side of this equation. He has been doing that work for people he hasn’t had a familial connection with, and I think it is some of the bravest and hardest work that someone can do. And I’m very, very proud to have someone in my party who has gotten into Parliament and has that sort of background, because, actually, it showed in his speech. He was able to tell us how difficult it was navigating one set of conditions to another. And now we’re not going to have that. We’re going to have a simple, clear set of conditions that apply in every situation, because we are recognising that those children are both equal in their need and their caregiver is equal in their need.

So I am very honoured to be able to speak to this bill. I am very pleased that it has the consensus of this House. I commend this bill to the House.

Every so often a bill comes before this House that actually brings the best out in everybody in the House. We’ve just heard some very rousing contributions. My colleague Anahila Kanongata’a-Suisuiki gave up valuable time on this bill to acknowledge all those who made submissions in the select committee, and then went through a list of different committees that assisted, and I think it was very unselfish for her to do that.

Also, I see the member from ACT opposite, MP Simon Court—obviously this has brought out the best in him because here he was lamenting a business in Levin, a business that may be disappearing to a manufacturer overseas who might be making products a lot cheaper. Obviously, as a free-market party, he has had a road to Damascus experience that would have him standing in this House lamenting the free market in the way he did. So, clearly, this is a bill that is bringing out the best in everyone.

It’s very good to get context to this, and I must in all seriousness acknowledge Mr Court’s colleague Karen Chhour, who I remember from the first reading did relate her own experience. All of us sitting here were very moved by her journey to this House related by my colleague, and how she was denied a safe place because of—really, from what we heard—the system. So the other thing that this bill does is it brings our attention to those who are a lot less fortunate than us. And I’m not just talking about those less fortunate financially. This year there’s been a large number of our colleagues who have made their maiden speeches, and it was a very rare person that didn’t have someone, a family member, to acknowledge up there in the gallery. I tried to hear as many of the speakers as I could, and I don’t think there was anyone that didn’t have someone, a family member.

But the people we’re talking about here are people who actually often end up without family members and people that end up alienated from our society. Just imagine—I’m just reading through some of the provisions in this bill and they do acknowledge some of the basics that people who miss out on families do miss out on, things like the birthdays, things like Christmas presents. I know they’ve been renamed, certainly the Christmas payment has been renamed a “25th of December”, I believe, or “holiday” benefit—or payment, rather than benefit. These are things that I think actually just acknowledge how important it is, because if you are in that situation—I always liken it to Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens. I think we all grew up with it; I think they still teach it in schools—that sight that we can all have of those kids in the workhouses, you know, looking out, who were completely, utterly missing out, who didn’t get anything. I think it’s the fact that that novel has traversed the centuries and we’re still talking about it here today in this House tonight that just shows how relevant that is; how important it is that we do understand. And I in no way want to make light of the situation that these people we’re talking about find themselves in.

In preparing for tonight, I looked at the Grandparents Raising Grandchildren Trust and certainly all of us as MPs, I’m sure, that are connected with their communities will have come in contact with this group. I suppose it’s a group that probably existed informally, but something often happens, a change in society that brings about the need for grandparents in this situation to come together; people who in the past may have worked hard all their lives, come to the end, and expected to sit down and be able to enjoy their final years or enjoy their retirement. But all of a sudden the advent, if you have a look at the statistics, of methamphetamine in particular is probably the thing alone that has changed. I was just looking at the statistics there of the breakdown of the families that they are dealing with, and I was surprised that for 86 percent of the children, according to Grandparents Raising Grandchildren Trust New Zealand, the issue is methamphetamine. And that’s incredible—and even cannabis; 81 percent cite cannabis as the major drug involved. So it gives us some idea of why a bill like this all of a sudden comes, it has its day.

The other things that cause—or the comorbid factors—this breakdown are identified as domestic violence, neglect, a parent unable to cope, alcohol abuse, and mental illness of the parent. A quarter of the children in grandparent care also suffered physical, psychological, and sexual abuse. So this just gives us some idea of—and, again, I go back to the theme of my speech, which was alienation. For us as a society, it’s more than just a need or an obligation just to financially support people; it’s actually to recognise their need, to genuinely recognise their needs.

So we’re bearing in mind that this bill relates to people who will be in care for less than 12 months, or a carer will have these children for less than 12 months, and that, of course, as we will all know, many of these children end up in multiple care. So it just means that, you know, even at this level, with this level of need, there still existed a two-tier system until we came to this bill, because, of course, of the orphans benefit and the unsupported child’s benefit.

I notice there has been some talk about orphans, and in fact I understand the Social Services and Community Committee were looking for a better word than “orphan”. I know the quality of the people on that committee, and that they were unable to really come up with a word that was suitable—it is difficult. I mean, often, with a lot of the systems we had in place, I mean the term “orphan” was commonplace. Anyone who’s read about affected families after the First World War and the Second World War, knows that the word “orphan” was very, very commonplace, unfortunately, because of the sacrifices made by their parents overseas.

But it’s not just the unsupported child’s benefit, of course—also, it’s differentiated for the very reason that there is abandonment by parents. So bringing that in line as this does, making sure that extending the eligibility of orphan people on the orphans benefit and those on the unsupported child’s benefit just means that at least the one thing we can do, we’ve done. And, again, it’s great to see that in this House—that we’re agreeing that the least we can do is bring them into line with those, I suppose, who are fortunate enough to be cared for, or in a situation where at least they have the stability of someone looking after them for more than 12 months. That’s certainly what this does.

So it gives me great pleasure to be standing here, and I’ll just reflect on one of the other submissions. It’s from Birthright—this probably sums it up, and again, it’s why there’s so much support: “Children have needs irrespective of their care agreements and in times of high stress it is especially important that those needs are met. It is also important that there is equity between caregivers who all take on a significant responsibility when they care for a child. Whether a child is cared for for a month or a year in some ways is irrelevant, the child’s needs must be met. The review clearly shows there are numerous incidents where a child might need to be cared for for less than one year in difficult circumstances whilst more permanent arrangements are made. Illness, death and imprisonment may mean that carers also need to make rapid arrangements.” And that, again, is a submission from Birthright.

I go back again to what I see as bringing out the best—and, of course, anyone involved, and the committee, will have seen this. And some of the people that came and submitted on this bill, of course, are so much the unheralded heroes of this. I just go back and, again, I acknowledge MP Simon Court. He mentioned his experience of the intellectual disability sector. Again, right across the spectrum there are people there, unsung, who often, for very, very low wages, display a dedication to those less fortunate than them, and for those of us who see this on a daily basis, it leaves us nothing less than humble.

So if we can do this as a House, if we can ensure that at least for those who are likely to become alienated in our society, they get to the stage where they’ll look back and say, “At least my fellow New Zealanders did what they could to get me through a situation that wasn’t of my making.” So, again, like everyone else in this House, I have no hesitation in commending this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Chair. For those of you who have been watching this debate and actually expected a debate, you’re probably sorely disappointed, because there is no debate. This, of course, is a piece of legislation that is supported by both sides of the House. I actually wish that more New Zealanders could see, sometimes, how select committees do function and function well, and also that they could see this House when it functions and functions well. You can bet your bottom dollar there’ll be no media reporting of this debate, and that’s unfortunate, because what we’re doing tonight in this second reading of the Social Security (Financial Assistance for Caregivers) Amendment Bill could seem quite minor.

What’s often staggering in this House is the things you have to deal with that are just a no-brainer, and, actually, the fact that you find areas where there is such a significant discrepancy between two sets of people who are looking after children that aren’t theirs, and two different arrangements for financial support. So the problem when the legislation first comes to the House is you just think, “Well, how can that even be? Why is this even a thing?” But in this House, we have the opportunity to deal with issues that arise.

I think it’s fair to say that over many years now there has been a significant effort by Governments of both major parties to really make a difference to the lives of children in care. And, as my colleague Chris Luxon pointed out, unfortunately many of the children in this situation have already experienced things that many of us in this House wouldn’t want to consider or dwell on. So for the children who are in care, be they in foster care or cared for by other family members, it is a responsibility for us in this House to ensure they are supported in ways that they need.

One of the things that I am pleased about—and I do want to acknowledge the Minister Kelvin Davis for continuing a wider piece of work that is more broadly around financial assistance for caregivers. The work they do is so crucial in terms of providing assistance to a group of New Zealanders that have already faced so many challenges in their young sweet lives that to provide not just financial support but emotional support and spiritual support to help them rebuild is really critical, and we do want to make sure that every child in New Zealand, despite the circumstances they’ve been born into, has the opportunities to flourish.

So I want to put on record my thanks for the thousands and thousands of caregivers who provide that financial, emotional, and spiritual support, and to say that this House is a House of Representatives—the fact that we have some of our own who have spoken in this debate who have been in the position to provide that support is special. One of the things that we heard with the submitters, and many of us as electorate MPs would have heard this, was some horrendous examples of families that have really struggled to support the children that are in their care. So I want to put on record our thanks for every person who accepts a child into their care, whether expected or not, and is able to provide support to them.

I think lining it up with foster care support is a no-brainer. Of course, holidays, Christmas, and birthdays are a special occasion for every child, and for a child that is in a family supported by a parent that isn’t their own, I think we should make more effort to make that a special or memorable occasion. And so that’s what this piece of legislation is doing. In the select committee, we were able to, again, listen to the voices of submitters, with real experience in this, actually recognising that New Zealand is quite a different place than it was 20, 30, 40 years ago, and so recognising holidays more broadly was an important thing for us to do.

The interesting thing that came out in the earlier work that led to this legislation that the Hon Tracey Martin did was there was actually a mixed view from the caregivers who were surveyed about the need for additional financial assistance. So some needed it; some didn’t. I think the difficulty, though, is for those caregivers who needed the financial assistance and couldn’t access it with the 12-month rule in place—that creates significant stress on a family that’s already dealing with additional challenges of bringing a child into their home to care for them. And so the removal of the 12-month rule makes sense. Some will need it more than others. I guess the area that I’d like to see explored in the further work that the Minister does is around making sure that there is greater, more targeted support to families who have higher needs.

Colleagues in the House have talked about children with disabilities, for example. Some children, with a range of challenges, will have greater levels of support. The earlier that support can be provided, the better, and so I would like to request that the Minister take some of those things into consideration in the further work that is done, so that the reduction of harm for those children can be the focus, and a more individualised, customised support for each one of those children and the families that have taken them into their care.

So I am very pleased to support this bill and to say a very big thankyou to all of the caregivers around New Zealand, and actually the organisations that support them. And I want to put on record my thanks to an organisation near me that operates just outside Cambridge, Kids in Need Waikato, who provide very practical support to some of these families who otherwise would be doing it incredibly tough. And to the 22,000 children whose parents can’t care for them for a range of reasons, for a short period of time, or for a long period of time, this House and this legislation supports you and wants all the best for you and your future.

Talofa, Madam Speaker. Can I first just acknowledge the Hon Louise Upston’s contribution tonight—that was really fantastic. I also want to acknowledge someone else’s contribution tonight, across the way, over in ACT there. I just wanted to say thank you to Simon for acknowledging the mighty and beautiful Ōtaki electorate in your contribution. Certainly, the Ō2NL, as we call it in the Ōtaki electorate, or the Ōtaki to Levin State Highway 1 upgrade that this Government is making sure goes ahead, which is fantastic. But I also want to just say thank you again for acknowledging Davey Hughes. If you are from the Ōtaki electorate, you know that Davey is a great local employer in Levin, in the Ōtaki electorate, and also, another FYI—I don’t know if the House knows—is he’s also the uncle of another great Labour MP, Darren Hughes. So that’s another little tip in there. And he does fantastic work in supporting people into work: a lot of our wāhine from all ranges, and he even has certain hours for people depending on your circumstances. So thank you for brining that into the House as well.

But I also want to acknowledge, as others have as well, the Minister the Hon Kelvin Davis—

💬 Kieran McAnulty: Top bloke.

—and definitely a top bloke—for bringing this mahi forward, and, of course, the former Minister who started this mahi, as well, the Hon Tracey Martin. Then, the biggest acknowledgment I want to give is to the 15,000 caregivers—or heroes, I would say—in Aotearoa, who have stepped in and provide love and care to our tamariki through whatever it is they need at that time. I know it’s not an easy job, but, yes, I really want to acknowledge those 15,000 caregivers out there that are doing that great mahi for our babies.

Currently, we know that there’s inequality, actually, in the payments if you’re a caregiver outside of State care. That’s essentially what this bill looks to ratify or to amend, to ensure that regardless of if you’re a caregiver, a foster parent, or part of Home for Life with a State care child, you’re also able to access the allowances for Christmas presents and birthday presents for the tamariki that you care for. We know how important it is for every kid to open a Christmas present on Christmas morning. You know, regardless of whatever the situation is in the house, that Christmas morning rustling, that present—you know, shaking it, the look on those tamariki faces is priceless. We all know that, and certainly, in the Ōtaki electorate, just to mention a crew that I’m able to work with: Terese Apitu, senior practitioner for Orangi Tamariki, Sergeant Beth Purcell, the police in Ōtaki electorate, and Christine McDonald, former Strengthening Families coordinator and counsellor, got together about eight years ago and saw the need to ensure that all caregivers and parents could access or get Christmas presents to their tamariki on Christmas day. Because of some people’s situations, that wasn’t always possible, so they devised what we call now “Fill a shoebox” and I’m really privileged to be part of that crew. Last year, we delivered 1,500 presents in the Ōtaki electorate to many tamariki caregivers as well as parents, in and out of State care caregivers, and I can tell you, that the looks on those tamariki faces of excitement when you show up with the sack from the community, I can’t even describe.

But it’s also the look on those parents’ and caregivers’ faces. It’s a look of relief, to be honest, and it’s also a look of gratitude because you know that maybe for Christmas that time it was going to be, “Can we just get a Christmas kai in.” So to be able to know that when they wake up those kids are going to be to unwrap those presents and don’t know what’s in them and have that excitement, is amazing. I think that’s something that every child has the right to have, regardless of their situation.

So, also sitting on the Social Services and Community Committee, as well, and hearing the 31 submitters—amazing submissions—and I know my colleague went right through the list, so I won’t go through it again. [Interruption] I don’t have enough time, to be fair. We’ll leave it out tonight, but I know that, listening to the submitters, everyone was in agreement—just like across the House—that this makes sense, that we want to make sure that, like I said, every caregiver has the financial means to go out and buy that Christmas present or that birthday present. So, yes, I just really wanted to thank the submitters that submitted, and also the work of the select committee in that space, as well, and of course, our chair, Angie Warren-Clark, as well, who was fantastic.

💬 Glen Bennett: Shout out.

Yeah, what about the deputy—oh, you know, Glen did a good job too. And we know our caregivers do an amazing job. We know that they provide that beautiful love, a safe space for our tamariki, but we also know that some of our caregivers are short-term caregivers, so they might not go through the 12 months. They might only have, say, a child in their care for eight months, and, at the moment, as it currently stands, that child that you have care of, if their birthday falls in that time that you had care for them, or if you have a child, even if it is for six or eight months over the Christmas period, you’re not entitled to the Christmas allowance or the birthday allowance. So we’ve also looked to remove that 12-month rule so that regardless of a short-term carer, or any carer in and out of State care, they get the financial means to be able buy a Christmas present and a birthday present for that child if they’re in their care at that time.

I have worked at Work and Income and Oranga Tamariki, albeit in a contract space and in our community for a really long time, and I can tell you I have seen the work and the commitment that the caregivers do. I’ve been really privileged to go to some of the caregiver Christmas do’s and just be part of listening to their kōrero and them sharing what happens and some of the really hard stuff that they go through, like the Hon Louise Upston also talked about. Unfortunately, some of these tamariki that do need that care and love at that time, they don’t just come with maybe a bag, they come with some other stuff as well. While our caregivers are amazing—they’re there to give love and provide care and safe space and day to day care for our tamariki—they’re not all counsellors or professionals in that. That work needs to happen as well for our tamariki. So our caregivers—make sure they can get them along to that, to be able to make sure that their wairua is right as well.

Just talking on that, I want to also acknowledge, again in the Ōtaki electorate—we’ve got lots of great examples where I come from—my auntie and uncle who are grandparents raising grandchildren. They love their moko and, while in their time of life they didn’t expect to be raising their moko, they’re really committed and they’re actually really active and loving grandparents. They’re involved in taking their moko to the Halberg Games in Auckland. They’re involved in making sure that their moko goes to wheelchair basketball in the mighty Palmerston North. They also make sure that their moko gets to do their strength training in the mighty Ōtaki electorate, and so really active grandparents, really active in their moko’s kura, in the kura community, but it is a stretch. You know, they are grandparents. They’ve done the raising of their children and now here they are, starting again as grandparents. And while I can tell you they love their moko, it is a stretch, it is a stretch to the budget at times. So, as grandparents, although they’d find the money whichever way they could anyway, this change where they’re Home for Life grandparents raising grandchildren, means that they going to get just that little bit extra to be able to make sure that their moko has that birthday present and has that Christmas present. I know that difference that’s going to make to them.

Can I say, just to end, it was a real privilege, as the Hon Louise Upston talked about, to work in the select committee where we were all wanting the same outcome. This bill was an easy one. The submitters were all agreed. Across the parties we all agreed. We all know the difference this is going to make, and we know it’s about equity, eh? And so I’m really proud. Another great initiative from this Labour Government to make sure that everybody is equal, that all caregivers get the same access. Kia ora.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a second time.