Social Security Amendment Bill

Members, we come now to our final debate, clauses 1 and 2. This is the debate on “Title” and “Commencement”.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Before I go into the title, I want to talk about the commencement. I think there’s a few things to note here, and that is because we have different parts of the bill coming into effect at different times. We’ve got three different dates: 26 May, then we’ve got 1 July, and then we have provisions that would be coming into place on 20 October 2025. I wanted to ask the Minister for Social Development and Employment: in the previous parts of the debate, we have heard about how guidelines and the operationalisation of some of these non-financial sanctions are still being developed, yet we’ve got, basically, three different dates. Can the Minister tell us to what extent some of these guidelines on operationalising this piece of legislation have been developed?

It seems to me like there was no sort of sense of information being given to us, when I asked about the guidelines that are being developed by the Minister in relationship to the non-financial sanctions. Because the report job search and the upskilling non-financial sanctions were added quite late into the piece, I am assuming that is why we have that 20 October 2025 date—that is, to give the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) an adequate amount of time to prepare guidelines, because the Minister just dumped those in the select committee quite late into the stage, even though she flagged it in a Cabinet document really early and then told no one. Compared to upskilling and the report job search, how much work has already been done in developing training modules, guidelines—you know, changes to the MyMSD portal or otherwise—for the provisions that would be coming into force on 26 May and 1 July, compared to the provisions that would be coming into place on October 2025?

I also wanted to know what level of consultation was done with MSD and who was consulted in MSD to ensure that 20 October 2025 was a good enough date to ensure that adequate guidelines were being developed for the upskilling and the report job search. Again, we did not really get much clarity around who exactly is being consulted around these guidelines, when I asked that in the debate on Part 2, so I am trying to seek clarity on this in the commencement parts of the debate.

The other question I had was also in relation to the provisions that will come into effect on 1 July. This is relatively soon, and so I wanted to ask: to what point have we got, in terms of not just developing guidelines for MSD staffers but the websites that are going to be created to communicate the changes to people on the benefit? With the traffic light system, there was, you know, quite a lot of communication that came through to people on the benefit to explain these changes. Obviously, those changes were not legislative in the traffic light system; these are, and there are real, material consequences attached to these non-financial sanctions. For the tranche of changes that are coming into effect on 1 July, what forms of communication will she be using to ensure that benefit recipients are able to have the information that they need? And will she be communicating to people on the benefit before 20 October around the changes that are incoming? Because there’s ample of time before 20 October.

I’m assuming that the more time she gives people on the benefit to understand these two non-financial sanctions that are coming into effect, the more people will be able to comply with them. Otherwise, if there’s not ample time being given to explain how those will work in detail, I’m assuming there will be more people who could end up being subjected to these non-financial sanctions and actually unable to comply with them. Any clarity on this would be appreciated.

Just to not conflate issues, I’ll take some questions on the title itself in a moment, but I’ll give the Minister a chance to answer any of my questions on commencement.

Well, the member Ricardo Menéndez March has laid out the different implementation dates, so he’s clearly aware of what they are. How those guidelines are developed is an operational matter for the Ministry of Social Development. They’ve been working hard, and I’m confident they’ll have them ready and they’ll communicate it in the way they need to.

I want to talk about, obviously, the title, Social Security Amendment Bill. I think we’ve probably agreed, on the side, that a better title would be “Social Security (Boot the Beneficiaries) Amendment Bill”. We think that’s a much better title. Given the outrage from many of our people in the community who just don’t think this is a fair response to their plight, and the punitive actions that have been taken by this Government, not representing the depth of feeling in the communities. We have huge concerns, and that’s why this bill isn’t labelled lightly.

“Boot the Beneficiaries” seems a very reasonable title, given the extreme work, now, that our team at the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) will have to undertake. We’re talking about huge pressures now at the front line for MSD, and, of course, there’s been a loss of over 700 jobs. So you’re talking about a loss of over 700 jobs in terms of backroom staff there, and yet they’ve got this huge workload, so we don’t see how they’re going to cope. They’ve got an extra 30,000 more people that they’re going to have to cope with. It is beyond us here on this side of the Chamber how they’re going to cope with this. So penalising them with sanctions that remove the agency of spending money with a money management scheme that makes it impossible for beneficiaries—that’s what they’re saying. Thats what they were saying throughout the select committee stage. The money management scheme makes it impossible for beneficiaries to pay for rent, power bills, and their ability to buy school uniforms. Are we listening to our communities? This is what this is.

I wasn’t on the Social Services and Community Committee myself, and Helen White’s been speaking on this, but reading through—we’re new to the committee, but that’s what they were saying: “You are penalising us with sanctions, and you’re making it very difficult in terms of looking after our whānau, looking after our family, and looking after our communities.” So I asked, looking over there at Shane Jones—it’s sad that he’s now on this punitive style; he once worked with me in terms of getting young people off the couch. That was his thing. Now he wants to push them through the couch. I don’t know what’s happened to him. You know, it’s a total change from Shane Jones and the aroha he used to show when he was with the Labour Party. He’s changed since he’s moved to the other side, and he’s become so punitive, and now he wants to bury his own relations and push them through the couch.

We don’t require a punitive approach here, Minister Jones. We need you to go back to where you were a few years ago, but sadly you’re not there. We all have problems with these beneficiaries. We all have problems. Some of them are our relations, some of them are our friends, but they’re part of us, so constantly punishing them is not the way, is not the strategy, going forward. We must have a more embracing aroha approach, which is what was the case under the previous Labour Government.

I ask the Minister for Social Development and Employment to think about that as we go forward with regards to this, in terms of doubling the time and making it tougher for whānau, damning this kaupapa with needless bureaucracy that will be managed by a faceless AI program. I mean, that was one of the major concerns, and you’re talking about disabled people who have to try and traverse their way through this type of kaupapa—incredibly difficult. So from our community and from all the responses that have come forward, it is quite clear that the title of this kaupapa is incredibly misnamed. I think you just drop in the “Social Security (Boot the Beneficiaries) Amendment Bill”, and this side of the Chamber would be very, very happy going forward, because I think that encapsulates what our community is saying, a community that’s been left out, that has not been consulted properly, that doesn’t really know where they stand at the moment, and that needs more consultation going forward. So that’s my kōrero with regards to this title. Kia ora.

Thank you so much, Mr Chair. While I take the point of the Minister for Social Development and Employment that she has confidence in the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) developing these guidelines, I’m keen to know whether she has sought any briefings or advice or updates on the development of these guidelines since this bill finished at the select committee stage. So far, I haven’t seen the Minister engage with the substance of this. I’m concerned she’s just fobbing it off as operational issues when, actually, these are material issues for our communities—the stuff in this piece of legislation could literally deprive people of the means to survive. She doesn’t need to believe me; she can just see the report and the evidence and the advice from MSD.

I want to go on to the title. I want to ask the Minister whether she came up with such a bland and nondescript title because she hadn’t finished writing the bill. I wonder if whether that’s the reason she had to come up with a title that does not accurately reflect what’s in the bill. Most other bills from this Government actually have names that often do reflect the intent of the Government in the bill. What we’ve seen so far throughout this debate is the Minister constantly just either adding bits to this bill, in the name of two extra financial sanctions, or, for example, putting Ministers in the chair who were completely out of their depth and unwilling to engage accurately on the provisions of this bill. She may want to check the Hansard, but, for example, James Meager couldn’t even accurately describe what a relationship was, in relation to the welfare system. So I recommend that she may want to talk to her colleagues around engaging both with the substance of what she’s doing and the broader welfare system to ensure that we have a bill and a debate that accurately reflects what is happening.

With that in mind, I was wondering whether the Minister may be open to adopting some of my amendments on the title, which I do think accurately describe in a neutral way what is happening with this bill. For example, amendments that would just simply describe that this is adding more benefit sanctions and other matters—you know, for example, she could add to the title: Social Security “(Four Additional New Benefit Sanctions)” Amendment Bill. I do think she may want to also consider titles that accurately describe the impact on people, which is that this bill will push more people into poverty. This is the end result of the so-called non-financial sanctions, particularly with compulsory money management. So I am just curious as to why she decided to name this bill the Social Security Amendment Bill—such a bland, bland term—without actually describing the impact of the bill and its title.

I think this is also particularly important because members of the community will just see the Social Security Amendment Bill becoming law, and the problem is that if you’re the everyday person and you’re not really engaging with the Minister’s low social media following, I think it’s going to be hard to understand, you know, what the actual impacts are of this piece of legislation just by looking at the title. I think good lawmaking should include accurately naming bills. I do think the Minister has an opportunity here to describe the legislation for what it is: an attack on the poor, an attack on people on the benefit; a bill that does not have any evidential basis, that does not support people into employment, and, if anything, will more likely overburden the front line at MSD who already told us that they’re oversubscribed. So I do think the Minister should, in good faith, take some of my amendments that I genuinely think better measure and describe what she’s trying to do.

I also think that she may want to take up the opportunity to describe this bill as simply taking measures to reduce people receiving income support by 50,000, because this is ultimately what it will do. It’s not about supporting people into employment. There’s nothing in this bill that actually does that. What it does is create new mechanisms for people to be stripped of income support—which, yeah, does help her meet her target of having 50,000 fewer people on the benefit, but it does not support, you know, anything to help people have decent incomes.

I think she may also want to consider whether a better name for this bill could be something along the lines of “Measures to Increase Child Poverty”. We’ve already seen that under her watch, food insecurity and material hardship for children is increasing. I think this bill will just contribute to that. I did try to ask in previous times, in the annual review debate, whether she thinks any of her policies will increase and exacerbate these issues. This is a bill that will do that. So why not just say it, own it, and name it for what it is: an attack on the poor and some of our most vulnerable families, who she actually made unemployed and are now receiving income support. So I welcome the Minister’s engagement on why she chose this title.

Thank you. I was wondering whether the Minister for Social Development and Employment would consider a name that is more accurate in terms of what this bill is to do—something along the lines of the “Blame Anybody Else and Distract from our own Failings Bill”. We have the situation at the present time where unemployment is up—it hasn’t been this high for years—and what this Government has done is it has spent its precious time putting through a bill where we are blaming and sanctioning people for their state of unemployment.

Now, I made an earlier comment in the first part about the relationship between this and other bills that have gone through this House. Late last year, we had a bill where we changed the law so that the Reserve Bank governor no longer had to take into account a maximum sustainable employment goal, because this Government wanted more unemployment. It wanted more unemployment because that would lead to wages going down as there was more supply in the market, and that would stop inflation on the back of good wages, of higher wages.

Now, that’s fine if you own a house. It absolutely kills you if you’re an ordinary New Zealander, many of whom can’t own a house, many of whose wealth is not through that source. What we really need in this country is full employment, and we had it. We had really good employment. While that’s difficult in terms of inflation, that’s a really important value of mine that we do that. Yet in this climate what we’ve got is growing unemployment, and what does the Government do? It brings in a law which talks about sanctioning beneficiaries.

We know some of those beneficiaries are the good people of Kinleith who have worked really, really hard all their lives. What’s the Government done to help them when manufacturing has got into trouble in this country? Where’s the Government for the people of Kinleith? Where’s the Government for people in our manufacturing sector? Where’s the Government when it comes to supporting our workers in New Zealand on low pay who have been impacted by pay equity issues? Out the door. They’re all just going to have their wages reduced and if they’re made unemployed, that’s really a good thing because it’s going to bring down inflation. That seems to be the logic—that that is the kind of trickle down.

This bill where there’s not really any need for it, where we’ve got 5 percent unemployment, where our greatest sector of people who are unemployed are our youth. The youth rates of unemployment are through the roof under this Government. That’s not because they’re all lazy. That’s because there are pockets of our population that are not able to find employment in a market this Government is responsible for.

So what do we do? We bring about a bill like this, which is all about blaming those people and saying that they’re slackers. Well, they’re not slackers in Kinleith, and they’re not actually slackers who are unemployed at the present time, because they weren’t unemployed under a Labour Government; they were employed. The numbers have gone up.

Rather than spend our lives distracting from the state of the economy—which has been engineered to have higher unemployment—we could actually concentrate on turning around the situation and concentrate on full employment. The Reserve Bank governor might again consider maximum sustainable employment as one of the objectives of an economy that is trying to bring wellbeing to most New Zealanders.

Perhaps the Minister would reconsider the name of this bill, and this bill could actually be reflective of the calculated distraction away from what’s actually going on, which is higher unemployment not through the fault of people all slacking around on the couch and needing money management.

I just wanted to turn for a minute to the issue of budget services, because this bill contains a money management tool, when in fact people are getting about 300 bucks a week. You try it. I would say you try to manage your money when you’re getting $300 a week. What did we do? We cut budget services because we were trying to save money. Apparently, it was a waste of money to spend it on our budget services. Yet we are asking for money management here. I would ask that the Minister consider—

CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): The member’s time has expired.

Thank you, Mr Chair. I have a question—well, I have a series of questions—for the Minister for Social Development around the commencement, and one of the things that is immediately noticeable is the three variations when it comes to the commencement date. The first one is the Monday after the Budget, and then 1 July—that’s understandable—but having a third commencement date is really puzzling for me, because there seems to be this arbitrary date when it comes to 20 October 2025, and, understandably, that is on the basis of the two new sanctions that the Minister has introduced as part of this bill. However, one of the things that we are seeing when it comes to this bill is a Government that has put forward more “blue tape” for people to be able to access benefits, to be able to access the support that they wanted, and to create as much of a bureaucratic and convoluted system as possible so that the least number of people are able to access the support that is needed.

I think that that is clearly reflected here in the commencement date, and let’s just go to the first part, because the thing is when it comes to this series of commencement dates, one of the things that is also quite noticeable—for example, in new Part 14 of Schedule 1 of the Social Security Regulations 2018, in Schedule 4 of this bill—is that there are also retrospective elements when it comes to certain dates being allocated. So I think that in terms of the actual date itself, it doesn’t affect the purpose of this bill all that much. However, what it does affect is the implementation of this bill.

Now, the Minister has mentioned that that is an operational matter—that’s what the Minister has said. However, I actually don’t think that in that case, it’s a convincing enough argument for two reasons, and I’ll just give two examples of that when it comes to why just simply referring to having the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) be able to implement this on the basis of these commencement dates is not viable. The first one is that what we don’t know and what we haven’t anticipated, but let’s say that as part of Budget 2024, what we did see was the severe cuts to the Public Service, and there have been a number of cuts to MSD, as well. Therefore, what MSD is possibly telling the Minister now may not be reflective of what is going to happen in a month’s time, or, indeed, in a couple of weeks’ time. So I don’t know if the Minister actually, when we are looking at the commencement dates, has taken into consideration, when MSD is giving advice to the Minister on the viability of those dates, the potential changes to the structure of MSD as a result of anything that is upcoming, which, I’m sure, is of Budget sensitivity.

The other example that I would just like to give is something that is actually very topical right now, which is the announcement that was made in the 2024 Budget around FamilyBoost. It was at that time, as well, that it was considered an operational matter that it was reliant on IRD to be able to implement it really smoothly, like the Minister is now saying that she has faith in MSD to implement these sanctions on the basis of the commencement dates that we see here. However, what we do see when it comes to FamilyBoost is that the Government has overestimated the capacity of IRD to do that, and what we’re seeing is $14 million being put towards the administration of it. Now, I don’t know if the Minister is able to advise on the basis of the commencement dates here that we are able to see this similar blowout when it comes to admin costs in order to implement these sanctions, and that is something that we have not heard the Minister articulate clearly throughout the entire committee stage.

My question to the Minister in this case is: would the Minister consider my current tabled amendment, which actually removes a lot of the clutter that we do see under clause 2 of this bill? It is removing subclause (1A), removing subclause (1) and subclause (2), and removing subclause (3), and making it nice and easy and simple to say that this Act, in its entirety, comes into force on 20 October 2025. Now, that would give reassurance not only to the communities but also to MSD that any changes as a result of the upcoming Budget will likely have petered out by October and that any structures that may change internally or organisationally may be able to adjust as a result of the Budget announcement.

I would very much like to hear from the Minister if she would consider—I’m not saying to remove part of the sanctions or part of the bill. All I’m asking for is to make it simple and to extend the bill’s commencement date to 20 October 2025, in its entirety.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

I will take another call from the Opposition, but just a reminder that this is the debate on the title and commencement. It is a narrow debate, so if people can keep it narrow; we don’t want to hear general debate speeches. The time for that is not now.

Yeah, Mr Chair, just further on the title and the commencement date. I did put up a very reasonable title before, as I’m sure Mr Meager—I’m sure he agrees with it, because as we all know, he’s got prime ministerial aspirations and so he’ll agree with anyone to advance his career. But anyway, coming back to the title [Interruption]—I just had to refer to that, because we know that National’s in a lot of trouble at the moment, as we all know.

I thought, given the impact that this kaupapa has on our communities, given the impact that the reapplication every 26 weeks has in terms of trying to get a benefit, that that is every reason why the commencement date should be extended for another 12 months. I think we all want to be reasonable here, we don’t want to be too punitive, do we? Do we? I look back at the Welfare Expert Advisory Group, who recommended the 52-week reapplication requirements be removed, citing that “There is little evidence in support of using obligations and sanctions (as in the current system) to change behaviour; rather, there is research indicating that they compound social harm and disconnectedness.” I think that that type of kōrero, from people who know our communities, is every reason that we have to be careful when we make change. As a Government, we did not advance all the recommendations from the Welfare Expert Advisory Group, but we certainly took a lot of what they said on board. They also recommended that money management be abolished, and yet we have a Government ignoring that type of kōrero.

CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): I think some of this are enjoying this history, but can you link it back to the title and commencement.

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: I’m citing these examples because I think that we should not be implementing these types of punitive strategies immediately. I think that we should be working with our communities, working with our community organisations, our different groups, and working these things up. Mind you, we’re totally opposed to them, but we have, through the whole process, heard from our people that they totally reject and resent the application of this kaupapa. So, that being the case, surely we should be postponing what we should be doing. On that basis, we are saying that let’s put this off for another 12 months, maybe 24 months—that would be better—and have a look at it again.

On top of that, we have a Government who is cutting services. The Ministry for Social Development (MSD) really does not have the capacity to deal with the projected changes, and—so many examples: the regulatory impact statement (RIS) highlights the consequences that MSD will have to direct more resources towards compliance—that’s what it says—and they’ll be required to put less resources into helping beneficiaries into work. So if that’s not a warning that these types of changes are far too soon, I don’t know what is. Research cited in the RIS highlighted that “Sanctions may increase mental and physical health problems”, including substance abuse and poverty. So wouldn’t a caring Government want to try and put that type of change off to way, way down the track? The RIS highlights that previous work on reapplications show that cancellations of the benefit as part of the reapplication process often led to a new application, suggesting procedural denials rather than ineligibility. I think that the other side should have a think about this as they want to make changes. I think that a better strategy would be to have a transition-type strategy over the next year or two, rather than implement a very punitive strategy on communities who, at the moment, hate this Government very much. Thank you, Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): Ricardo Menéndez March—a contribution focused on the title and commencement.

I will be adding new points on the commencement dates. Thank you very much, Mr Chair, I do take your guidance quite seriously on this.

I wanted to ask about the staffing capacity in relationship to the third tranche of policies coming into effect on 20 October. Was there a reason that the Minister for Social Development and Employment also added 20 October as a direct result of the staff not having capacity to implement this policy; if not, what was the reason, other than that? Because so far, in the public realm, we mostly just have statements from the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) saying that the traffic light system has now really overburdened them. There are programmes for things like preventing homelessness that have now been put on pause as a result of that and so I’m asking whether that’s the reason why there’s the 20 October date.

Additionally, I’m curious to know whether the Minister has requested, since introducing those two additional sanctions to, for example, Cabinet, to increase the resourcing for staff and to expand the number of staff working at MSD at the front lines to ensure that she can adequately implement the second tranche of sanctions coming into place on 20 October. I know that she mentioned earlier that she had confidence around the setting up of the guidelines, but MSD has, in my view, in my opinion, not expressed confidence around the capacity they have to continue implementing the current set of programmes to the point that some are now being dropped. So my new point was around the staffing capacity and whether that was the rationale for having the 20 October date as well.

My other question would be on whether she expects, in the commencement sort of period that we have, that she’ll continue developing—or she expects MSD to continue developing—for example, modules and/or communications to clients around the benefit sanctions coming in 1 July. So between 1 July and 20 October, whether she expects there will be ongoing work to develop communications on the implementation of compulsory money management as well as the obligation failure count.

We haven’t really talked about the obligation failure count in relationship to the commencement date, and I wanted to ask whether the obligation failure count extensions—that is, the fact that obligation failures will now be accumulated for twice as long than before, whether those will start accumulating basically at the commencement date of 1 July or whether she thinks that beneficiaries should be given a bit of a sort of reprieve to just be aware that this is coming into place; whether she expects communications to come before 1 July around the obligation failure count. Because I could see that, for example, if her intent is that people are complying more with the obligations laid out in legislation, having those communications come out before 1 July would, again, ensure that people are not accumulating more failure counts, assuming that they’ll reset in a 12-month period as opposed to twice as long as it is being now laid out in this piece of legislation.

I worry that without those clear communications being put out before 1 July, that people could end up assuming that those obligation failures will reset in a specific period that they assume would have been the case, and so I’m hoping to seek clarity on how the Minister seeks to mitigate any adverse consequences that may come from the staged process that she has.

The other thing that I want to speak to, and this is in relation to my colleague Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan’s amendment, is why not just have everything come into place in October? It just makes sense to me—right?—that, like, we have this one bill with one commencement date that enables both the MSD front lines to prepare and for the people who are receiving income support to adequately prepare for these new punishments that are being added, as opposed to having a much more convoluted process that just, again, as others have outlined, increases the bureaucracy that people have to go through.

To recap for the Chair, I’m asking as to whether the lack of staff capacity factors in it all in setting the date of 20 October, and, if so, what steps is the Minister taking to increase that capacity so that we don’t have other work programmes being dropped like we have seen as a result of the Government initiatives?

I move, That debate on this question now close.

Mariameno Kapa-Kingi’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Social Insecurity Amendment Act 2024” is out of order as merely being an attempt to criticise the bill.

Mariameno Kapa-Kingi’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Social Devastation Amendment Act 2024” is out of order as merely an attempt to criticise the bill.

Mariameno Kapa-Kingi’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Kick us while we’re Down Amendment Act 2024” is out of order as being merely an attempt to criticise the bill.

Mariameno Kapa-Kingi’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Social Deprivation Amendment Act 2024” is out of order as merely an attempt to criticise the bill.

Ricardo Menéndez March’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Social Security (Pushing People Into Poverty) Amendment Bill” is out of order as merely being an attempt to criticise the bill.

Ricardo Menéndez March’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Social Security (Making People Reapply Twice as Often and Other Matters) Amendment Bill” is out of order as merely being an attempt to criticise the bill.

Ricardo Menéndez March’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Social Security (Additional Barriers to Continue Receiving a Benefit) Amendment Bill” is out of order as being merely an attempt to criticise the bill.

Ricardo Menéndez March’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Social Security (Measures to Increase Child Poverty and Other Matters) Amendment Bill” is out of order as being merely an attempt to criticise the bill.

The question is that Ricardo Menéndez March’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Social Security (Additional Benefit Sanctions and Other Matters) Amendment Bill” be agreed to.

The question is that Ricardo Menéndez March’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Social Security (Four New Benefit Sanctions and Other Matters) Amendment Bill” be agreed to.

The question is that Ricardo Menéndez March’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to change the title to “Social Security (Measures to Reduce People Receiving Income Support by 50,000) Amendment Bill” be agreed to.

The question is that the Minister’s amendments to clause 2 set out on Amendment Paper 263 be agreed to.

The question is that Ricardo Menéndez March’s amendment to clause 2 set out on Amendment Paper 282 be agreed to.

The question is that Mariameno Kapa-Kingi’s tabled amendments to clause 2 be agreed to.

The question is that Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan’s tabled amendments to clause 2 be agreed to.

The question is that Mariameno Kapa-Kingi’s tabled amendments to clause 2 be agreed to.

Madam Speaker, the committee has considered the Social Security Amendment Bill and reports it with amendment. I move, That the report be adopted.

The question is that the report be adopted. Those of that opinion will say Aye, to the contrary No. The Ayes have it.

Ricardo Menéndez March: No, the Noes have it. Party vote.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Are we sure we want to have a vote on procedure? Can I ask that question again?

Ricardo Menéndez March: Sure.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is that the report be adopted.

Motion agreed to.

Report adopted.