Another sorry from Christopher Luxon after beneficiaries miss out

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has apologised after people's benefits were wrongly suspended because officials were overwhelmed with paperwork.But he's standing by his statement to Parliament that had not happened, saying it was correct at the time.RNZ on Thursday revealed people had their benefit payments wrongly suspended following a law change that was rushed through Parliament last year.The new law requires some beneficiaries to re-confirm their circumstances at least once every 52 weeks, to check whether they are still eligible.The Ministry of Social Development (MSD) said processing delays caused by a high volume of people confirming their circumstances meant some of their paperwork was not checked in time, so their benefit payments stopped.That same law change had also caused a separate issue: thousands of pensioners missed out on their Winter Energy Payment, because that payment was incorrectly included in the legislation.Louise Upston.RNZ / Mark PapaliiLuxon and the Social Development Minister Louise Upston apologised for the missing Winter Energy Payments last week.On Friday Luxon also said sorry for the second problem."There's clearly an issue, our job is to fix it ... I apologise for it, I'm sorry that it's happened," he said."It's really disappointing to see that there are further issues there."Luxon said he was focused on ensuring people got the money they were owed, and that the underlying problem was fixed.MSD said everyone had been paid back, and there were no longer processing delays.Luxon last week told Parliament he was confident that no beneficiaries had lost payments due to processing delays."My statement was correct at the time," he said on Friday, adding that he had only found out about the problem on Friday morning.Meanwhile Social Development Minister Louise Upston refused to comment on her statements in Parliament.On Tuesday she was asked whether benefits had wrongly been suspended due to processing delays.Upston said no, but changed her answer to "possibly" after multiple further questions.RNZ asked whether Upston would clarify her statements.She said she would not be commenting further until she received the findings of MSD's review into the matter.