The big question for Labour: Will Hipkins have any more success than Ardern did with the top priority policy issues?

Chris  Hipkins,  after  he became prime minister, committed  to defeating the  cost-of- living crisis. He  proceeded to make a  bonfire of policies  that were at  the  heart of Jacinda Ardern’s administration. 

But, as   Richard Prebble pointed out this week, “the government has not just U-turned, it has repudiated the policies it claimed were essential”.

The number one priority  for her  government, Ardern proclaimed, was to eliminate child poverty. She identified so closely  with the issue that she took responsibility herself for the task.

So what progress was  made?

StatsNZ data released this week shows no real change in all areas used to measure child poverty rates in New Zealand.

This prompted  a loud wail  from the Child Poverty Action Group, which  says  it is  the leading  voice on the issue.

Its press release said: “Latest figures measuring child poverty rates in Aotearoa New Zealand are a sad indictment on the country with no real improvement in policy that could turn things around”.

Lindsay Mitchell: Writing off beneficiary debt

• Lindsay Mitchell writes – 

There is a call from anti-poverty activists for the government to write off beneficiary debt which has grown to over 2.3 billion dollars.

Acquiescing to this demand would create an ever-growing snowball.

Next for consideration would be student debt; debt to the Ministry of Justice for unpaid fines; debt to IRD for unpaid child support payments; debt to Kaianga Ora for overdue rents and more.

After all, many of the people with forgiven Work and Income debt fall into these other categories also. For the sake of consistency, the write-offs should be all encompassing.

In which case, what about debt to the state-owned Kiwibank? Surely it is within the government’s grasp to exercise some clemency there as well.

Lindsay Mitchell on joining the right dots and on the sobering outlook for people who will be lifetime beneficiaries

THE Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister has been braying about the Government lifting “about 66,000 kids out of poverty in the past few years …” 

In its latest annual report the Ministry for Social Development takes pride in its focus on getting people jobs resulting in 226,836 clients moving off benefit into work in the last two years (“our highest recorded result”).

But social commentator LINDSAY MITCHELL points out that 415,266 benefits were granted in the past two years, when more benefits were granted than cancelled.  She writes: –  

• Our leaders need to join the right dots

The Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister says:

“We’ve lifted about 66,000 kids out of poverty in the past few years …”

What he neglects to add is they have also consigned about 37,000 more to life on a benefit bringing the total to over 209,000.

Bryce Edwards draws attention to the time the PM has devoted (it’s not much, apparently) to her Child Poverty Reduction duties

A reader of Lindsay Mitchell’s blog has prompted an article– headed PM spends 0.2 percent of her time on Child Poverty Reduction? – which draws attention to the time Jacinda Ardern apparently devotes to her child poverty portfolio.

The blog reader seized on something Bryce Edwards wrote for The Democracy Project in an article (published by the BFD) headed Labour has given up on the poor.

Edwards drew attention to the mounting evidence that, under Labour’s watch, the problem of wealth and income inequality is spiralling.

He says he sees signs that Labour ministers have put this crisis into the “too hard basket”, then references recent reports on the topic.

Lindsay Mitchell: On child poverty, racism and colonisation

A table in an article posted on Bassett, Brash & Hide shows there are 53,000 NZ European compared to a total of 47,000 combined other ethnicities (using the most recent data reported in June 2021).   

Poverty, plainly, has no colour.  There are more New Zealand European children in material hardship than all other ethnicities put together. 

Social commentator LINDSAY MITCHELL – the author of the article  – writes:  

A just-published Listener article asks, “Why doesn’t middle-class NZ care about child poverty?” It gathers views from half a dozen people including a principal, a teacher, an advocate against child poverty, a charity head, a Māori provider chair and Pasifika social worker. Apparently, they told the Listener that the middle-class has become indifferent to child poverty.

Yet a careful reading of the piece finds it is primarily the Child Poverty Action Group advancing the idea that,

“For middle white New Zealand, poverty is equated with being brown. This is where the indifference comes from.”

The Chief Executive of the Auckland City Mission goes further claiming active hostility to solo mothers, especially Māori:

“As a society, the narrative is ‘how dare you raise a child alone? We are going to make it as hard for you as we can – we will punish you.’ And secondly, in our country, poverty has a colour. It is about racism and colonisation.”

In fact, there are more NZ European children in material hardship than all other ethnicities put together.

The table below shows there are 53,000 NZ European compared to a total of 47,000 combined other ethnicities (these are the most recent data reported in June 2021):

Sepuloni is chuffed about reduction in numbers on benefits – but more than 300,000 Kiwis are being succoured by the state

Social Development  and  Employment Minister Carmel Sepuloni  was  quick  off  the mark to announce  the government’s  achievement in  getting  more  people off benefits. She  says the government’s response to COVID-19 has helped keep people in work, with March Quarter Benefit statistics showing a further fall in the number of people receiving a main benefit and jobseeker assistance.

There were 19,883 fewer people on a main benefit, compared with December, with near-record numbers of people moving into work, Sepuloni said.

The figures also showed an annual fall of 4.8 per cent in the number of people receiving a main benefit.

She  claims  it  was the government’s quick response to COVID-19  that had worked, with initiatives such as the Wage Subsidy and the economic support packages keeping people in work and delivering record low unemployment.

Bigger benefits from tomorrow – bravo! But they might not buy as much as before

Ministers  have been celebrating  their  wisdom in raising  benefits  substantially from  April 1.

Social Development Minister Carmel Sepuloni led  the  chorus by  telling Parliament it is the biggest lift to main benefits in decades.  For many years, the rate of main benefits has fallen further behind the average wage, placing  many people, including children, in undue hardship, she said.

That  was  an unusual admission, given the  Labour  Party has been in office  for  four years.

So  now  the  good  news:

“In addition to indexing main benefits to wage growth, we are further lifting main benefits so they don’t fall further behind. The Ministry of Social Development’s analysis shows that from 1 April, a couple on a benefit with children will now be, on average, $237 a week better off than they were when the Government took office in 2017.

“As a Government, we have worked hard to lift as many children out of poverty as possible, and while raising the level of main benefit is only one way to achieve our goal, it is an incredibly important step in the right direction”.

Child poverty group presses for more govt help as demand for benefits and food grants surges

So   how  is  the  team  of  five  million  looking after  its   latest  encounter  with  Covid-19  and  its  more  transmissible  Delta  strain?

The  majority    will  be  relieved  to  have  escaped  its  clutches.

On  the  other  side  of the  ledger,  the virus  has  had  a powerful  impact  on  lower-  income  groups.

One  lobby  group,  noting the current lockdown triggered the largest weekly increase in numbers of people receiving benefits since the first lockdown last year, says the government isn’t doing enough to help affected families.

The latest MSD reporting also shows food grant numbers near the end of August were double what they were at the same time last year, when Auckland was in a level 3 lockdown.

See how Maori have fared under colonisation (not too badly) and how Ardern has fared in averting criticism

We commend social issues commentator Lindsay Mitchell, who tirelessly digs up data that put a different perspective on matters reported by mainstream media or brings government policy and its implementation into question.

Two splendid examples have been posted on her blog in the past few days.

One post (using graphs to underscore the argument) contends the progress of Māori social and economic indicators that has occurred under the process of colonisation stands in stark contrast to the constant barrage of contrary claims

The second post challenges the Ardern Government’s claims to be the most open and transparent government ever.

Greens see red despite benefit increases – but Michael Cullen could tell them (and the Ardern government) what safety nets are all about

The Ardern  government has  made  “well-being”  such  a  focus  of  its  policies  that many  New  Zealanders  think  it  is   now  the  way  forward.

Labour’s ally, the  Green Party, is so enamoured  with  the  “well- being”  philosophy  it  sharply criticised   the  government for raising the  level of  main  benefits  “by less than $8 a week” from April 1.

“We have a poverty crisis in NZ, and we must go further and faster to deliver income support that enables everyone to live with dignity,” says Green Party spokesperson for Social Development & Employment Ricardo Menéndez March.

“The government currently expects a single person over 25 years old to be able to get by on just $250.74 a week, and they’re supposed to celebrate that rising to $258.51. That extra eight dollars isn’t even enough to buy a block of cheese.”

Menendez  March  says it is  “disingenuous”  of  the  government to continue to say indexing benefits to wages is the best thing they could have done, and 

” … even the Children’s Commissioner said they need to be bold and courageous, and actually lift benefits.

“Indexation of benefits to wages means little without a substantive lift in core benefits to close the gap which has continued for decades.”