It never takes long for the Greens to revert to type. Having done moderately well in last month’s election, but having been denied a seat at the Cabinet table, the Greens are now ramping up demands for significant benefit increases to make life much more bearable for those on benefits. Their cries are in tandem with a number of charities, including the very vocal Auckland Action Against Poverty, who have described Jacinda as “disconnected” and who make the very strange claim that she is “choosing to keep people and families in poverty”.
“Referring to $25 as a ‘substantial increase’ in benefit levels is so problematic and disconnected with the realities of people who are living day to day in this country, and to be frank it reeks of privilege,” says Pao.
“This Labour government has consistently campaigned and talked about being ‘transformational’ in their approach to social issues like welfare reform and we are yet to see any of these slogans backed up by real and lasting action.”
Poverty action groups are demanding benefit increases of 47%. The Greens have come out in support.
Frankly, the Greens, as a supposed support party to Labour, ought to know better. They ought to… but they just can’t help themselves.
And of course, our dear friend Golriz has to add her voice to the choir:
Let us just take a look at the numbers, to see how realistic these claims by poverty action groups, and the Greens, really are.
At the moment, the cost of welfare benefits runs at approximately $34 billion a year. A 47% increase will take that to approximately $50 billion. This is without accounting for any extra beneficiaries who may come onto welfare over the next year due to job losses. That is merely assuming that there are no significant changes to the welfare payroll at all.
How exactly do poverty action groups and the Greens think all this is to be paid for?
We are already printing money just to stay where we are. The economy has held up better than we expected with the tax take this year being higher than was forecast, but nevertheless, we are still in crisis. Our tourist industry is in freefall, we have no overseas students, there is no sign of our borders opening any time soon, and no one knows how next year will pan out. It may not be as bad as forecast, but the forecasts have been fairly dire, so any improvement on them does not mean we are doing well. Every country on the planet is in trouble. While we seem to have managed the health crisis fairly well, we simply don’t yet know how the economy will play out. It is just too early to say.
All of that being the case, this is the worst possible time to start talking about significant benefit increases, to “lift people out of poverty”. The only way out of poverty is to get some training and a skilled job. Increasing benefits will not bring people out of poverty.
Jacinda reminded everyone of the $25 benefit increase given at the start of the pandemic. Sure, $25 isn’t much, but it was a generous move anyway. When you are at the bottom of the heap, surely any increase makes a difference. I do have some sympathy with those trying to eke out an existence on a benefit, but I have always believed that welfare should never be a way of life. For far too many people, it has become just that.
Instead of simply demanding more money and calling the prime minister ‘privileged’ (which, of course, she is – what else would a prime minister be?), there are a lot of things that the poverty action groups and the Greens could be campaigning for that would both improve people’s lives and help the economy. Here are a few suggestions:
The Greens could propose a bill in parliament that allows beneficiaries to keep all of their benefit while working for a short period (say 6 weeks) to allow them to do work such as picking courgettes in Northland, which is a high unemployment area. There may be some beneficiaries prepared to do such work, but who do not want the administrative nightmare of dealing with MSD when they need to reinstate their benefit.
The Greens could propose, along with the above suggestion, that beneficiaries be transferred to rural areas needing workers (where worker accommodation is available) to allow them to replace the many overseas workers who normally pick fruit in places such as Otago or the Bay of Plenty. All travel costs could be paid by the government and accommodation provided by the orchard owners as normal. This would mean the need for overseas workers, a nightmare for the government due to its MIQ regulations, would be reduced or eradicated all together, while stopping valuable export dollars from being lost.
This scheme could be extended to cover harvesting of grapes and olives next autumn, where there will be the same problem. It could also be extended to cover work such as pruning and planting in some of the orchards, vineyards or olive groves.
The dairy industry needs workers too, although most of them will need skills. How about beneficiaries are paid their benefit in rural areas while training to become dairy workers? Travel costs will be covered by the government, but local beneficiaries could be used, meaning that existing accommodation arrangements would continue.
Reintroduce National’s scheme to pay people to relocate out of Auckland, preferably to smaller towns. Housing is at a premium in most towns and cities nowadays, but it is worse in Auckland than anywhere else. Rents are much cheaper out of the main centres too. Accommodation allowances would reduce substantially.
People who refuse to work when there is work available locally should lose a portion of their benefit. Labour is generally too soft on beneficiaries to do this, but it is what is needed when we have a shortage of workers because we cannot bring in temporary workers from overseas. It doesn’t matter if the pay is low. Those on benefits are not losing their benefits anyway and so will be substantially better off.
All of this will require a lot of organisation on the part of MSD, which creates more job opportunities for administrators, particularly in rural areas. There’s a few more jobs that beneficiaries might be able to do.
None of this will happen, of course. Poverty action groups and the Greens will continue to try to shame the government into simply doling out more taxpayer cash, which in the end will result in higher taxes, while doing absolutely nothing to encourage people to try to help themselves. The opportunities are there. But right at the moment, the government just cannot give in to these crowing voices. There just is not enough money to go around, and there won’t be for some time yet.
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