John Tamihere - the new Apirana Ngata?

John Tamihere is getting closer to the source of the crime problem than others. I disagreed earlier with the assertion that preventing crime starts at school and said it starts earlier - in the family planning clinic or at home. Tamihere is saying, in the maternity ward.

JT seems to make some sense when he gets on his Maori solutions for Maori problems band-wagon, but I can't agree to separatism in the long run and just how long do these arrangements go for? I once rang his show and asked what happens to those Maori who don't want to come to his I'm-in-control-of-your-benefit-party? And he didn't have an answer. It relies on compulsion. The beneficiary agrees to the trust controlling their money or there is no money. Otherwise individuals will simply opt-out to avoid the paternalistic ministerings. It isn't unusual or difficult for Maori to up sticks and go elsewhere. Maori beneficiaries, in my experience, are a very mobile - or transient - group.

Ever since Maori have received welfare, from the early days of the Old Age Pension,and later the Family Benefit, there have been attempts to control how the money was spent. Agents were appointed and later tribal committees formed. I am personally dubious about their merits. Perhaps because the approach ignores the central question of why benefits are needed in the first place.