There is a certain useful phrase about rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic (and I am not referring to the post on Big News about ACT). No. It was my instant response to reading that Iain Duncan Smith ( double-barrelled surnames are bad enough - unhyphenated ones are worse), Incomes and Pensions Minister in the UK, is still pursing a 'single' benefit. It is "doable" he insists.
To what end? NZ Labour spent years pursuing the idea. Why would it encourage people off welfare or discourage them from going on? As I heard a talkback caller astutely point out the other day on an unrelated matter, you can staple feathers on a Labrador but that doesn't make it a chicken.
And the classic political argument is employed to justify the estimated $7 billion pound cost of setting up this new creature. It will be paid for by the taxes that the long-term unemployed will produce when they get jobs.
Run a mile Chancellor.
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Meanwhile in the UK: Nick Clegg defends radical benefits cuts.
Welfare should encourage mobility not compensate poor, says deputy PM ahead of potentially fractious Lib Dem conference...
Billions of pounds are to be slashed from the welfare budget by the chancellor, George Osborne, when he unveils the results of his drastic public spending review next month.
This is from the Guardian...
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