Tuesday, March 24, 2015

Parents should feed their kids - not schools


Jim Rose points out that the Mana News editor, whilst railing against the cruel dispensing of the Feed The Kids Bill by National, inadvertently revealed that breakfast is actually exceedingly cheap to provide. Not that we don't know that. In fact if he is paying $5.55 for 2 litres of milk, he isn't shopping around.
Lets-feed-the-kids-Otara-breakfast-courtesy-of-Mana-Party


Mana News editor writes,

Just to get breakfast for the kids is $12.55 that’s not including sugar or fruit so kids aren’t eating tasteless soggy Weetbixs.

Reminder.  Government assistance for each low-middle income child averages around $78 per week. Sure there are many other expenses children incur. But if families can't provide the essentials then maybe they need to go under income management. The facility now exists, and even Labour recommended families that neglect their children should be subject to it in their 2014 welfare manifesto.

Time for some honesty and objectivity about 'feeding the children'. National are to be commended, not condemned, for standing their ground.

7 comments:

Unknown said...

Kia ora Lindsay

$12.50 is not cheap considering those families only have $40 for food after rent and electricity.

Anonymous said...

What a radical notion! What's next?

Parents should educate their kids - not the state!

Parents should provide healthcare for their kids - not state hospitals!

Parents should keep their kids safe - not the police!

Lindsay Mitchell said...

Hello Mana News

I would recommend that any family with only $40 remaining after rent and power talks to WINZ about budgeting advice. It's free. I worked with an organisation that provided the service and willing clients could always be helped (though living within new budgets established is not always a bed of roses.)

Hamish said...

I'm most offended that the author thinks weetbix and milk is tasteless. Tainting it with unhealthy sugar... Tsk, tsk.

Unknown said...

For someone who claims to be a commentator on welfare your out of touch. The Budget advisors are saying their simply isn’t enough money benefits are razor thin. People genuinely only have $40 for food a week and that’s a meat pack nothing more.

Hamish said...

Mana News, when I left home 6 years ago me and my flatmates covered ALL of our essentials on $90 each a week. Full grown men and woman; Food, power, internet, heating, and house essentials. We made budget each week EASILY, and left with a few hundred dollars each at the end of each year. We managed that three years in a row until we dispersed, and the neighbouring flats all managed the same. I keep up with many students in the area, and heaps of them manage very similar levels to this day.

We weren't funding new clothes, a low bedroom house in a nice neighbourhood, takeaways, food that wasn't on special, new technology, cigarettes/vices, or bedrooms to ourselves on that budget, but those weren't things we felt entitled to, because why on earth should we have? No one owes me or you, or anyone you know that level of comfort. Luckily our frugality afforded us our pick of some of them, and we had great lives while there, appreciating what we did have.

It's completely possible and entirely reasonable for anyone to make the same type of budget, and while it may require forgoing things you like or are used to, it's also extremely common.

'The Budget advisors' you're talking to are the ones who are out of touch - likely because they support the same entitled ideology you push rather than the self responsibility we favoured.

Anonymous said...

but those weren't things we felt entitled to, because why on earth should we have?

right. and let's be clear: when we're talking about bludgers - and we are - they are "entitled" to nothing at all.