Any live-streaming?

Anyone know if the Libertarianz/True Liberal/Cannabis reform get together today in Auckland is live-streaming?

Welfare reform protests alarm beneficiaries

WELFARE REFORM PROTESTS ALARM BENEFICIARIES

Friday, October 5, 2012

The language protesters are using to describe ongoing welfare reforms is unnecessarily frightening people on benefits, according to welfare commentator Lindsay Mitchell.

"Welfare reforms are being described as 'cruel', 'punitive', 'brutal', 'vicious' and 'violent' prompting beneficiaries to fear the worst - that they will lose their income."

"This is simply untrue. The reforms are focussed on getting more people into work and on creating better outcomes for children. For people on the DPB the work expectation kicks in when their youngest child goes to school and can be met with a little as ten hours per week until their youngest turns 14. But if there is no work, they will continue to be supported. Loss or partial loss of benefit will only apply to those who repeatedly refuse to meet drug test requirements for suitable jobs; who repeatedly refuse to enrol their child with a local GP or kindergarten, or who have an unresolved arrest warrant against them."

"If benefit payment rates were being cut, as happened in the early nineties, an outcry would be understandable. But demonstrating against the government putting more effort and resources into getting people into work makes no sense. Especially  in such a distraught fashion which, as I said earlier, is actually alarming the people the protesters claim to care about."


www.welfarereform.co.nz

Quote of the Day

This is beautiful in its simplicity. Coincidentally I'd only yesterday been having a conversation with my Dad about Somerset Maugham and he was recommending various works. The Moon and Sixpence particularly appealed to him not least for its naming.  Anyway the quote that arrived in my inbox this morining:

If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the irony of it is that, if it is comfort or money it values more, it will lose that too.

— William Somerset Maugham, Strictly Personal [1941]

Where did that protest banner come from?

People opposing the government's welfare reforms are gearing up to protest nationally on Friday this week. One protester has made this sign:

Curious as always I searched the quote. Here is the original:

Morality is doing what's right, regardless of what you're told. Religion is doing what you're told, regardless of what's right."- unknown

It would seem the original quote was a protest against religion. But I didn't think the protester would have come up with the substitution herself.

So I googled images and found this:

This amended phrase actually appears on  the Wisconsin Oath Keepers shared Tenth Amendment Center's photo.


Now  Oathkeepers are libertarian/conservative, nationalist, constitutionalists associated with the Tea Party and would be pro welfare reform. When they talk about not obeying they refer to not obeying what they view as illegal government (the Obama administration) and, for instance, his gutting of the 1990s welfare reform.

It's strange world when left-wingers parade around with right-wing protest banners. Or statists carry the same message as non-statists.

Truth column September 20

My September 20 Truth column is now on-line

Why does Labour persist in creating state dependency unnecessarily? Or at least it would, given the chance. Its half-baked food in schools policy makes no sense. Most children in decile one to three schools – the lowest income – arrive at school with breakfast on board.

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Other Truth columns here

Principles are the problem

I laughed outright at Bryce Edwards' complaint about the Libertarianz

“Part of the problem is that the Libertarianz are just too damn principled, and all about promoting their core ideology," said political commentator and lecturer Bryce Edwards.

At least  they have some principles and ideology to adhere to.

Or would it be better if they had some political wannabe minor celebrities using the party as a personal vehicle. Or a leader who appealed to old ladies and racists. Or embodied any of the new religions like global warming, freedom from genetic engineering or trees before humans. Or provided a hitching post for old religionists who cling to biblical ideas of sin. Or played to separatists and first-people privilege sentiments. Or were such a broad church as to be indistinguishable from the next broadest church.

Are these political entities what Libz should be looking to emulate?

Sean Plunket moving on - what next for NewstalkZB?

Whale reports Sean Plunket is moving on.

He was off air the day before the TVNZ Close Up demise was announced leading me to wonder if the two were connected.

But I also noticed a lift in his mood about a week ago leading me to suggest  to my other half that,  "Plunket's got a new woman". He just had that boyish wickedness thing going on. He's very, very funny when  in that frame of mind. But maybe I mistook a new relationship for a new job. There was certainly a sense of relief about him. A devil-may-care, let down your hair (sorry for atrocious rhyme) attitude.

I've listened to him off and on, whereas when Justin du Fresne was host, ZB was the only station I tuned into. It's more likely now that I'll switch over from the fabulous Sound (97.3fm) after dropping daughter off and singing our way to work, to Michael Laws (who was happily replaced by Rodney Hide yesterday doing a sterling job with the lines filled all morning and Rodney chirping away about his new born baby Grace).

In Plunket's first year he made the mistake of treating talkback callers like hostile interviewees. He would lead them through an argument using faulty logic to disprove their position. He had none of du Fresne's congeniality. But this year he had improved. I thought he was warming to the listeners and they to him. If I switched off it was because I wasn't interested in the topic, or some of the nuttier callers were  irritating.

He could sometimes pull off an unusual idea. When Margaret Mahey died he spent a morning talking to people about their favourite books. It was quite compelling and nostalgic as caller after caller evoked universal memories of childhood fiction.

But where does NewstalkZB go now? It wouldn't bother me one iota if they switched the Welllington network over to the national network and beamed in Leighton Smith. BUT he isn't popular with a number of the Wellington audience, who are very parochial and sometimes not that bright. Ironically the programme's very weakness.

A permanent post for Rodney perhaps?

Quote of the week

The Centre for Independent Studies has a weekly newsletter "Ideas" from which this is taken:

Freedom quote of the week:

If you have been voting for politicians who promise to give you goodies at someone else's expense, then you have no right to complain when they take your money to give it to someone else, including themselves.

– Thomas Sowell

The only problem is, where are the politicians NOT promising to give you goodies at someone else's expense?

"Job creation is free in the private sector"

With all the talk from Labour and the Greens about government job creation, or the lack of, this Washington Times editorial is timely:

.....the fiscal cost of “creating or saving” jobs in the private sector should equal $0 because true job creation should add value to the employer’s bottom line. In fact, if creating a job was ever a net cost to the employer, a rational employer wouldn’t be hiring anyone — how could his enterprise remain healthy?

Further (from me) if a employee in the private sector does turn out to be a cost (eg an investment  failure) the cost is born by that business. The lost opportunity stays within that business. It isn't socialised out across every other business or tax-paying individual as happens when governments get involved in job creation.


(Hat-tip FFF)

Barbara Sumner Burstyn on welfare reforms....

...wonders what character Paula Bennett would be in a modern version of Oliver Twist:

Paula Bennett and her second stage welfare reforms may not yet have gone so far as the workhouse. But despite the mounting evidence of human misery right here and now in our land of plenty, clearly, there is serious Malthus channeling occurring inside the National Party. Charles Dickens wrote the character of Oliver Twist to protest the New Poor Laws. An author today could easily write a modern version. I wonder what role Paula Bennett would play?

The reaction to the latest reforms has been so over the top. But this particular writer is an extremist. After her expressions about the  female soldier killed in Afghanistan it's a bit rich to evoke her own victimhood at the hands of Work and Income.

"Feminist rhetoric" blamed for public misconception

Professor David Fergusson who has headed the Christchurch Health and Development Study for many years says that "feminist rhetoric" is to blame for the public perception that domestic violence is nearly always perpetrated by men.

"The proper message is that both gender groups have a capacity for domestic violence [and] women probably perpetrate more assaults on children then men do," Mr Fergusson said.
The ramifications are a public health system that tends to overlook male victims of domestic violence.
One example was White Ribbon Day, which he had been critical of because it focused on female survivors of domestic violence and there was "no comparable day for male victims".
"It is those biases which have been built into our system right the way through it, largely from feminist rhetoric that implies that males are always to blame"

Gareth Morgan doesn't know what he is talking about

Gareth Morgan has changed his tune over the past few years. I once thought he dealt in facts. But reading the following in today's NZ Herald proved me wrong. He wrote:

The numbers on benefits move in line with business cycles. When the economy is growing and employers are short-staffed beneficiaries go to work - even those most maligned of beneficiaries, sole parents.

Data:

The only "numbers on benefits" moving in line with business cycles are the unemployed. And Gareth's article is most definitely about all beneficiaries.

September 13 Truth column

 My September 13 Truth column is now on-line:

"When well-paid policy advisers are less interested in the cause of a problem than racing to solutions, you know they’re selling the taxpayer short. Such is the case with a recent Children’s Commissioner report into child poverty which allocated just two paragraphs to the causes in a 58-page paper. This apparent lack of interest in the causes is doubly disturbing when his “expert” advisory panel had provided a supporting paper on exactly that."

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Just how does MSD define 'fraud'?

Reconciling these two pieces of information is a struggle.

A partnered mother admits she "lied" to Work and Income to get (presumably) the DPB. She claimed her husband was an illegal immigrant who had returned to India.

Yet Ministry of Social Development Chief Executive says she won't be prosecuted because "There is no evidence of fraud."

There have been many instances of women  taken to court and successfully prosecuted for claiming a benefit they weren't entitled to. After lying about being unemployed, claiming the DPB while living with a partner is the most common form of fraud. Perhaps this offending hadn't reached a high enough monetary level to prosecute. Perhaps the Ministry defines this case as abuse but not fraud. Where is the line drawn?

The ironic thing about this case is, if India doesn't work out, it's highly likely Ms Heremaia will be soon 'legitimately' collecting welfare.

It has to be "hard"

Simon Collins has been out talking with teenagers affected by the new welfare rules which pay most of their benefit as in-kind assistance. It would appear there are a few hitches with getting the balance right but some good stories about the difference the new service providers are making. These are the people contracted to work alongside the teenagers. These are the 'mentors'  that ACT always thought would be at the heart of any successful reform. And they are put with the most important cases first - the young beneficiaries.

Whereas the title of Collins' report has negative connotations - Teen welfare hard for guinea pigs - I see it as a positive. In terms of making ends meet it has to be hard and seen to be hard because part of the rationale for these reforms to deter others from going there.

My heart goes out to some of these kids though. I've got two teenagers and they are very, very lucky. They have something you can't put a price on. Security and unconditional love. That's what launches youngsters into a world that they can get the best out of. I fervently hope this new approach can make a real difference.

On addiction

Are we going to reach a point when every behaviour that has bad consequences is described as " an addiction"? There's the obvious alcohol and drug addiction, then gambling addiction; then there was sex addiction, and I believe I've read about shoplifting addiction. There's the obvious offshoots from adrenalin addiction. Caffeine addiction. And more. Now food addiction has appeared.

The effect of describing bad-consequence behaviours as 'addictions' is two-fold; legitimisation and collectivisation.

The perpetrator of bad-consequence behaviours isn't in control because their brain is cross-wired by some malfunctioning chemical messages. This constitutes a medical condition that requires treatment, ergo, funding. Guess who from.

So he who cannot control his urges becomes the obligation of he who can. But the very legitimisation of his bad-consequence behaviour will provoke more of it because he was handed a convenient excuse.

I eat, drink and gamble. But they are under control. Part of the reason they are under control is that out-of-control they stop bringing pleasure. I worked that out for myself. My brain hasn't been "hijacked" as Doug Sellman describes people whose reason has abandoned them.

David Cunliffe making stuff up

David Cunliffe writing a post on Red Alert which started on the subject of Women's Suffrage Day goes off on a tangent and gets to this,

The median household is at least $900 worse off than a couple of years ago.

Obviously not per week, or even per month, so he must mean annually.

The annual median household income from all sources for the last three years available was:

2009 $64,168
2010 $64,272
2011 $67,028

Time spent on welfare update

There is now a discussion under way at Public Address about what Paula Bennett claimed on Radio NZ this morning, which was subsequently reported in the NZ Herald (see last post).

I still find the latest revelations surprising. Mainly because they weren't part of the Welfare Working Group (WWG) report. Or I would have reacted then.

So I went back and checked. The WWG Issues report said,

As can be seen, there are over 170,000 people who had spent five or more of the last ten years on a benefit. Within this group of people, 100,000 had spent more than nine or more years on a benefit.

What I'd expect. But contrast the NZ Herald report today:

... Some 161,000 people had been on benefits for at least five of the last 10 years, and another 139,000 people had been on benefits for at least 10 years.

Still some mismatch  BUT the second figure is a subset of the first. Not 'and another'.

For the record, the Ministerial Q & A sheet says,  

"More than 161,000 people have received a benefit for at least half of the last 10 years and 139,000 have spent more than a decade on benefit since 1993."

Post note: After some correspondence the NZ Herald on-line is amending their copy.

When did the recession begin?

The NZ Herald reports:

Some 161,000 people had been on benefits for at least five of the last 10 years, and another 139,000 people had been on benefits for at least 10 years.

If this is correct then  half of current beneficiaries have been on welfare for five or more years and 43 percent  for 10 or more.

Remind me, when did the recession begin?

And coincidentally today's welfare reform protest at Ministry of Social Development Auckland offices featured the theme, "Job creation, not intimidation."

Truth column September 7

My September 7 Truth column is now on-line.

There’s every chance this is National’s last term in government. Its performance has been fair under difficult international and domestic circumstances, but where are the 2014 support partners?

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Other Truth columns here