Cut and paste press statement

Here's a good example of an almost immediate and almost verbatim cut and paste media statement appearing in the NZ Herald.



Hon Paula Bennett
Minister for Social Development
Minister of Youth Affairs
5 September 2012
Benefits stopped for those with arrest warrants
People with outstanding arrest warrants will no longer receive a benefit while evading Police says Social Development Minister Paula Bennett.
“Of the approximately 15,000 people with a current arrest warrant, around 8,200 are on benefits,” says Mrs Bennett.
“If someone has an unresolved arrest warrant we will stop their benefit until they do the right thing and come forward to the authorities.”
“In exceptional circumstances where someone poses a danger to the public, their benefit can be stopped immediately at the request of the Police Commissioner,” says Mrs Bennett.
Around 58 per cent of people clear their arrest warrants within 28 days. Those who don’t will be given 10 days to clear or challenge the warrant before their benefit is stopped, or reduced by fifty per cent if they have dependent children.

People will still be able to apply for hardship assistance for themselves and their children.
“Most people clear their warrants within a month, so 38 days is a reasonable amount of time to step forward and straighten things out,” says Mrs Bennett.
“Once someone has come forward their benefit can be reinstated but there will be clear consequences for people who continually refuse to acknowledge or resolve arrest warrants.”
ENDS

No benefit for people on the run

By Kate Shuttleworth

 

Social Development Minister Paula Bennett. Photo / Janna Dixon

Minister of Social Development Paula Bennett has announced people with outstanding arrest warrants will no longer receive a benefit while evading police.
"Of the approximately 15,000 people with a current arrest warrant, around 8,200 are on benefits,'' said Mrs Bennett.
"If someone has an unresolved arrest warrant we will stop their benefit until they do the right thing and come forward to the authorities.''
Around 58 per cent of people clear their arrest warrants within 28 days - those who don't are given 10 days to clear or challenge the warrant before their benefit is stopped, or reduced by fifty per cent if they have dependent children.
In exceptional circumstances where someone poses a danger to the public, their benefit can be stopped immediately at the request of the police Commissioner,'' said Mrs Bennett.
"People will still be able to apply for hardship assistance for themselves and their children.
"Most people clear their warrants within a month, so 38 days is a reasonable amount of time to step forward and straighten things out.

"Once someone has come forward their benefit can be reinstated but there will be clear consequences for people who continually refuse to acknowledge or resolve arrest warrants.''

Responding to Green assertions about child poverty

I've used my computer time up today responding to a Green candidate brought to my attention by Shane. So it's also today's posting:

bsprout says: "What Key's government is currently doing has actually worsened child poverty and he clearly suggested that there wasn't much more he is prepared to do."

The latest HES finds that using the AHC ‘fixed line’ 60% measure of child poverty the rates were:

2009 22
2010 22
2011 21

And they are down or the same on every other measure depicted.

Table s.2, pg 13

http://www.msd.govt.nz/documents/about-msd-and-our-work/publications-resources/monitoring/household-income-1982-2007/2012-hir-full-summary.doc

bsprout says:"...there appears to be a pervasive view that the 270,000 children living in poverty are suffering because their parents made poor choices and by restricting support will encourage them to get jobs and budget better. The fact is that the majority of these parents are in work or part-time employment."


The Children's Social Health Monitor says:

"In New Zealand, children who are reliant on benefit recipients are a particularly vulnerable group. During 2009, 75% of all households (including those with and without children) relying on income-tested benefits as their main source of income were living below the poverty line (housing adjusted equivalent disposable income <60 2007="2007" br="br" median="median" of="of">

In 2011 there were 234,572 benefit-dependent children. Assuming that non-child households are as poor as dependent-child households (unlikely) the number of beneficiary children living below the poverty line would be 175,929 or 75 percent.

http://www.nzchildren.co.nz/children_reliant.php

That represents a majority of 270,000. There is some overlap between benefit and part-time work but not enough to justify your statement. In fact, those children with parent on a benefit and working part-time are more likely to be above the threshold.

bsprout says: "Only a very small percentage of families abuse the system and to keep tightening the availability of benefits is just punishing many families who through redundancy and lack of jobs are suffering."

Your idea of abuse is probably fraud. My idea of abuse is to add children to an existing benefit at the rate of 18 percent of all children born each year. It is hardly surprising we have a child poverty problem.

http://www.occ.org.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0011/9866/No_3_-_Causes_and_consequences.pdf

Final point. Even when NZ had the lowest unemployment rate in the OECD (2007 or thereabouts) the number of children on benefits did not fall below 200,000.

Crucial statistic omitted

Concerning the Children's Commissioner report released last week about child poverty and proposed solutions, there is a very short section headed The Causes of Child Poverty. This  is supported by an additional  paper: Working Paper no.3 What causes child poverty? What are the causes? An economic perspective.

The supporting paper contains this fact:

"Wilson and Soughtton (2009) report that about 18 percent of New Zealand children are born to a parent on a main benefit (about 13 percent are born to a parent on the DPB), down from 25 percent in the 1990s."

Here's my question for you. If you were responsible for the final report, the one for public consumption, would you have considered that statistic important and would you have included it?

(BTW the reason the percentage is down from the 1990s is far fewer people on are an unemployment benefit.)

Truth column August 23

My August 23 Truth column is now on-line.

Surprise, surprise – not. The Greens want higher welfare payments.

Last week, they had a private member’s bill to extend the In Work Tax Credit (IWTC) to beneficiary parents pulled out of the ballot. That means it will probably be debated and has a chance of becoming law.

More

Other truth columns here

Quote of the day

“Every jobs market needs a ladder and, at present, the bottom rungs of that ladder have been sawn off by a welfare state that has trapped the people it was designed to help. The waste of taxpayers’ money is as nothing compared to the waste of human potential.”  
                          Fraser Nelson, Spectator

(Hat-tip Karl du Fresne by way of Neville Gibson)

Sign of tough times in the public service

Things must be tough at Statistics NZ. They didn't produce their usual Father's Day facts this year. Nor, quite correctly, Mother's Day. Never mind, it was always a bit of a feel-good puff piece. It never told us for instance how many Fathers would spend the day in prison, or otherwise estranged from their children, or visiting under supervision - such is the lot of thousands of Dads.

On a cheerier note, soon children will be able to celebrate double-dad days! Father's Day will become Fathers' Day.

Strange times in which we live.

Australia: Taxpayer funding versus medals won

I came across this graph via the New Zealand Initiative newsletter. It wasn't the subject of their article but appeared at the same linked page.

On the other hand NZ taxpayer funding will have undoubtedly risen along with the medal tally over the same period. Perhaps we can only safely conclude that taxpayer funding does not guarantee medals.

Russell Norman - ticket clipper

Yesterday Green co-leader Russell Norman had a conversation with Larry Williams about, amongst other things, child poverty. Norman was in favour of the universal child payment recommended by the Children's Commissioner report released earlier this week. When Larry protested that it would result in money going to families that don't need it Norman was unperturbed. His defence was that it was a simpler system to administer (so is flat tax) and would prevent those who needed it from falling through the cracks. He maintained it should be free like healthcare for all under sixes. He personally thinks its great he can take his children to the doctor free of charge. Williams again protested that Norman doesn't need to take his kids to the GP free of charge. He can afford to pay. It went on in this fashion. When Larry suggested to the co-leader that perhaps people shouldn't be having children that they can't afford to raise Norman replied, "But that's not the real world. That's an ideological position."

So common sense is now ideological. "But that's not the real world...." It's never going to be the real world either with politicians like Russell Norman blithely accepting  that people do have children utterly irresponsibly - resulting in 22 percent on a benefit within the year - and demanding that the rest of society pick up the tab for their upkeep, education and health.  Oh, and he's happy to clip the ticket along the way.

For the love of a dog

I received this story via e-mail and it touched me.

A Wisconsin man has been thrust into the spotlight after a picture of him and his 19-year-old dog went viral on the Internet, according to a story from Granite Broadcasting sister station Northland's NewsCenter.

According to the Northland's NewsCenter report:
The image of John Unger and his dog Schoep has been viewed millions of times on Facebook, reaching people across the world.
They say a picture is worth a thousand words but, it's safe to say one of Hannah Stonehouse Hudson's newest snapshot is worth millions.
"It's been viewed almost three million times; it's been shared I think 150,000 times. It's been like an incredible amount of times," said Hudson on an overcast day in Bayfield, Wis. "My mother has a saying, "For the comfort and convenience of the dog," and he is the epitome of this saying. He loves this dog, he takes care of this dog, his life is about this dog."
John Unger and Schoep have spent almost twenty years together; he was rescued as a puppy.
"We both wanted to work with a dog that had been abused and we knew this. We talked about it and that's what we wanted to do. We wanted to help out an animal and bring out his full potential," said Unger.
It's hard for Unger to talk about their time together because 19-year-old Shoep is nearing the end of his long, happy life.
"What he means to me? I can't put into words."
He suffers from arthritis and has trouble sleeping, so to ease his pain, Unger takes him swimming and Schoep will fall asleep in his arms.
"Not too many more times are we going to be able to do this. So every time now it's a pretty special feeling....the buoyancy it gives him in the water relieves the pain, or at least some of it to the point where he's relaxed," said Unger with Schoep by his side. 


 And there is more here about how people reacted to this story.

Two wins for responsible people...

...and two blows against advocates of universal penalty.

Drinking age stays at 18 and folic acid addition to bread remains voluntary.

Great. I don't often applaud parliament but today being at their mercy is just a little less painless.

Three OIA tables that explain child poverty

Little commentary needed from me. The tables are self-explanatory. If you pick up slight discrepancies that is because the questions asked were slightly different; some variations in how the database is queried, and the first table doesn't include 16 and 17 year-olds. Suffice to say the numbers are shockingly high.

13,634 caregivers (and some will have added two babies) account for 22 percent of all babies born in 2011.

The single most influential impact on reducing child poverty would be the reduction  in these numbers

Walker takes offence at "'rape jokes"

A piece appears in the DomPost page 2 today about Holly Walker tweeting her disgust at "fellow MPs making rape jokes" prior to a select committee hearing. Her tweet included "#rapeculture #oldboysclub". She then laid a complaint with the speaker. Jamie-lee Ross subsequently put his hand up, apologised and the complaint was withdrawn. But he says his comments were misunderstood. And Walker won't repeat what she heard.

Now on one hand it's a nothing story because the complaint was withdrawn. But on the other the impression is left that Ross is a oafish, loose cannon....or that Holly Walker is particularly precious and humourless. Perhaps  there is a responsibility on her, having gone public with her strong feelings of offence, to explain what caused them.

Quote of the Day

"The government consists of a gang of men exactly like you and me. They have, taking one with another, no special talent for the business of government; they have only a talent for getting and holding office. Their principal device to that end is to search out groups who pant and pine for something they can't get and to promise to give it to them. Nine times out of ten that promise is worth nothing.The tenth time is made good by looting A to satisfy B. In other words, government is a broker in pillage, and every election is sort of an advance auction sale of stolen goods." -H. L. Mencken

- (1880-1956) American Journalist

 

(Hat-tip ICH newsletter)

Voting for policy not for the party

In yesterday's Hutt News:

David Shearer is pathetic

Here is his hot- off- the- press media statement. My italicised comments are interspersed:

David SHEARER
Labour Leader
28 August 2012 MEDIA STATEMENT

John Key in denial over Kiwis in hardship 

The number of Kiwi children living in poverty has grown significantly under John Key’s watch but rather than acknowledging the problem, the Prime Minister would rather play the fool in Parliament, says Labour Leader David Shearer.

 The Household Incomes report released yesterday says "Child poverty rates were flat from 2009 to 2011 – this is a good result in the circumstance"

 
“John Key’s flippant response to this crisis is disappointing. He refuses to accept the findings of several reports showing the gap between the rich and poor is the widest it has ever been, that inequality is rising and the number of children living in hardship is up to 21%.

 Just as the level of inequality dropped in the 2009/10 year, it is entirely possible it dropped in the most recent 2011/12 year due to  current economic volatility. The most recent year isn't yet available.


“John Key just shrugs his shoulders and says, oh well, ‘things are bouncing around’ for these children and their families. Apparently it’s all the fault of the global financial crisis and that’s why he hasn’t been able to deliver the so-called brighter future he’s been promising Kiwis for years.

 The report says that because of the GFC, the Christchurch earthquakes, the economic downturn and recovery it cannot predict where inequality trends will go.

“That excuse and his mocking attitude won’t wash with the many New Zealanders who are working harder than ever but failing to get ahead.

“Hard-working parents can’t support their family on the paltry $13.50 an hour they’re earning. But John Key’s not rushing to help them out, saying only that they’ll ‘eventually’ get a pay rise.

 And a single earner family with two children on $55,000 or less effectively pays no tax.

“Children are going to school without breakfast or lunch because their parents can’t afford to feed them but John Key’s more interested in spending millions of dollars on drug-testing people.

 Can't afford to feed them? Even KidsCan says it takes just $241 per year to feed each of these children, maybe a dollar a school day. DPB beneficiaries get an average of around $516 a week.

“More than 50,000 New Zealanders are leaving for Australia looking for better paying jobs every year but Bill English says we shouldn’t be crying over them at the airport.

“This Government doesn’t have solutions for these problems. It just has excuses,” said David Shearer.



And you want us to prefer your crap?

Children's Commmissioner child poverty cop-out

The scene-setting opener:

"In  1986  an  estimated  11  percent  of  children  lived  in poverty.  By 2011, that figure had risen to 25 percent, or about 270,000 New Zealand children."

Those statistics are remarkably synonymous with the sole parent rates; between 8 and 11 percent in 1986 and 28 percent in 2006. Though not all child described as living in poverty are in single parent homes there's still substantial correlation. 65% of the 270,000 are on welfare. Most will be relying on the DPB.

The report just released by the Children's Commissioner asks for a lot. An awful lot.

It wants

1/ Child support payments to go to the custodial parent instead of to the government to offset the DPB (cost $159 million annually)

2/ Family tax credits to rise by an average of $17 per child and incrementally for those aged 0 - 6

3/ A new universal child payment of $125-150 per week that would be targeted to the poorer after the child reaches 6 (this could replace current forms of financial support like Family Tax Credit)

4/ To raise the take-up of other child entitlements such as the child disability allowance. It wants these rates of take-up published and the IRD and WINZ to offer performance pay for higher rates realised.

5/ More government-funded budgeting services

6/ Increased parental earnings from income and more childcare assistance 

7/ A new Child Poverty Act to "embrace" targets

The list goes on  but forgive me, as I stopped when it got to housing and health. I was overwhelmed. It's all been said before in one form or another. It's a depressing deterministic prescription. No rigorous analysis of why children are in poverty or why some children in poverty have perfectly good outcomes. The closest the authors get is this:

Social commentators often talk about child poverty resulting primarily from parents making poor decisions about how they spend their money, bad morals, a poor work ethic, bad luck, unwise lifestyle choices and so on. While some parents undoubtedly make poor choices, there is little evidence  that  poor  people  mismanage  their  income  to  a  greater  extent  than  those  who  are better  off.  This  is  not  to  suggest  that  we  should  ignore  the  contribution  of  parental  lifestyle choices  and  various  social  ills  (including  drug  and  alcohol  addiction)  to  poor  outcomes  for children, but the main causes of child poverty lie elsewhere. (My emphasis)

That's put "social commentators" in their proper place.

Let me leave you with this sample:  

It is important to recognise the impact of the experience of colonisation on Māori. The alienation of land and resources has seen the loss of a cultural and spiritual base and the loss of an economic base (Cram, 2011). Any analysis of the financial and material deprivation of whānau today is incomplete without understanding this context (Baker, Williams & Tuuta, 2012).

Contrasting attitudes and approaches to low decile school parents

When things are made free there will always be uptake and more 'need' created in the process as people's willingness to pay themselves is eroded. But these two school stories provide a sharp contrast.

On the one hand there are calls for the existing free food programmes  in low deciles schools to be expanded because parents aren't providing it; on the other is an effective new e-learning programme in Auckland's poorest suburbs, where (in Tamaki)  the average income is $19,000 but the parents are finding the $3.50 per week for their children to participate.

At you would expect the first call comes from government - or an agency of - the Children's Commissioner. Whereas the second expectation and request for parents to contribute is from the private sector.

It is too easy for parents to expect others to pick up the slack for them in this country. It becomes a habit. But as the second story demonstrates, not an unbreakable one.

Truth column August 16

My August 16 Truth column is now on-line.

I’m a non-smoker and consider my right to be free from other people’s cigarette smoke well and truly satisfied under current legislation. The anti-tobacco religionists are now starting to get up my nose far worse than cigarette smoke used to.

More

Other Truth columns here

Employers take subsidy but don't uphold their end of the bargain

This issue has concerned me since learning that a Wellington/Taranaki employer subsidised by WINZ to take on young unemployed beneficiaries was paying his employees in a haphazard and suspect way. It isn't advisable to accept just one side of the story though, so I wrote to MSD and asked them under the OIA if the company was under investigation (as described to me by the mother of one of their ex-employees). I also asked if it was Work and Income practice to apply a stand-down period to those youngsters who lost subsidised jobs apparently through no fault of their own.

Their response told me that MSD was in the process of recovering subsidies from the company in question but that it was not under investigation for fraud. And that the stand-down period didn't apply in these instances.

I've since wondered  how widespread this problem is. Labour MP Su'a Wlliam Sio has also asked questions and found that employers owe $800,000 in job subsidies paid out for employees that did not, in his words, "fulfil their end of the bargain".

 “If Job Ops workers are sacked inside six months then employers are supposed to pay back the up to $5000 in wage subsidies they get to take them on in the first place.  It is not good enough that there are currently 477 employers who owe taxpayers a refund, with a total of $814,541 outstanding."

Almost certainly there will be employers who see the job subsidies as an opportunity to advance business interests. And that's OK if ultimately the young person remains in  their ethical employ. Subsidies should be the optimum win-win, despite the purist in me opposing them. The system is what it is and it's better for taxpayer money to be spent on getting someone into a job than keeping them dependent.

Quote of the day

Every dime the government spends—whether acquired through taxation or borrowing—is a dime that someone in the private economy won’t be spending. If people are not spending already—which is not the case these days—we must look to the earlier government interventions that brought about that condition—and then repeal those anti-market corporatist policies, regulations, and taxes.

— Sheldon Richman, “Bastiat Misread” [August 24, 2012]

(Hat Tip FFF)

Banning fun and creativity

This blinkered, rigid 'philosophical' idea that food shouldn't be played with is quite awful. It pains me to read the silly opinions of people whose minds have been captured by ideas with no rational basis. These are the 'can't' people. They are everywhere but tragically they abound in education. What reasonable explanation can a child comprehend about why it is bad to play with food? Bad to make play dough; bad to use eggs or flour to make sticky pastes from which you can then create all sorts of weird and wonderful structures; bad to use food colourings and vegetables to make fantastic wallpaper; bad to use macaroni to make colourful necklaces; bad to use carrots to make snowmen noses; bad to use icing sugar to depict snow on wintry painting - the list is endless. If they don't get a good reason they either get resentful and rebellious or just repeat the stupid one and so the stupidity stretches on .

I am not at one with the world today. Probably never have been and never will be. The thinking and actions of too many people just goes from bad to worse. I'm going out with my dogs. Their behaviour makes more sense to me than that of some supposedly intelligent human-beings.

Jacinda Ardern in The Truth

Jacinda Ardern, Labour spokesperson for welfare, wrote an article , Welfare of the nation, which appeared in last week's Truth. Note she starts with her own door-knocking story which counteracts David Shearer's now infamous roof painter on a benefit (more evidence of the ideological split on welfare currently dividing Labour).

Door knocking in an area with low electoral enrolment last year, I met a woman who was ecstatic I could enrol her. When I asked what occupation she would like listed, she dropped her head and said: “I was a receptionist, but I’m a bit sick right now. I start chemotherapy soon. I’m so sorry”. I asked her why she was apologising and she replied “because I’m on a benefit”.
Nothing indicates to me more that something is wrong with our welfare system than when those who need help apologise for receiving it, and the minority who don’t need the support, but get it all the same, are portrayed as the norm.
The concept of the system hasn’t actually changed all that much since 1938, when the unemployment benefit was made available to anyone who was “unemployed, is capable of and willing to undertake suitable work, and has taken reasonable steps to secure employment”.
It was a social contract. Everyone paid into a collective pot, and if you fell ill or lost your job, you drew from the pot until you found work again. Simple. The concept remains unchanged, but not our perception of it. Why? And how do we restore the notion of true social security?

The concept does not remain unchanged though.  For starters, today "everyone" does not pay "into a collective pot" before they have access to a benefit. Thousands of teenagers start life there and stay year after year. Also, as I have demonstrated before, pre 1970s people had to be of sober habits, good moral character and not have induced their own incapacity to work. And before the 1970s the DPB - in terms of dependence, now the single biggest benefit type - did not exist. Hence it is not a "minority who don't need support" - it's a majority. Not if you define support the way it was defined at the outset of social security.

To say all people on a benefit have chosen welfare as a ‘lifestyle’ is way off the mark. We know Kiwis want to work – the queues of people who turn up for jobs at supermarkets are evidence of that.
There are 112,000 sole parents on the Domestic Purposes Benefit. Most come off it within four years. The overall rate fluctuates very little, although the Ministry of Social Development predicts that the Government’s costly welfare reforms will still see more people on the DPB than when the Government started.
In 2009, IRD surveyed why people on government support struggle to get off it. The first reason was job availability. Numbers two and three? Whether they had the right skills, and could cover childcare costs.
These are legitimate issues. A sole parent on the DPB receives $293 per week before housing assistance. If they find part-time work, they can apply for help with child care and receive a maximum of $3.91 per hour. If you’re moving into a minimum wage job that has curious hours and requires either a babysitter or childcare, it has the potential to wipe out your wages from day one.

Who is saying "all" people on a benefit have chosen welfare as a 'lifestyle'? We all know that there are people with terminal illnesses, people made redundant or people born intellectually disabled who need support. And most people appear happy with paying taxes to provide it.

But let's get on to the DPB. There aren't 112,000 sole parents on it for starters. She's failed to identify that a growing number of DPB recipients are caregivers to people who would otherwise need to be hospitalised or institutionalised. Then she downplays the level of dependency by telling us that "most come off it within four years". But many go back on it. Her statistic conveniently masks what the government now knows to be the truth as expressed here:

 " just over half had spent at least 80% of the history period observed (the previous 10 years in most cases) supported by main benefits."

Next, if people came off the DPB when jobs were available how come when NZ had the lowest unemployment in the world (2007) the numbers only just dipped below 100,000?

Then she emphasises the weekly payment of $293. Add to this the average weekly accommodation supplement and average family tax credit and the sum is $519 per week. And the IWTC that Labour now wants to abolish was exactly about preventing moving into work having "the potential to wipe out your wages from day one". Honestly, she is stupid.

Finally:

It’s time to revive Michael Joseph Savage’s philosophy and create a social security system minus the shame.

Be careful watch you wish for there Jacinda. Savage's system was based on the concept of the deserving and non-deserving. Whereas you and your comrade Deborah Russell want it to be free from any notion of worthiness. Make your mind up.

Childless and single are the new 'poor'

MSD has just released the Household Income Report for 2012. It's as up-to-date as it can be after surveying, analysing and publishing, and relates to the 2010-11 financial (June) year. I've pretty much copied main points:

Incomes fell for deciles 3-6 … but rose for the top decile especially. At the very bottom incomes were flat (protected by benefit rates being CPI adjusted and NZS being wage related).

Inequality rose to its highest level ever [but] redistribution through the tax and transfer system reduces inequality very significantly compared with what it would otherwise be. An example is that single-earner two-child families with income less than around $55,000 from wages pay no net income tax. They receive more from WFF tax credits than they pay in income tax and ACC.

Child poverty rates were flat from 2009 to 2011 – this is a good result in the circumstances. 50% of poor children are Maori/Pacific.

50% of poor children are from sole parent families and 50% from two parent.

Income poverty rates for single person working-age households trebled from the 1980s to 2007 (10% to 30%) and were 35% in 2011.

(The headline from Stuff is misleading: Poor get poorer, inequality reigns. In fact the 'poor' flat-lined. The middling incomes dropped. Same journalist writes, "It also painted a damning picture into child poverty, with 21 per cent of Kiwi kids living in poverty, compared to 15 per cent in 2007."  See above were the child poverty rate is described as a "good result" in the circumstances.)

Percentage of teen pregnancies aborted

Reading through a paper about the high teen birth rate in the US and why it matters, linked to by Eric Crampton earlier this week, I came across this table:

The Danish figure for percentage of teen pregnancies aborted is very high. I don't know, but it may be similar in other Scandinavian countries because they have similar low teenage birth rates.

Paradoxically it is those teenagers who stand to lose the most by having a baby that avoid giving birth. Those who believe their (economic) life chances are slender continue with the pregnancy (generalising here you understand).

Trying to slot NZ in there, in 2010 (our birth and abortion statistics have improved recently) there were 28 births per 1,000 15-19 year-olds and 22 abortions. This lines us up closely with the United Kingdom in 2003. So, assuming the miscarriage rate is also similar, 37 percent of teen pregnancies in NZ in 2010 ended in abortion. A long way off Denmark.

I am emotionally averse to  abortion but when it means subsequent births result in children  born to people ready, able and wanting to become parents the incidence of it is ameliorated.

Across the news

(Don't you hate those trendy media phrases that develop?)

"Why we are all beneficiaries of the welfare state"

This column, by Massey University tax lecturer Deborah Russell, appeared in the Dom Post yesterday under the heading, "Why we are all beneficiaries of the welfare state":

"It's easy to criticise the welfare system. Beneficiaries get too much money, too many of them cheat, and it all costs too much. But the unrecognised reality is that our comprehensive health and welfare systems create freedom and security for us all......

But when we criticise people who receive welfare, we are not just imprudent. We also undermine the security of our friends and family members and fellow citizens who depend on the welfare system.

If we complain about teenage mothers, and insist that someone ought to control their income and make them stop having babies, we make every sole mother worry about interference....

 Our health and welfare systems are based on need, not some notion of worthiness.

More

The first thing that came to mind was Benjamin Franklin's quote, "Those who would sacrifice freedom for security deserve neither."

People are hardly free when compelled to pay tax for systems they neither approve of nor use. Those making the largest tax contribution are often also paying for private health and education and would never qualify for a welfare benefit due to means-testing. So it is farcical to claim that,  " ....we are all beneficiaries of the welfare state."

Worse, many beneficiaries do not feel free; they feel trapped and forgotten. They are living at a subsistence level in substandard housing due to their safety net now being called upon by one in eight working-age New Zealanders. The welfare system has created so much contrived 'need' (consider Russell's example of teenage sole parents),  real adversity and emergency cannot be adequately met.

It is not a noble idea that the welfare system is no longer based on some "notion of worthiness". It used to be. That was how the architects designed it. Otherwise the system would be open to abuse. As it now is.

But the worst aspect of this academician's position is her cautioning against criticism of the welfare system. Is this how she teaches her students?

Truth column August 9

My Truth column from August 9 is now on-line.

In 2004 the Civil Union Bill was bitterly contested. Conservatives lobbied MPs furiously to prevent gays from forming state sanctioned and recognised partnerships.

 Even parties were split on the issue – ACT for example – although United Future members were unanimous in their opposition. The bill passed into law narrowly.

Just eight years later a new bill to legislate for gay marriage seems to be stirring far less division and looks like having the numbers to pass into law. Even lone surviving United future MP, Peter Dunne, is indicating support for it. That’s quite a sea change.

Society can change quite rapidly. Emotions burn out. Or people see incremental change, realise the sky hasn’t fallen and are then amenable to more. It is my fervent hope that the same attitudinal shift will have occurred to views about voluntary euthanasia. Labour MP Maryan Street currently has an End of Life Choice Bill in the ballot. 

The last time Parliament debated this issue was 2003. Then, New Zealand First’s Death With Dignity Bill was voted down 60-57.

More

Other Truth columns here

On WINZ paying for vasectomies

The NZ Herald reports:

NZ First social policy spokeswoman Asenati Lole-Taylor said it was difficult to justify the amount of public money spent on vasectomies.
"Why should the population in New Zealand pay for something that is supposed to be a personal expense? It's astounding really.

Who cares how much WINZ spends on vasectomies so long as they don't spend money on reversing them!

But if we accept the NZ First argument, where does the line get drawn on what "is supposed to be a personal expense"? What about raising your children? Paying your rent? Do you suppose that NZ First are launching an attack on all welfare? Because that's going to look pretty funny up against the privileges pumped out under the Super Gold Card.

Generally I am against the "spend now to save later" arguments so loved by the Left. Too often there are those unintended consequences, and it's a licence to ramp up spending enormously in the here and now when there is no guarantee there will be a later saving.

But as vasectomies do provide an almost 100 percent certainty of future saving I can make an exception.

Europeans not measuring up

Is it just that I am so brow-beaten over the issue of racial discrimination that when I get to the following paragraph it feels as though, as a European, I am being castigated for being under-represented in prison?

 Despite Europeans making up 68 per cent of the population, only 33 per cent of those in prison are Europeans. That compares with 49 per cent Maori and 11.3 per cent Pacific - yet they make up only 15 per cent and 7 per cent respectively of the overall population.

If I put that aside and actually engage with the 'accusation' Maori and Pacific both have young populations and so you could expect some slight  over-representation, which is what we see with Pacific. But not gross over-representation, which is what we see with Maori. Why isn't some thought given to that difference. In the report's terms, why does the justice system let down Maori in a way that it isn't letting down Pacific people?

And as always, when these sorts of reports make it into mainstream media and are widely broadcast on the TV, I worry about the message they send to subjects of them. It'd be like me telling my kids that whenever they have a problem,  it's not their fault. They know however I am far more objective that that. Loving them doesn't mean I can't see their weaknesses. But it does mean that I have to help them overcome those weaknesses in anyway I can.

Blonde joke

An old, blind Marine Gunnery Sergeant wanders into an All-Girl
Biker Bar.

He finds his way to a bar stool and orders a shot of Jack Daniels. 

After sitting there for a while, he yells to the bartender,

'Hey, you wanna hear a blonde joke?

 The bar immediately falls absolutely silent.

 In a very deep, husky voice, the woman next to him says, 

 'Before  you tell that joke, Marine, I think it is only fair, given 
that you are blind, that you should know five things:

 1. The bartender is a blonde girl with a baseball bat.

 2. The bouncer is a blonde girl with a 'Billy-Club'.

 3. I'm a 6-foot tall, 175-pound blonde woman with a black 
belt in karate. 

 4. The woman sitting next to me is blonde and a professional weight lifter.

 5. The lady to your right is blonde and a professional 
wrestler. 

'Now, think about it seriously, Marine.... Do you still wanna tell 

that blonde joke?'

The blind Marine thinks for a second, shakes his head and mutters, 'No...

not if I'm gonna have to explain it five times............

Ministry data: It's NOT official!

Paula Bennett keeps insisting there is no official measure of child poverty in New Zealand. This tack hasn't worked well for her.

In any case there is a measure produced by her Ministry.

The 2011 Household Incomes Report summary says:

Child poverty rates were the same in 2010 as in 2009 using both the fixed line AHC measure (22%), and the 60% AHC moving line measure (25%) 

There is much more detail following this statement including a table that shows the change since 1998.

Just over an hour ago a rattled (IMO) Bennett released another statement:

‘’Following recent debate on the issue, I have been misquoted in various media as saying there is no poverty line, or it’s been reported that I don’t acknowledge that a poverty line exists.

‘’What I’ve actually said is that there is no official measure of poverty in New Zealand, and that is correct." 

So her Ministry spends money exhaustively examining, analysing and reporting on poverty but the results are not official. Bizarre.

If I was using the MSD report I would  certainly feel justified in describing the data as 'official'. Would you?

Ill-disciplined MPs

Gareth Hughes, on Frogblog, has a post about the behaviour in parliament yesterday. Kudos to him for not posting the rest of the speaker's comment directed specifically at the Minister for Social Development. I wouldn't have heard about it myself if it hadn't been for a caller to talkback describing the look on her face.  Like Hughes, I don't care for the petty, juvenile behaviour of some MPs - a prime example is my own, Trevor Mallard. So I don't tune in any more.

Maggie Barry in danger of patronising

National MP Maggie Barry is opposed to voluntary euthanasia.

Ms Barry said many advocates of euthanasia were unaware of the world-class palliative care available in New Zealand's 35 hospices, palliative care homes, and in hospitals.

I am not one of them. I am aware of the care available. But being knocked out on opiates and blown up from steroids is still something one should be free to choose to avoid. I've seen it and it didn't strike me as a peaceful exit.

Back to Maggie Barry's assertion. Grey Power members are amongst the strongest supporters of voluntary euthanasia. They more than most will have had the experience of watching a slow death. Claiming they may be ignorant of palliative care is patronising if not insulting.

My advice to Paula Bennett re breaching privacy

Don't do it again.

Next time a Domestic Purposes Beneficiary starts to publicly complain about unfair treatment,  motivated either as an individual or by political activists, challenge them to disclose their full circumstances and income.

They don't need to be put under threat of exposure from the Minister. But they do need to know that they will be loudly challenged by you through newspapers, radio, television and social media.

You have the mana. You have the media pull. You can set up the platform. Use your power well. Use it to elicit the truth.

Call their bluff.

Jacinda Ardern contradicted by FVDRC

Criticising the Green paper submission summary released today Labour MP Jacinda Ardern says:

“Research shows that poverty and income inadequacy are key drivers of poor outcomes for children. Ms Bennett’s Green Paper ignores this with systemic issues like poverty barely rating a mention in the summary.

Yet the Family Violence Death Review Committee (FVDRC) included the following statement in its submission:

Low socioeconomic status (typically defined as family income below the poverty line, under-employment, and low education) is one of the major environmental conditions associated with child maltreatment. However, while the research shows an association between physical abuse, neglect and poverty, it is not a causal pathway. The majority of families living in poverty raise their children well.

Amen to that.

Being lightweight isn't going to do Labour any favours.

Submissions to the Green Paper on Vulnerable Children on-line and summarised

Submissions are now available on-line from MSD .... that is, those from NGOs and organisations. Those made by members of the public (like me) are not available.

Scanning through the lengthy summary paper via various searches I can only find a small number of references to benefit dependence playing a role in child abuse and neglect. One is a paragraph titled "Blaming Communities".

Blaming communities: A small minority of submissions suggested the problem of vulnerable children lay with particular sorts of people or communities. These submissions argued the culture of that group is the problem rather than the solution. Groups who featured in these kinds of arguments were Maori, DPB recipients, beneficiaries in general and absent fathers.  A related theme was the argument that vulnerability has arisen from a breakdown in family values, such as marriage, within communities.

(In 172 pages the DPB is mentioned three times.)

Anyway I searched "blaming" and "blame" . Guess what? The above reference is the only one. There is no mention of submitters blaming poverty; blaming colonisation; blaming systems or blaming inequality.'Blaming' is code for (as the summary authors see it) unfairly and prejudicially judging individuals.

Here is another brief allusion to welfare:

Benefits encourage poor parenting: A small minority of submissions argued the benefit system encourages and enables people who cannot parent properly to have children.

So a handful submitters have made the connection.   But the observation is pretty well buried under an avalanche of apologism for what is generally, at the core, an abrogation of parental responsibility.

(My submission was published here in February.)

Truth column August 2

My August 2 Truth column is now on-line.

Shortly after Labour’s Bill to extend Paid Parental Leave (PPL) from 14 weeks to six months emerged from the ballot, a poll of 16,000 votes showed 60% of respondents thought National was right to promise a financial veto against it. 

Frustratingly, this doesn’t indicate whether people were against the extension in the current economic climate, against an extension at any time, or against the entire scheme.  I fall in the last category.

More

Other Truth columns here

Taking on the Treaty

This is probably a coincidence but Rodney Hide and John Ansell have both launched into the Treaty of Waitangi today.

Rodney serves it up to the Tribunal:

The Waitangi Tribunal is our Babylonian priesthood. Its members spend their days poring over a tatty old text seeking guidance for modern-day government.
The funny thing isn't that they do it. The funny thing is that anyone takes them seriously.

More

While John writes:

TREATYGATE
Wake Up New Zealand, We’re Being Conned!

 More

Importantly, John Ansell has also worked out a practical way in which other New Zealanders can join him to stop the "TREATYGATE CON".

Shearer should reaffirm Labour's commitment to making work pay

Today's DomPost editorial points out the obvious. God knows why last year's Labour couldn't see it.

Given that the last Labour government had nine years to upskill, educate and nudge, the public could be forgiven for assuming that under Mr Shearer Labour has nothing new to offer.
Of one thing voters can be sure: extending the "in work" tax credit used to compensate low-wage workers for the extra costs associated with work, to beneficiaries, as proposed by Labour last year, will not solve the problem. It will only further reduce the incentives to seek paid employment.

The IWTC is an incentive to work. Effectively remove it and the incentive disappears. Shearer should publicly reaffirm Labour's commitment to making work pay separating himself from the lame duck period under Goff and King.

Doctor and academics slate Mayor's excitement over private sector job creation

Lower Hutt Mayor Ray Wallace has been lambasted on the DomPost's opinion page. Below is a letter from a local GP and a further featured letter from University of Otago academics appeared today. My response to the first follows:

 

Dear Editor

Unlike Dr Susanna Kent (Letters, August 9) I wasn't "appalled" to see Lower Hutt Mayor Ray Wallace recently launching a refurbished cigarette factory in Petone. Tobacco is still a legal substance. While this remains the case we may as well have the jobs here. At least the usual outcry  over unemployment caused by manufacturing jobs being lost overseas is avoided. Of course, criminalising tobacco would also create jobs. For illicit growers, black market racketeers,  police, court personnel, prison officers, etc. The unstoppable cannabis industry proves the point.

Acts of heroism

I feel terribly sad about the seeming loss of three lives in New Plymouth yesterday. When you have a child who could easily fit the bill it hits home more sharply perhaps? But there is something I wanted to say. While it may have been the wrong, and eventually tragic call to climb yesterday, the instructor lost his life trying to save the boys. It reminds me of the teacher in the Mangatepopo Gorge tragedy, who strapped one of the youngsters to his back but neither made it out. Makes me weep.

Maori and Pacific unemployment drop

Statistics NZ has just released the June HLFS. Overall unemployment is up slightly (6.7 to 6.8 percent) but Maori (13.9 to 12.8 percent)  Pacific (16.0 to 14.9) and Asian (9.4 to 8.2) unemployment are all down from March, though all figures are still slightly higher than June last year.

A new table (15) has been added. It shows the NEET percentage (aged 15-24 Not in Employment or Education). That stands at 13.1 percent.

Internationally NZ is ranking 14th in the OECD. We have steadily fallen in the rankings since around 2006. The OECD average is 7.9 percent.

Anyway, generally not much to write about that gives cause for optimism.

Kiwiblog: Labour soft on fraud?

David Farrar has a post regarding an exchange David Shearer had with a constituent about a neighbour being on a sickness benefit while he was up painting his roof. Shearer empathises with the constituent about the unfairness of the situation. Then Farrar points out the hypocrisy of this as Labour has opposed every National reform measure to reduce fraud. The implication is that Labour is soft on benefit fraud.

The statistics don't support this however.


table IS.1: Fraud and abuse investigations and reviews completed, and overpayments identified¹

Financial year2	Number of investigations and reviews completed	Number of overpayments established	Value of overpayments ($)
2006/2007	39,141	7,084	41,935,634
2007/2008	26,736	4,407	33,702,275
2008/2009	26,400	3,327	33,780,453
2009/2010	19,935	2,996	39,336,133
2010/2011	16,266	2,424	39,838,760

table IS.2: Fraud prosecutions completed

Financial year1	Number of prosecution cases of benefit fraud completed
2007/2008	1,028
2008/2009	735
2009/2010	789
2010/2011	690

Quote of the day

From Walter Williams here:

"One does not have to be in favor of death camps or wars of conquest to be a tyrant. The only requirement is that one has to believe in the primacy of the state over individual rights."

"ACT brand has been irredeemably damaged"

I am not a fan of Richard Long. In today's Dominion Post he writes as if an expert on ACT's history but can't get the ex-president's name right. However, the title of his column is wholly correct in my humble opinion.

Former ACT president Catherine Isaacs took the political gold at the weekend for making a sensible, coherent case for charter schools. But, alas, it is all too late to save her party.

More

Unpalatable choices in public health provision

A disturbing example of the difficult choices that will increasingly face public health rationers.

From Scotland:

A GOVERNMENT adviser and leading surgeon has suggested that NHS funds would be better spent on providing surgery for morbidly obese patients than on palliative care for the terminally ill.

More

Truth Column July 26

My July 26 Truth column is now on-line.

Every day across New Zealand thousands of heroin addicts are given legitimate doses of a heroin substitute – methadone – by their local pharmacist.

While the programme purports to wean people off with reducing doses, more often it’s a maintenance scheme which keeps the addict  stabilised, functioning and free from crime. 

This is a prime example of harm minimisation in practice. It represents an acceptance that people either want or need to use recreational drugs and making criminals out of certain users only creates additional harm.

Contrast this approach with the recent news that police have arrested over 2500 people in cannabis operations over the past six months. 

More


Other Truth columns here

Does Sam win ... yes she does!

Erin Simpson Show Next Fashion Icon

 

Sam  was the winner of a trip to the NZ Fashion Weekend in late September. I watched the show on Friday heart in mouth despite knowing the outcome (she arrived back at Wellington airport with a beautiful bunch of flowers). She was thoroughly surprised when the judges said her name, and suitably humble I am happy to report. Her model was also a Year 9 girl, but 5' 11" and in (ginormous!) heels and they look adorable together - very much the long and the short of it.

The On Demand replay is here

And, from Sam, thanks so much to all of those people who voted her into the Top 25. You made it possible.

Remand population grows significantly

I wouldn't agree with Kim Workman's philosophical approach to crime and related matters but his statistical stuff is sound. Yesterday he delivered a submission to the Law and Order  select committee containing the following:

“In the last ten years, the sentenced prisoner population increased by 33.7%, while the remand population increased by 116%.” Said Mr Workman, “Around 56 percent of those remanded in custody did not go on to serve a custodial sentence. We remand offenders in custody at a rate higher than other comparable countries, with the exception of the United States.
“Maori defendants are nearly twice as likely as their European counterparts to be remanded in custody. The unanswered question is whether this discrepancy occurs because of differential offending patterns by Maori, a lack of cultural responsiveness, or the negative impact of laws, structures, processes and decision making criteria. There has been no in-depth research on this issue since 1973, and it is a matter of urgency.”

Following the link to his full submission was unsuccessful but it did take me to Rethinking's website. My first visit. It's a well designed site. Just a quick excerpt which describes Maori offending in a way I haven't seen before;

 At every stage in the criminal justice process, the outcomes for Māori are generally more severe than they are for Pakeha. Māori are less likely to receive diversion or cautions and are more likely to be sentenced to prison. Although New Zealand's imprisonment rate is 199 people per 100,000, the rate for Māori is closer to 700 per 100,000. Māori make up over 50% of New Zealand's prison population and over 60% of its female prison population.

Asset Sale poll

All I hear from commentators, politicians, the media etc is the majority of New Zealanders are against the asset sales. How do they know? This NewstalkZB poll doesn't bear out the claim.

Do you support the Government's asset sales legislation?

• Yes 50 %
• No 47 %
• Unsure 3 %

Truth Column Friday July 19

My Truth column for July 19 is now on-line:

A local bus stop was recently tagged with ‘Aoteoroa is not for sale’. I was tempted to sneak out in the dead of night and add, ‘No more house sales to immigrants’ beneath.

Because that is the implication and most would find the idea abhorrent. 

Now we have, ‘No asset sales’ which is equally sweeping, superficial and emotive.  The reality is the NZ government is carrying huge overseas debt and it needs to pay some down. If it doesn’t, its future ability to borrow to fund everyday, vital services could be endangered. 

We are all watching the situations unfolding in various European countries, which are either bankrupt or verging on it. That poses the question: Would New Zealanders prefer austerity over asset sales?

Read more


Other Truth columns here

Dads matter - an understatement

Rodney's Herald on Sunday column today is about his Dad and how important our Dads are. How they guide us and set an example. I am also blessed to have one such Dad. And I can bring to mind two people who lost their Dads in the past year who felt exactly like Rodney and I about them. Good men themselves.

Then I had lunch with a friend just returned from where her father lives who didn't even visit him. Can't abide him and was forced to explain to the aunties why. Because he violently abused her mother and siblings and she will not forgive him. Never. And without him she'd gone badly off the rails as a youngster (not that she ever seems to particularly rue her 'colourful' past.)

Last week Sam took a photo of her Dad and me as part of a social studies project. It's something to do with photos of everyday things that matter - a favourite meal for instance - to send to a school in another country. I wondered out loud how many of her fellow pupils would be able to send a photo of their Mum and Dad together. She in turn identified out loud which friends could. About half. I told her how when I was her age I didn't know anyone, not a friend, not a neighbourhood kid, who didn't live with both parents. Bar one whose mother had died.

Isn't that a phenomenally rapid  social change. One generation. And we know the downsides. The wealthier kids materially weather the upheaval  better but that's about it. And I'm not condemning people who split. Intolerably unhappy relationships should be abandoned. But the widespread nature of breakdown goes far beyond what should naturally occur. Or what would naturally occur without government interference.

Getting around the DPB work-test rules

The table below shows that most grants of a DPB are to people transferring within the system or who have been on welfare previously - 71 percent to be precise. I asked the Minister under the Official Information Act:

1/ In 2011 how many second-time or subsequent grants for the DPB were to a caregiver with more than one dependent child; a youngest child under 12 months old and who had been off benefit for between 12 - 48 months? Their answer:

The point of my question? I am trying to ascertain how many people will qualify for a further 5 years of welfare before work-testing because they had a subsequent child off welfare. 437 is a starting figure.

Not included in this figure is for instance someone who left under 12 months ago and returned with a newborn.

The Ministry also qualified my 'off benefit' as 'off DPB-related' which also narrows the field.

The point is, as it stands, as long as a baby isn't added to a benefit the caregiver won't be work-tested until the baby is 5. Some people are clever. They have already forced the Ministry to pay the DPB to both parents if the parents split custody of their children. So there are two benefits to play around with when considering which one to 'add' a subsequent child to.

As in any group of people, there are those who will abide by the rules because they are honest and well-motivated, and that includes people on welfare. But there are others who will play the system for all it's worth. Ironically those are the very people these new rules are supposed to positively influence.






table DP.3: Periods since clients last received any main benefit

Period since client last received any main benefit	2006/2007	2007/2008	2008/2009	2009/2010	2010/2011
	Domestic Purposes Benefits granted to working-age clients1
None (clients transferring within the benefit system)2	9,447	10,035	10,654	11,416	11,071
Under 12 months	9,900	10,567	10,876	9,683	9,963
1–2 years	3,289	3,938	4,483	3,656	3,198
2–4 years	3,061	3,393	4,365	4,201	3,307
Had not received a main benefit in the previous 4 years	7,774	8,561	11,433	11,660	10,533
Total granted to working-age clients	33,471	36,494	41,811	40,616	38,072
	Domestic Purposes Benefits granted to other clients1
Total granted to other clients	940	1,054	1,100	942	799
	Total Domestic Purposes Benefits granted1
Total	34,411	37,548	42,911	41,558	38,871

Forget "fair" and focus on the fiscal restraint

David Shearer says that Mondayisation of public holidays and longer Paid Parental Leave are "fair to families".

But these bills aren't fair to employers and most taxpayers. They are both an additional cost on the economy. And the timing is bloody awful.

Leaves me in no doubt that National was the better governing party to weather a protracted recession. That's not to say they couldn't do  better.

The passage of these bills would indicate that New Zealanders are no better than other head-in-the-sand Europeans.

Two coroner's reports

The NewstalkZB 9 o'clock news (Wellington - not the Network because I have checked the replay) reported that Gary Evans found Macsyna King "had no involvement in the death of her twins."

Contrast that to a coroner's report last week that found two good Samaritans had contributed to the death of Iraena Asher.

I am going on media hearsay but these findings seem utterly incongruous.

Using a benefit as camouflage

Here's a perfect example of people using a benefit as camouflage (albeit not a very successful one). I mean they surely didn't need the money.

Three solo mothers, one of whom is known locally as "the queen of green" and is seven months pregnant, have been sent to prison for a cannabis operation that netted them up to $340,000 in four months last year for selling "tinnies" from a state house in Napier.
A "tinny" is a small tinfoil-wrapped package containing between 0.6 and 1.2 grams of cannabis, which sells for about $20.
Business was so good during the four months that they sold a $20 tinny every minute and the number of customers so great that their cars would clog up the street...... The four offenders, who are all beneficiaries, appeared for sentencing before Judge Tony Adeane in Napier District Court last week.

Truth column July 13

My Truth column for July 13 is now on-line.  

Some people on the dole fail drug-tests and subsequently miss out on a job. So they stay on welfare. Is that OK?  The current government doesn’t think so. That’s why new legislation proposes sanctions – a reduction in benefit – when it happens. 


The legislation does not propose drug-testing all beneficiaries as a condition of eligibility for ongoing support. That’s jungle drum stuff. There’s another problem with benefits and substance abuse though.

Read more

Other Truth columns here