Green/Maori Accord

Back in February I blogged the reasons why a Maori/Green Accord is a distinct possibility.

Today's Green conference has brought more talk about such a possibility.

The Greens and the Maori Party holding the balance of power after the next election would be a very dangerous situation for New Zealand to find itself in.

Political cross-dresser

How quickly a leopard can change its spots. Reason describes the new Mayor of London's transformation from libertarian to authoritarian. Fascinating piece. Populism is so seductive.

Art and schools

To give you an idea of how schools utilise technology while still learning hands on creative skills have a look at this. I am amazed at the variety of drawings that came out of the 20-odd children I worked with yesterday. They each had a copy of a photo of an afghani child (I had already drawn in pastel so was familiar with the subject). I demonstrated how I would tackle the subject using oil pastels and they followed. It was a real pleasure. The children are aged 9-10.

Who is he kidding?

Some lawyers really do lay it on thick. A brutish, callous 19 year-old was yesterday jailed for two years after his vicious attack, caught on camera, on a 17 year-old. The defence counsel says, as the offender heads off to prison, the turning point in his client's life would be when he got out of prison and had to take responsibility for his young partner and their expected child.

What??? He should be nowhere near a child. Hopefully his 'partner' will run a mile. But I've known silly girls who romanticise and mope after their incarcerated love objects. Parting is such sweet sorrow....

Give me a break. Likely the judge had similar thoughts running through his head. His parting comment to this individual was, "For what it's worth, I do not think you could care for a guinea pig."

Let's hope someone from care and protection services was paying attention.

Front page but it's not news

The following appears on the front page of the Dominion Post. It's not news - not in sense that news implies something 'new'.

Dr Van Herck, who is originally from Belgium and has been working in New Zealand for 2½ years, said many able-bodied sickness beneficiaries should be on the unemployment benefit instead.

"A lot of people on sickness benefits say Work and Income staff have sent them and just expect you to sign the form."

He had seen one woman who had been on a sickness benefit for 19 years because of asthma but smoked a packet of cigarettes a day. Work and Income had offered her several quit programmes. "She admitted she was too lazy to go."

Another sickness beneficiary's documented reason for not working was they "could not be bothered".

He signed off both beneficiaries but wrote on their forms that they needed follow-up and reassessment.

On the day he saw the asthma sufferer, he also saw a man whose leg had been amputated above the knee and who worked full-time, despite pain. Another woman continued to work after a stroke.

"They are paying taxes to sustain somebody with asthma smoking a packet of cigarettes a day. Many GPs have complained; it becomes a culture of handouts."

What it is going to take to break this culture? First there has to be a consensus that 'bludging' just isn't acceptable. Until that happens isolated individuals will struggle to stand up to the intimidation or sheer persistence. Alongside the culture of handouts is the culture of making excuses for people. The opposite doesn't demand that we stomp all over people punitively. What it requires is more people showing, teaching and expecting aspiration and ambition.

Sometimes those people just aren't available in the lives of beneficiaries. But they exist in the community. And I have seen the difference 'mentoring' relationships can make.

Then I have also seen the resistance of people to any effort to help and encourage them. In which case we need to relearn a culture of just saying 'NO'.

Questions

National's Simon Power is playing to the law and order buffs. I should know, being one. Here he highlights how many people on home detention are absconding.

Mr Power said the Government had put its obsession with reducing the number of prison inmates ahead of public safety.

Obsession? If Labour is obsessed the statistics don't reflect it.


The graph above groups the sentenced prisoner population according to current eligibility for discretionary release (either on parole or home detention). Prisoners in the category “no discretion for release” include those whose sentence does not allow early release on parole or home detention, as well as those who are eligible but have yet to pass their parole eligibility date. “Discretionary release eligible” refers to those who have passed their parole eligibility date or home detention eligibility date but have yet to be released or have been granted leave to apply for front end home detention but have yet to be released.

The data reflects the influence of parole laws introduced in 2002, which meant that parole eligibility occurred earlier in the sentences of longer-term prisoners. However, this has not meant that prisoners have been released earlier. Instead, the number of sentenced prisoners currently eligible for release, but who have yet to be granted release by the Parole Board, exceeds the number who are not eligible for release.


As it stands 48 out of 2,500 home detainees absconded. My point is, if National says it can do better, then they are saying they will eliminate all the risk. That would entail keeping all 2,500 home detainees in prison.

So will they be making a commitment to abolishing home detention and building prison capacity? What exactly is it that National are going to do better than Labour?

Maori Party and Poverty Elimination

Has the Maori Party poverty elimination policy been costed???

My goodness. This (I notice it is not co-issued by Tariana Turia AND Pita Sharples which is usually the case) puts the Maori Party to the left of the Greens.

The Maori Party says:

* Provide a universal benefit for parents raising children. If families are already well off, recoup the benefit from tax on higher incomes. (Universal benefits reach the neediest families most effectively.)

* Set a baseline for poverty at 60% of the average wage, and a deadline of 2020 to eliminate child poverty.

* Exempt the first $25,000 of income from tax.

* Raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour.

* Remove GST from food. (The government says this would make the tax system too complex, but that argument hasn't stopped them granting all sorts of exemptions from the Emissions Trading Scheme.)

* Investigate other sources of revenue - capital gains tax, bank transaction tax.

I will attempt some VERY crude costings and please feel free to put me right if I err.

1/ A universal benefit for parents. Which parent? How much? In 2006 there were 515,000 families with dependent children. A modest universal benefit of $20 per week would cost $536 million. But why should a parent with one child receive the same as a parent with 5? The old family benefit (scrapped in the early 90s) used to be paid per child. In which case it would cost over $1 billion.

2/ Set a baseline for poverty at 60 percent of the average wage. The average income from wages or salary was $893 a week in June 2007. So at 60 percent every family head (employed or otherwise) would receive $536 a week. That's around double the current benefit rate. With roughly 114,000 parents on a benefit, instead of $1.5 billion the welfare bill would be $3 billion (and that doesn't include family support and accommodation supplement.)

3/ Exempt the first $25,000 from income tax. That would cost (very roughly) about $11 billion.

4/ Raise the minimum wage to $15. (Cost to business about $1.2 billion)

5/ Remove gst from food. $2.4 billion (DPF figures)

That's $15.9 billion. To be raised from incomes and income over $25,000. That's about 1 million workers paying an extra $15,900 a head in tax.....

...or whatever effort and wealth-creation tax the Maori Party prefers.

When they have driven all the workers away they won't have to worry about divvying up the pie any more. There won't be one.

Having talked this through with my own 'economic adviser' he wonders whether this isn't a cultural policy designed to return NZ to the economic approach that prevailed before colonisation.

Still missing the point

Today's Dominion Post editorial is about the Kahui twins and the Kahui family. It runs through the all too familiar list of high-profile child murders and concludes;

Many of their cases have common features: alcohol and drug abuse, lifestyles fuelled by crime and benefits, mothers with children to different fathers, delays in seeking medical help and a refusal to cooperate with police once a crime has been discovered. Many, too, occurred within Maori families.

Maori are not alone in abusing their children. Every culture has its dirty secrets, but there is no escaping the fact that Maori children are disproportionately represented among the victims.

Maori Party co-leader Pita Sharples says this is because Maori are over-represented in poverty-stricken and under-achieving communities.

He may be right, but that is an explanation, not a solution. The killing will not stop till relatives and neighbours of mistreated children recognise that they owe their loyalty to society's most vulnerable members, not to those who abuse them.

Again this misses the hub of the matter. Again we are seeing the responsibility shifted to people other than the mother and father. The killing will not stop until those individuals bringing babies into the world make a commitment to them. But too often they are too young themselves; too consumed with having a good time whether that's getting on the piss, partying, taking off to play the pokies, smoking P. It's all about escaping life and responsibility. What is the reward for behaving any differently? Loneliness (a baby isn't much company), ostracism (you can't hold your piss) hostility (you're a nark).

It is no good appealing to the cuzzies when it is quite likely they are the source of malevolent 'peer pressure'. Where the whanau is any good the babies have long gone usually to grandma.

It takes an incredibly strong individual to raise a child well in this sort of environment and the fact is there just aren't that many to be found. Lifestyle welfare has created a feckless and inhospitable setting for children. Caring 'relatives and neighbours' can't compete with it.

What would they fight about?

This is a quote from Judy Kirk addressing the National Party northern regional conference on the matter of the EFA,

I don't think it's a damned good idea, Mike Williams; I think it stinks and I think you and your party should be ashamed of yourselves and what you have done to this democracy. You're not prepared to fight with us on ideas. You'd rather break all conventions and ram through anti-democratic legislation. Well you will fail.

Can you guess which part of the quote had me choking?

You're not prepared to fight with us on ideas.

Just which ideas would they find to fight over?

- That the purpose of government is to equalise people's incomes and outcomes?

- That the purpose of government is to use taxpayer's money to do what the private sector can and should do?

- That the purpose of government is to usurp private property rights when it suits?

- That the purpose of government is to intervene in the social and moral spheres of New Zealander's lives when it sees fit?

Now those debates would be worth hearing. But they could never occur between National and Labour whose prescription for government is the same.

What Cindy Kiro really thinks

The New Zealand Herald reports on a survey commissioned by Family First about behaviour and attitudes to smacking since the passage of the anti-smacking legislation;

Children's Commissioner Cindy Kiro said yesterday that she had not seen the survey.

But she urged people to move on and learn better parenting skills.

"The key message is, 'For goodness sake, can't we move on?' So much energy has been wasted debating this."

That's an interesting attitude in itself. Very. It reveals that the Children's Commissioner does not care for discussion or debate when it comes to what she wants to do. To those of us who would put up objections, the key message is actually, "you are wasting your energy". Presumably we will be wasting our energy opposing any other of her initiatives like mandatory screening of every baby's home life.

The Office for the Children's Commissioner should be disbanded. It is partisan, it is authoritarian. And worse still, of the matters that it seeks to control, which has improved since its inception? The number of established child abuse cases? Bullying in schools? Youth violence? Adolescent pregnancy?

The only real success the office has achieved is in rubbing good parents up the wrong way while spending their money touring the world promoting New Zealand as some sort of world beater. How ironic.

As the Commissioner is so very fond of 'sending messages' here is mine; I will decide what is and isn't a waste of my energy. I am not here to roll over at your behest.

NZ doesn't fit the mould

Apparently the US has a small welfare state because a majority of Americans believe that work is a determinant of success.

From the NCPA;

Capitalism, when combined with a relatively small government, is a well-established ticket to improved standards of living. However, many countries continue to oppose capitalism. The resistance of many countries to adopt capitalist economic systems has puzzled economists for decades, says Kevin A. Hassett, a senior fellow and the director of economic policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute.

In a recent study, economists Alberto Alesina, Edward Glaeser and Bruce Sacerdote found that pre-existing social attitudes toward luck may be the crucial determinant of the political path of a society. The authors uncovered a striking difference between American and European attitudes towards the poor:

* If you ask Americans whether they believe the poor are lazy, 60 percent agree.
* However, if you ask Europeans, only 26 percent say yes.

Historically, large welfare states have emerged in countries where citizens generally believe that luck determines income. According to the authors:

* If bad behavior (or laziness) is viewed as a source of poverty, then the welfare state is small.
* America has avoided the fate of Europe because its citizens disproportionately believe that luck is not that important a determinant of one's circumstances, but hard work is.
* If Americans are predisposed to believe that high incomes are generally merited, then they will be resistant to change.
* However, when capitalists succeed because of bribery and corruption, citizens become less convinced that the income distribution reflects merit, and are more willing to redistribute.

It takes more than luck to maintain a free society. If America is to avoid acquiring a welfare state the size of Europe's, the rule of law must be vigorously defended and the corrupt must be adequately punished, says Hassett.

But a recent NZ study found an even larger number of Kiwis blamed being poor on being lazy. A whopping 73 percent.

Yet New Zealand has become a large welfare state. The best reason I can come up with is that for decades now NZ has been 'ruled' by minority opinion. The special pleaders and anti-capitalists are running the show. The lobbyists are powerful and our parliament is not representative of how many New Zealanders feel about work and welfare. And political correctness has made people afraid to challenge the status quo.

Not the whole story

Susan St John, champion of welfare for children, telling us half the story,

Child Poverty Action Group economist Susan St John said the Budget made no effort to make it easier for beneficiaries to work by lifting the $80 a week limit on income they can earn before the benefit is reduced - a limit that had not changed for 22 years.

Limits for earned income have changed for those on the dole (who might also have dependent children.)

Until 1996 an unemployed person could receive the maximum benefit and earn NZ$50 (or $60 for beneficiaries with dependent children) a week before the benefit was abated. Under current arrangements an unemployed person can earn an income of $80 a week before the benefit is abated.

And although the $80 limit wasn't changed, for those on the DPB and WB, the amount of benefit lost between $81 and 180 was reduced from 70% to 30% for those with a youngest child over 14 in 2003. From the MSD press release,

This change to a social development approach is supported by the introduction of a new single abatement rate for DPB/WB clients allowing them to keep a greater proportion of any income they receive while on the benefit.

DPB/WB clients will be able to earn up to $80 a week on top of their benefit with no affect on their main benefit, and income between $80 and $180 reduces the benefit by 30 cents for every dollar received and by 70 cents for every dollar received over $180.

There are increases coming in the family support for beneficiaries with children. Family support is becoming a really big ticket item of government expenditure.

These are the figures from 2003-09 (actual to forecast)

$862 833 846 1,285 1,699 2,081 2,132

So as usual the CPAG are ignoring increases in assistance in order to strengthen their case for greater redistribution. Sadly it's what you come to expect from beneficiary advocacy groups.

Give parents and pupils choice

Flat tax and anti-smacking legislation

Sir Bob Jones was on Good Morning TV yesterday talking about tax, the Douglas era and how Roger's reforms were 'radical' in comparison to what was happening in the rest of the world. The Muldoon era of daylight robbery is discussed (actually 'discussed' isn't right - Bob thankfully does all the talking), the Laffer Curve effect, what's happening in Slovakia with their flat 10 percent tax, and why we should be following suit. It starts at 1:45.

(If you enjoyed Bob stay tuned for an announcement about my campaign launch where he will be guest speaker)

Then stick with the Good Morning (it soon won't be) and watch Beth Wood (Save the Children) and Ian Hassell (ex Children's Commissioner) argue with Bob McCoskrie (Family First) about the anti-smacking legislation. Quite teeth gritting stuff with the presenter clearly biased towards the proponents. This starts at 2:05.

Churches refuse to register as third parties

Thanks to a religious group getting involved in the 2005 election we are now lumbered with the ludicrous and unfathomable Electoral Finance Act.

Now more religious groups want to get involved in the 2008 campaign and are claiming the EFA does not apply to them and they will not be registering as a third party.

The churches are distributing 50,000 copies of the first of five leaflets, on child poverty, coinciding with the Budget this week.

Methodist Church president Brian Turner said the Electoral Commission recommended that they should "err on the side of caution" and register as third parties under the new Electoral Finance Act. But they decided not to.

"We don't see it as electioneering or promoting any particular party against others, so we didn't see the need to register," he said.

The same churches made it clear just weeks ago they want benefit levels raised. They are in the same camp as the CPAG who are backed in their legal action against the government by the Greens and the Maori Party.

The leaflets and 2500 posters are being sent this week to Anglican, Baptist, Catholic, Methodist, Presbyterian and Salvation Army churches under the auspices of their umbrella group, the Council of Christian Social Services.

The Council of Christian Social Services is very political. They make submissions to the Social Services Select Committee and they are traditionally left-wing.

I hope that the Electoral Commission is very fair-handed in administering this Act - if that is possible. But somehow I cannot imagine the churches being prosecuted. It makes me very unhappy to have to urge the application of rules with which I don't agree but then again the rules were supposed to bring about a level playing field and the churches should not be above them.

Not stacking up

I am a little perturbed by this front page story from today's DomPost.

Pacific Islanders' crime rates, poor education and low employment are creating an underclass and a drain on the economy, a study says.

Issued last week, the document says Polynesians are less productive and less likely to contribute to economic growth. They have the highest unemployment in every age group....

Not according to the Household Labour Force Survey. Maori have slightly higher rates.

Polynesians are over-represented in crime statistics and have higher rates of convictions and prosecutions.

Assuming Polynesians continues to mean Pacific Islanders, their crime rates are not especially high. In fact the article later disputes this saying,

Statistics NZ crime figures show Pacific Islanders made up 9100 of 112,774 people convicted in 2006 - just over 8 per cent.

8 percent is pretty much in keeping with their share of the population remembering that they are a young population and the age group that most commits crime is around 18-25.

Yes. Pacific rates of imprisonment are higher than European but considerably lower than Maori.



They are more likely to need Government assistance for housing and income.

More likely than who? Of those working age New Zealanders currently receiving a benefit 7.6 are Pacific. Again in keeping with their proportion of the overall population. (Maori on the other hand make-up 31.5 percent).

I would be the first to defend a researchers right to publish an ethnicity study without being subjectively attacked but on the basis of what has been reported I can understand why Pacific communities are angry about the focus on their people as producing an underclass.

AND, as with Maori, it must always be appreciated that many Pacific people are doing jobs that, although not well paid, are crucial to the functioning of our institutions.

UPDATE: Having listened to an interview with the study author I understand that the research is about different immigrant groups and their contribution to economic growth. But now I am even more concerned because the statistics are about ALL PI people, 60 percent of whom are not immigrants. He clearly believes that PI people are a drain and will become a bigger drain on social welfare but when asked specifically about those figures couldn't respond. His conclusion is that more PI immigrants should not be encouraged until the problems are sorted. They shouldn't be taking jobs off other low skilled people like Maori.

Why not? If they are more willing, if they have a work ethic, why not welcome them?

Serving up red herrings and victimhood for breakfast

Not unusually I can hear my husband loudly remarking "Silly b----h," at the TV.

I know in a minute he will put his head around the door and tell me about the latest display of mammoth intelligence from some hand-wringer.

"What's that about?" I enquire not lifting my eyes from the keyboard.

"Oh the silly b----h says that it's the fault of the liquor industry that so many more women are drinking and driving. Apparently it's because they have been targeting young women with alcopop thingies. Marketing is to blame. "

"Well you know," I respond,"That these women advocates will never have a bad word said against females. It couldn't possibly be their fault that they are drinking and driving. It's got to be consumerism or capitalism or any damn thing but the individual."

The truth is people drink and drive because of a widespread culture of irresponsibility. Period.

Can you help?

My son is doing a social studies project to gain some NCEA credits. It involves a 6 question survey aimed at people who will be directly affected by the Emmissions Trading Scheme. If you could assist by answering his questionnaire could you e-mail him at

mitchellr@athena-college.co.nz

I know he would be very grateful.

Vision versus reality

Labour's vision for state housing was as per the poster,



The reality was described thus,

Interviewer:Even as late as 1958 when Les Baily was seconded by the Department of Education to begin organising recreational activities for the children of the Hutt Valley, conditions and attitudes had not greatly changed.

Les Bailey:I was looking around that area, I always felt sorry for them in some ways with the predominance of state housing that was put into the district. All you saw was bare lawns, there wasn't a tree growing anywhere, no shrubs, no gardens, no places where kids could play freely, you know? — and there certainly was a lack of playground space. It wasn't a very attractive area at that time.

Sure they had the riverbank, the riverbank in those days wasn't the playing fields that are all there now, there weren't the stop banks in and so on.

Interviewer: This is the Hutt River?

Les Bailey: The Hutt River, yeah, and there was a lot of these pretty scrubby sort of areas down there and I imagine that perhaps that is where some of the Mazengarb report activities — as reported by them — took place.


And today those areas are even worse, particularly the 'shopping centres' (euphemism for takeaway shop, more takeaway shops, second hand shops selling over-priced junk, Credit Union, Housing NZ and Work and Income Offices). And the government is still forking out,

State house tenants say the sooner the Government starts insulating their homes, the better.

This week's Budget will include $53 million to make all state houses warmer and dryer within five years.

Peter Petterson has been in his state house in the Lower Hutt suburb of Taita for 30 years and says the upgrade is much needed.

"They are cold, you've got to use heaters. Some of the older people stick on some more clothes and blankets."

Mr Petterson says it is a shame the upgrade is happening after his children have grown up and moved out, but at least his grandchildren will benefit when they come to stay.


Labour's vision under Mickey Savage was never realised. All that happened was people were made dependent, robbed of their initiative and ambition, made poor, and frequently bitter and resentful. And still the socialists press on.....

What real commitment looks like

At last, a real plan to regain New Zealand's economic standing in the developed world. According to Radio New Zealand,

The ACT Party says slashing the number of MPs and offloading state businesses, would lift economic growth and leave the average New Zealander $500 per week better off.

They're part of 20 pledges that party leader Rodney Hide is promising to carry out, if ACT holds the balance of power after the 2008 general election.

Mr Hide is also committed to flattening tax rates, cutting state spending and remodelling climate change policies.

Mr Hide says the plans would help lift New Zealand from being poorer than the lowest ranked states in Australia and the United States; Tasmania and Mississippi.

He says the proposals would boost annual growth, by 5%.

The 20-point plan is here