Harawira - confirmed racist

Blair Mulholland hits the nail on the head. Hone Harawira is an utter creep and crank. If Maori and Pakeha are so repulsive to each other why has there been widespread inter-marriage? Like Blair I would be more than happy to have Maori (or Asian or Indian) grandchildren if one of my children found someone who was good for them. Yes there can be problems when cultures meet but people can and do work through those differences. Good Lord. This is the clearest evidence yet of how racist Harawira is. Let's hope there is greater enlightenment and tolerance amongst the rest of his party. Because Harawira represents the sort of bigotry that ultimately fuels wars.

No-one will be normal

From today's NCPA news digest (highly recommended for subscription)

An updated edition of a mental health reference for doctors may include diagnoses for "disorders" such as toddler tantrums and binge eating, and could mean that soon no one will be classed as normal, says Reuters.

Leading mental health experts warn that the new edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), which is being revised now for publication in 2013 by the American Psychiatric Association (APA), could devalue the seriousness of mental illness and label almost everyone as having some kind of disorder. Citing examples of new additions like "mild anxiety depression," "psychosis risk syndrome," and "temper dysregulation disorder," they said many people previously seen as perfectly healthy could be told they are ill.

According to Wykes and colleagues Felicity Callard, also of Kings' Institute of Psychiatry, and Nick Craddock of Cardiff University's department of psychological medicine and neurology, many in the psychiatric community are worried that the further the guidelines are expanded, the more likely it will become that nobody will be classed as normal anymore:

* Technically, with the classification of so many new disorders, we will all have disorders.
* This may lead to the belief that many more of us "need" drugs to treat our "conditions," and many of these drugs will have unpleasant or dangerous side effects.
* The "psychosis risk syndrome" diagnosis is particularly worrying, since it could falsely label young people who may only have a small risk of developing an illness.


I suspect that this development is, in fact, further widening and is part of an ongoing process.

This may lead to the belief that many more of us "need" drugs...

...or benefits.

Which is exactly what is happening. With psychiatric and psychological conditions the fastest growing category for qualification for disability benefits in this country. A trend which is probably mirrored internationally.

Stopping work many be the worst course of action for someone suffering a mild disorder. At least (and at last) there seems to be a growing concern about this amongst health professionals.

Bits and bobs and bulbs

And the Lord said "Let there be light," and the energy-saving lightbulb manufacturer said, " All in good time". God I hate these bloody things. I rise early and in the dark. This morning I slipped in a pile of chunder left by one or other of my obliging animals. Cursing I reach for the light switch to inspect the damage and begin the clean-up and I can barely see what I am doing. This is not progress. It is literally a step back to the dark ages.

And spell-checkers aren't much better. Why doesn't it recognise "chunder"? And have they been programmed by near-illiterates? Their offerings when I hit the wrong keys rarely include the word I actually want. And on that subject I frequently hit the wrong keys because the white letters on my black keyboard have nearly all disappeared with use. So perhaps some solace after all. When the lights won't come on it doesn't really matter because the letters are invisible anyway.

Why is it that it often takes an insane person to say the sanest thing? Labour can't win the next election under Phi Goff. Phil Goff is nice. But John Key does 'nice' better. Now if ACT had stayed out of government, someone like Rodney Hide would have been a much better foil for the Prime Mr Nice. ACT could have been ripping shreds off National instead of contributing to the economic malaise the government is prolonging.

So what is there of cheer in the literal gloom. Yesterday, remedial reading with a school child, we came across the word 'ecstasy'. Needless to say the young lady could not pronounce said word. After supplying the sound for her I asked, Do you know what it means? A drug, she answered. Correct I replied. No, not really. I laughed and said if you were in 'ecstasy' you would be very happy, very excited. That's what it means but there is a drug called ecstasy too. I suppose I will not be asked back if she goes home and tells her parents that I said if you took ecstasy it would make you very happy and very excited. Geeez. Now I am worried again.

But I did provide some happiness and excitement to one very young child visiting the Academy Galleries on Wednesday. I was sketching and the picture caught his fancy big time "Cut! Cut! Cut!" he exclaimed repeatedly. Indeed it was a "cut".

Another infant death and another out-pouring

I was working yesterday and when eventually got free to call, couldn't get through. Danny Watson, NewstalkZB, was putting two and two together and calling for an end to the "free money" that has created the dysfunction culminating in what was then another child assault.


Dear Danny

Yesterday you called for an end to "free money". People rang in and said "enough is enough". Now the assaulted baby is another infant death statistic. The outpouring yesterday was a replay of the outrage we heard after the death of Lillybing and too many others. After that particular case I got mobilised and started up a petition calling for a parliamentary review into the DPB. I wrote to every newspaper , advertised, called talkback, knocked on doors, as did many others. What happened? We collected 1400 signatures. A hugely disappointing result. Time and time again people wrote to me that they were having difficulty getting others to sign because everybody knew somebody - a friend or family member - on the benefit. Or that they supported the DPB system. Personally it was a very difficult time with a good deal of the opposition to my petition getting nasty via threats and public ridicule. I have continued to do what I can through articles, submissions to select committee, standing for parliament twice and working in the community with needy families. My point is this Dan;

There is not enough political support to stop the "free money" and all of the devastation it visits on children. You will find no support for ending or substantially reforming the DPB from the Maori Party , Labour, the Greens or even National. In fact, the formation of the unofficial Welfare Working Group comprising Sue Bradford, the Child Poverty Action Group, academics and the mainstream churches is gearing up to fight for the status quo, or even higher benefit levels. Your listeners seem to want the sort of change you were advocating yesterday yet at election time they vote for parties that refuse to form policies that would see an end to the cash for babies programme.

It doesn't have to be the way it is in NZ. The only other countries that have DPB-like benefits are England, Ireland and Australia. Elsewhere support is temporary and conditional. In the US teenage mothers must stay at school to be eligible for financial assistance and they must live at home or in an adult supervised setting. Their teenage birthrate, which is high like New Zealand's, has been falling steadily along with the abortion rate and dare I say it, their child abuse and general crime rates. They have a long way to go but at least they are going in the right direction.

Meantime our politicians are too afraid to grab the bit between their teeth and do something decisive despite many knowing that the level of child abuse and neglect New Zealand is experiencing has everything to do with incentivised and casualised child-bearing. Because the state will provide on an indefinite and no-questions- asked basis, mothers are abandoned by or get rid of the fathers of their babies, and are then latched onto by new males who want sex and a roof over their head with no obligation to be a breadwinner. They do not make wonderful step-fathers. It's just dreadful what we have let develop under the guise of a 'caring, compassionate' welfare state.

Sometimes your number is just up

Sometimes your number is just up. This morning, when I saw a photo of the student pilot killed near Feilding on Monday I remembered her as a woman I sat next to when I sat my Aviation Law paper a few weeks ago. Then I thought, but what would she be doing sitting an exam in Wellington? Read on to find she has recently being training in Wellington and lived in Waikanae. We only exchanged smiles, both focussed on exams. She was sitting navigation, evident from the map and instruments in use. My recollection of her is she looked about my age but was with a man who looked quite a bit older who waited in the visitor area during the exam. The first crash report told of a woman "about 50" so others also thought she was younger than 64. I thought when I heard the initial report, how many women "about 50" are aviation students flying around the Kapiti Coast/ Manawatu area? Can't be many. There aren't even that many female students full stop. We were the only two in that exam room....

I haven't been flying since I passed the biannual flight review mainly because during the school holidays I couldn't book the plane I wanted. For some reason most of the Cessna 152 fleet was out for maintenance. Perhaps as the organisation is orientated around being a commercial school for mainly international students term-time applies and holidays present the best opportunity for maintenance, required every 100 hours of flight time. But the two air crashes during that short space in time since have served to remind me that flying requires immense vigilance and diligence and every pilot wants to avoid that sick sensation of knowing there is terrain or another plane in close proximity but can't sight it. And even close to home, within landing distance of the runway, the danger can be elevated by higher density of traffic. RIP Pat Smallman and Jessica Neeson. They both had the aviation bug and died for it.

Getting sicker

Trends in proportion of the working-age population receiving Sickness Benefits at the end of June, between 2000 and 2010

31,944 in 2000 up to 58,465 in 2010 - an 83 percent increase.

Currently 41 percent of recipients have a psychiatric or psychological disorder. Looking back, in 1971 there around 6,000 people on a sickness benefit at any given time and "mental, psycho-neurotic and personality disorders" accounted for 10.3 percent of "disease suffered by the beneficiary."

Notwithstanding far more people were hospitalised (as opposed to being supported on a benefit) 30 or 40 years ago, incapacitating mental illness, or the diagnosis of it, is on the rise.

The next biggest category is musculo skeletal conditions at 15 percent.

Interestingly Maori are over-represented at 26.6 percent of all sickness beneficiaries whereas Pacific people make up only 6.3 percent - slightly under their share of the total population. I wonder if this is because when Pacific people are ill they rely more on family? They tend to have poorer health, with higher rates of diabetes and some cancers, so it would follow that more rely on sickness benefits than is the case. Their reliance on the invalid benefit is even lower at 5 percent of the total. Perhaps Pacific people keep working through illness. Whatever the reason the difference between Maori and Pacific always fascinates me because it shows that belonging to a low socio-economic community (where conditions can often cause or aggravate ill health) need not automatically lead to benefit dependence.

Well done and well said Stephen Joyce

Unusually I am pleased with the National Party and particularly Stephen Joyce. Instead of simply greasing the loudest squeaky wheel they are going to take an evidence-based approach to lowering the current blood-alcohol limit. For two years drivers involved in crashes will be tested to see if their reading is between .5 and .8. Good idea. But what Stephen Joyce says about overseas studies hits the nail on the head;

"They also tell you that if you didn't allow anyone to have any alcohol, you would save more lives, and if you actually didn't let anybody drive, it would save the lot."

The legislative balancing act between protecting lives and protecting freedom is constant. Protecting life, as counter-intuitive as it may sound, cannot top the list of priorities. If it did we would have no freedom to act or exercise our own judgement at all. All risk can never be removed but the further society attempts to move towards that unachievable goal, the less freedom individuals have.

Now if Joyce would just apply this understanding consistently he would be a very valuable and rare politician.

UN rapporteur - listen up

The indigenous rights special rapporteur from the UN is saying that the cause of the high rate of Maori incarceration is "the historical and ongoing denial of the human rights of Maori."

That is a view which I have more sympathy for than once was the case. But whatever the truth of it is, it is still a cop-out. And it undermines the chances of the situation improving by providing an extrinsic excuse for offending.

100 years ago NZ jails were not full of Maori. That came after urbanisation. It came after the alienation of males from the wider whanau. As James Belich has pointed out, in the 1800s there was a great deal of crime committed by colonial Pakeha men also alienated from their families through immigration. Having a family both relying on them and caring for them is the best protector from offending.

So I wonder if James Anaya would entertain the idea that Maori women have a great deal to do with the high rate of Maori incarceration? Because Maori women have supplanted a large number of Maori men as the head of their families. That's not to say it isn't a two-way street. Many of the men bring the alienation upon themselves by feckless and unsociable behaviour.

This then is where the state has played a damning role by supporting the alienation of Maori men from whanau. It does this through the benefit system and through the legal system (family court and CYF). The odds are stacked against too many a Maori boy from birth. Consider that;

1/ He will be raised on welfare in a workless household
2/ Most of the male role models he is exposed to are disaffected
3/ Most of the female role models he is exposed lack the capacity to 'mother' in the full sense of the word (which is possibly why so many Maori males have relationships with much older women - looking for the mother figure they never had.)
4/ He is stereotyped (rightly or wrongly) by Pakeha institutions
5/ He is failed by (or he fails - take your pick) the education system thus subjecting himself to a life of menial work which does not provide enough money to compete with the DPB.
6/ He will father children very young also subjecting himself to a life of penury being bled dry by the child support system.
7/ Crime becomes the only avenue through which he can make some real money and prove his machismo.
8/ He will grow up in an environment where going to prison is part of the wallpaper.

So forget the fading historic wrongs - land theft and racial exclusion. They are being, or have been righted. And I support that process in so much as the state should right its own wrong-doings.

What the rapporteur needs to get to grips with is that the state keeps Maori down with its benevolence-cloaked intervention. And he can add to the benefit and legal system drug prohibition, which takes a greater toll on Maori than any other ethnicity. There is no future for the group of Maori Mr Anaya claims to care about in furthering the role that the state plays in their lives; in appealing to more national and international state agencies to ensure their 'human rights' are upheld. That particular mode of action is what got many Maori into the position of 'extreme social and economic disadvantage' they now occupy. For instance it was radicalised Maori feminists who fought hard for the DPB in the name of human rights.

The Maori man has to understand that the state is not his friend. And neither is the UN.

Numbers on benefits up 7 percent

June 2010 benefit statistics have just been released;

At the end of June 2010, 112,000 working-age people (aged 18–64 years) were receiving a Domestic Purposes Benefit . Over the year to June 2010, the number of Domestic Purposes Benefit recipients increased by 7,000, or 7 percent .

At the end of June 2010, 85,000 working-age people (aged 18–64 years) were receiving an Invalid’s Benefit. Over the year to June 2010, the number of Invalid’s Benefit recipients increased by 1,000, or 1 percent.

At the end of June 2010, 58,000 working-age people (aged 18–64 years) were receiving a Sickness Benefit . Over the year to June 2010, the number of Sickness Benefit recipients increased by 4,000, or 8 percent .

At the end of June 2010, 62,000 working-age people (aged 18–64 years) were receiving an Unemployment Benefit . Over the year to June 2010, the number of recipients of an Unemployment Benefit increased by 11,000, or 22 percent .

At the end of June 2010, 333,000 working-age people (aged 18–64 years) were receiving a main benefit . Over the year to June 2010, the number of recipients of a main benefit increased by 23,000, or 7 percent .

The sickness and invalid totals are record June year highs, and the DPB number is the highest since around 1998. As I have said many times before the unemployment number will drop as the recession eases but the numbers on the other benefits will be much slower to reduce, if they reduce at all.

It's not ok to have a baby on a benefit

Media Release

23 PERCENT OF BABIES ON BENEFIT BY YEAR-END

Friday, July 23, 2010

Data released under the Official Information Act shows that by the end of December 2009 14,394 babies born that year were being supported by a main benefit. Welfare commentator Lindsay Mitchell said, "That represents around 23 percent of babies born in New Zealand last year, an increase on 2008 when the percentage was 21% and 2007 when it was 18%."

"The increase partly reflects the recession, with more males appearing as the primary caregiver, but even pre-recession the percentage never dropped below 18. "

"Ministry of Social Development research has shown repeatedly that the younger a child relies on welfare the lower the likelihood of them leaving it. So this recent increase is going to contribute significantly to long-term welfare dependence and long-term child poverty."

"Child poverty, which often leads to poor mental and physical health, and educational under- achievement, is nearly always framed as a problem for government to resolve, usually by increasing benefit payments. But why aren't questions asked about the high number of people having babies with no way of supporting them beyond using somebody else's money? While the unemployment associated with a recession may be beyond the individual's control, starting or adding to a family is not. Successive governments have poured money into changing attitudes towards smoking and domestic violence. Perhaps it is time for a campaign saying, it's not OK to have a baby on a benefit - something the Welfare Working Group could usefully explore."


Additional data;

Of the babies born in 2009 who were reliant on welfare by the end of that year,

*51 percent had a caregiver aged 16-24 years of age
*46 percent had a caregiver of Maori ethnicity; 30 percent had a caregiver of NZ European ethnicity
*82 percent had a female caregiver

What happened to the 'Death With Dignity' Bill?

After NZ First departed from parliament what happened to Peter Brown's Death With Dignity bill? Isn't it time for another party to draft a bill? Isn't this something ACT could usefully do? (As an aside I had a look at ACT's website to see if such a bill would fit with their philosophy or values and was surprised to find none described. And the 'Liberal' tag now gone, though it may have been gone for a while. But I remember reading about the most recent voluntary euthanasia debate in Rodney's autobiography and he was very sympathetic to the issue.)

Voluntary euthanasia is an issue for everybody and I couldn't agree more with the sentiments expressed by Dr John Pollock.

"I think an individual has the right to choose for himself how his life goes and how it ends. I don't think that it is fair or it is moral for somebody else to suggest that they know better and that they have the right to determine that you may not be helped to die."

...Under the current law, some terminally ill patients were left in the "most appallingly wretched states, sometimes akin to those who died of starvation in Nazi concentration camps", Dr Pollock said. "Ironically if we allowed a cat or a dog or a horse to reach such a condition we would be breaking the law and risking a prison sentence."

"I really do believe strongly that that we ought to have euthanasia and I think it's time to push. I would feel that the last few months of my life were worthwhile if I could stimulate a push to change this cruel law.

"The law won't be changed in time for me and the only way that I can legally end my life before it is due to end is suicide and that's the cruelty of it - not only suicide but suicide alone because if I top myself with my family present then I put them at risk and I think that's hideous. It's very cruel."

He said the law would give terminal patients the comfort of knowing help was available - if they needed it...

"I may not make use of it and that is a very important point to make ... just knowing it's there, just knowing it's a possibility is a huge comfort and relief."

Another three strikes absurdity

I have a friend whose father had a stroke. It changed his personality. He had been a proud, hard-working, stubborn and conservative man, gruff but good-hearted. After the stroke he would say and do things out-of-character. Come out with overtly racist comments in front of her children who were part-Maori. Other actions she wouldn't speak about. But he passed his days in a home gradually losing touch with reality. His death was, I think, a release for him and the family. I still have fond memories of him from my childhood. We shared a love of country music (an Emmy Lou Harris song was played at his funeral, I think Rose of Cimmaron) and he was more tolerant of me than his own children.

All of this runs through my mind this morning after reading about another 'three striker' being held at Rimutaka while he awaits trial for indecent assault after allegedly, "grabbing the breasts of a fellow resident at a Hutt Valley disabled people's home." He is 69 and suffers from dementia.

The real sadness is there is no-one who will take the man. Not even his family.

The absurdity is that if he re-offends he will end his life in prison. It won't be much use telling this man that if he doesn't want to incur two more strikes he better stop grabbing parts of women's anatomy.

We have an ageing population, life expectancies are increasing and, unfortunately, dementia is on the rise.

Psychiatrist Justin Barry-Walsh, who made submissions opposing the bill on behalf of Australian and New Zealand psychiatrists, said treating mental illness could be more effective at preventing crime than incarceration. "There is a modest but significant relationship between mental disorder and criminal offending. A number of people will be swept up by the legislation who would represent limited risk, at best, to society of serious violence."

(I suppose this produces the scenario whereby the judge exercises his compassion and does not apply the three strikes provision but the question remains over why a process that was purportedly about protecting the public from the very worst violent offenders is capturing seemingly pathetic cases).

National - scrap WFF or endorse Annette King

Simon Collins reports on the Working For Families evaluation which I blogged about Friday:

Labour's $1.5 billion Working for Families package has driven a net 1200 parents out of the paid workforce - achieving the opposite of its aim to "make work pay".

An evaluation by Inland Revenue and Social Development Ministry researchers has found the $60 a week in-work tax credit lured 8100 sole parents into paid work. But 9300 second-earners in two-parent families dropped out of work because higher tax credits let them stay home with the children.

But Labour social development shadow minister Annette King said yesterday the contrasting results were "two good outcomes".

"It enabled people [sole parents] on the benefit to go out and earn more and to reconnect with the workforce because it was worth their while," she said. "And if people [in couples] who were doing part-time work are now able to stay home with their families, that's a win too, because we have two groups that have different needs."

But what about the economy?

Labour maths: 2 GOOD OUTCOMES = LOST PRODUCTIVITY

Add to that the first "good outcome" has since been cancelled by the recession.

$1.5 billion is being spent to decrease productivity. Another good reason to classify WFF as welfare.

On the positive side, what this report does present is National with an opportunity to do what they should have on entering office. Scrap WFF.

Governments have never been able to 'top-up' wages without it having a negative impact on the labour market.

If National had the gumption and the long-term interests of NZ at heart they would promise to abolish this grand redistribution scheme and make the next election one about socialism versus individual effort and responsibility. Not National socialism versus Labour socialism. Many thousands of people are heartily sick of being denied a real choice.

MSD anticipating legislative changes?

The 2009 Statistical Report from MSD has just been posted on-line. It covers almost every conceivable statistic relating to benefits up to June 2009. Yes, it is already a year out-of-date. But as I scan through it I find myself getting confused. For instance it says (page 41);

How much additional income could beneficiaries receive before their benefits are affected?

In recent years, all clients receiving benefits could receive up to $80 per week (before tax) in other income before their benefit payments were affected.

This amount was raised to $100 per week (before tax) for clients receiving:
• an Invalid’s Benefit
• a Widow’s Benefit or a Domestic Purposes Benefit – Sole Parent,if they were paying for childcare.

But an increase from $80 to $100 was part of National's 2008 policy reported here on Stuff;

National will also increase the amount of money beneficiaries can earn without losing any of their benefit - from $80 to $100.

And signalled here in March this year at the MSD website;

Sole parents on DPB will be able to earn more before their benefit is affected. The abatement free threshold will increase from $80 to $100 per week and the part-time abatement threshold will increase from $180 to $200 per week.

The same applies to the invalid's benefit;

People on IB who choose to work part-time will be able to earn more before their benefit is affected. The abatement free threshold will increase from $80 to $100 per week and the part-time abatement threshold will increase from $180 to $200 so people can earn more before their benefit is affected. Personal income exemption guidelines have not changed.

These changes were still being submitted on in June, the Select Committee report is due 30 July 2010 and the final legislation hasn't been passed. So have Future Focus reforms already been implemented or has the report been prepared to be read post-legislative change? But it's a 2009 report.

What am I missing here?

National - what have they done in government?

Whaleoil has dragged my attention to this weekend's National Party conference and I confess to some quiet amusement at his antics. There will be a few raw nerves ready for the touching today. What it's all over, I am not quite sure but in-party politics is a very real and very dirty game.

But more generally it seems timely to reflect on what National has done since taking office;

WELFARE

Key promised the country he would not raise the qualification age for Super. Stupid mistake. Life expectancies have grown enormously yet the pension is universally available at the same age as it was in 1898.

Working age welfare. The Future Focus bill will make minor changes about work-testing DPB parents when their youngest is 6 and some people on the Sickness benefit. The first completely avoids the real problem. The long-term dependency of young mothers who enter the system as teenagers, predominantly Maori. The unemployed will have to reapply for the dole after 1 year but over 80 percent never reach one year and they should be monitored so closely a reapplication process should be redundant anyway.

Kept Working for Families which they railed loudly against in opposition.

Fell into subsidising jobs for the young. Never works long term.

Kept quiet about the large increase in student allowances as people went into study instead of jobs thereby transferring from the dole onto another benefit.

HEALTH

Pretty much status quo but have reined in spending with mixed success. Reducing home services to the elderly was fraught. Home services keep people out of homes where they will need even more subsidised care. And these cuts are high profile and stir up a lot of public sympathy. Tony Ryall has probably done the best out of all Ministers.

EDUCATION

National standards have been highly controversial. Yes, 20 percent of children are failing. So target those children. Not successful schools. Waste of time, energy and money. Seem driven by the right's hatred of teacher unions.

Kept student interest-free loans which they railed against loudly in opposition.

LAW AND ORDER

Trying to turn NZ into a 'soft' police state by increasing police discretion. Non reversal of the very unpopular anti smacking legislation. Introduction of on-the-spot DV orders, requiring DNA swabs from non-convicted people, three strikes which encompasses non-violent crimes, patch bans, looming alcohol clampdowns, upping war on P, stupid comments about the economic benefits of building prisons, car crushing, etc.

ENVIRONMENT

ETS - which they railed against loudly in opposition. This will be a very hard to handle election issue next year. Alienates their usual rural rock-solid voting base. Could lead to the formation of a new farmer's party which could have the effect on National that the Maori Party had on Labour. Stupidest action since in government.

Mining. If they actually get on and do it, one of my few ticks. But picking 'scared' places like Great Barrier was stupid and risks turning the public off the whole idea.

GENERAL ECONOMY

Small tax improvements soon to be cancelled by rise in GST.

So just a once over lightly but I think I have covered most of the things that the non-political joe-average notices.

God knows why they are riding so high in the who-would-you-vote-for-tomorrow polls. As always, I would love to know how many people would join me in the 'don't know ' group.

Working For Families evaluation

A Working For Families evaluation was published at the MSD website 2 days ago.

What does it cost?

The WFF changes affected 382,500 families with dependent children and cost an additional $1.5 billion in the year to March 2008 compared with the year to March 2004

What effect did it have on sole parent employment?

In the quarter ended June 2007, there were an estimated additional 8,100 sole parents engaged in some paid work as a result of the WFF changes, and increased numbers of sole parents were working 20 hours a week or more. Sole parents’ periods of benefit receipt were shorter and sole parents previously on benefit were staying off benefit longer. In 2007, two out of five sole parents who were not employed considered themselves available to work.

A more recent analysis suggests the economic downturn in 2009 has eroded most of this impact. The growth in Domestic Purposes Benefit numbers during the economic downturn was due both to an increase in grants and to a decrease in cancellations.
The growth in the number of grants is equally distributed between those who have not received a benefit in the previous four years and those who have.

What effect did it have on mothers (usually the 'second earner') in couple families?

Although not an objective of the reforms, the WFF changes gave couple parents greater choice about working and caring for their children by making it easier to manage on less income from the labour market. Families could reduce their hours of work or take lower paying jobs and have their income topped up by WFF Tax Credits payments. The WFF changes also reduced the net return from additional hours worked for those families whose payments were abating. Although there was no impact on the total hours second earners in couple families were in paid work, 9,300 fewer second earners in couple parent families were in paid employment in the quarter ended June 2007 due to the WFF changes.

What effect did it have on child poverty?

The percentage of children living in poverty, using a 60% measure relative to 2004, dropped by 8 percentage points due to WFF. Without the WFF package, New Zealand’s child poverty rate would have continued to climb from 2004, most likely reaching around 30% in 2008.

In the scheme of things it's a lot of money for arguable gain.

Another Mickey Mouse makeover for the NHS

Based on the information relayed by the Independent this new makeover for the NHS, the "sixth major reform of the service in 20 years", looks as likely to succeed as all the others. Essentially it is about shifting the management of the budget from 302 Primary Care Trusts (conceptually similar to NZ's PHOs) to groups of GPs, and allowing patients to register with any practice they like.

Why does it look unpromising?

Groups of GPs organised into consortia are to be given freedom and responsibility for buying care from local hospitals and other providers, including private organisations, in a major switch of purchasing power from central management to the surgery.

There's that freedom word again. Getting a lot of that out of the UK at the moment.

But read on;

"GPs can't generate a surplus and pocket it, nor if they fail will they become personally liable."

If the GP does not have the freedom to make a profit if he runs an efficient service and he does not have any responsibility for losing money if he runs an inefficient service he doesn't have freedom and he doesn't have responsibility. He's still a semi-public servant on the tax-funded payroll, albeit highly trained.

But what is the problem they are trying to fix? Rationing, waiting-lists, lack of patient choice.

Say you had a car, most of us do. It periodically needs a check up and sometimes gets sick. Imagine the government holds the funds for the provision of these services. The funds are distributed via Primary Car Care Trusts. My local mechanic must apply for the funding to fix my car or arrange for it to go where it can get fixed. I don't have to pay him directly because I already paid him through my taxes. Great. Except there is a really long queue to get my car in because servicing and repairs are 'free'. And then when I do eventually get a slot it needs electronic work that he can't do and there's a new queue to join for that 'free' service. I am going to be walking or bussing it (although the buses are subject to the same shortages) for some time.

Based on this latest brilliant idea, giving the mechanic the 'freedom and responsibility' to deal direct with the ancillary suppliers, still publicly funded so 'free', will make the queues go away. And the government says I can now start going to other mechanics if I want to, which will also make the queues go away. But why would I want to? The next mechanic has no incentive to be better than the first. He's just working for the government (notwithstanding he has to fund his own premises and overheads either from what they pay him or what they allow him to charge me) with no prospects of becoming more profitable or going out of business. What's changed?

Colin James speculates

On the eve of a National Party conference (? searched '2010 National Party annual conference' on the Nats website and found nothing) Colin James speculates;

Key's moderate, Howard-style, bit-by-bit-term-by-term National-leaning policy evolution should be in tune with a party that went through 30 years of seesawing positioning and wants to settle back into long-term government commanding the centre.

There are two complications to this comfortable scenario.

One is the structure of the next government. This term Key has a super-majority, with ACT to support some measures and the Maori party to support others and deliver some Maori voters.

If in the next term National needs both parties for a majority (likely if, say, Labour gets 38 per cent and the Greens 6 per cent), managing their antithetical positions to pass contentious legislation will be very challenging -- or paralysing.
Even if there is a super-majority again (a real possibility) [my link insertion] can Key keep both in the tent?

He has given the Maori party some big mana wins and whanau ora. There is not much more mana he can deliver without upsetting conservative National members and voters. Whanau ora has potential to embarrass if not very tightly managed.

On the other side, Rodney Hide has had some big wins in deregulation and local government this term plus some totemic wins. What can Key give him in a second term that doesn't scare the centre? (Might Hide look elsewhere to continue his career: for example, the Auckland mayoralty in 2013?)

And all the while, the economy will not be flying high and might even have another bad turn, given the debt-driven turmoil and huge uncertainties in the global economy. The 2014 election might look grim. Will Key want to risk a loss?

The point is that so far Key has not hit any big bumps in the road nor has had to make any really hard decisions. That has maximised the openings in the clouds for his sunny personality to shine through on his party.

So it will shine this coming weekend. And his faithful will bask.

Interesting observation about ACT and Rodney Hide. I struggle to see how ACT can survive 2011. Rodney can, but the party? What can they ask for policy-wise? The public perception is that law and order, welfare, education and health are all undergoing reform. Could they get votes on repealing the ETS? And is it politically tenable for National to entertain kowtowing?

Still, as they say, a week is along time in politics - let alone a year.

Collins and economic nonsense

Talking up the economic benefits of building prisons is a mistake.

Whatever the government spends building and staffing them is a loss to the private sector elsewhere.

This is illustrated by the 'broken window' fallacy written about by Henry Hazlitt;

Hazlitt noted that "everything we get, outside the free gifts of nature, must in some way be paid for." Government spending ultimately comes from taxes. What is seen is the benefits of the spending, and often they are truly benefits to some people. But what is not seen is the goods that would have been bought had the workers not been forced to pay the taxes from their wages. The public as a whole loses, because the gain to some is less than the overall cost to the taxpayers and consumers.

To illustrate this he developed the broken window example;

If someone throws a stone into a shop window, the owner needs to repair it. This puts people to work and increases total output. Since this creates jobs, would we be better off breaking lots of windows and repairing them?

Substitute Collins' claim;

If someone commits an imprisonable crime, they need to be locked up. This puts people to work and increases total output. Since this creates jobs, would we be better off breaking lots of laws and locking people up?

We know the answer to that.

At best what Collins is trumpeting is the benefit to the recipient of government redistribution. But in the case of crime and prisons, the loss of the taxpayer is even greater than usual because, unlike a simple broken window, crime incurs many other costs along the way.

What Collins is pushing here is complete statist socialist claptrap.

Big blooper about being behind bars

My anti-BS siren just went off when I read the opening sentence from a lead item on Stuff this morning;

Kiwis behind bars in many countries

Fifty-seven New Zealanders are behind bars in other countries.

57.

There are over 800 people behind bars in Australia alone (prison bars that is.)

I don't have the time to check out other countries now. The soccer is about to start.

But wouldn't any thinking person have looked at that figure and thought, too low. Way too low.