Turei explains

Meteria Turei explains to an audience who hasn't a clue about New Zealand.

Last weekend I revealed a lie, a lie that I decided to talk about because of the situation we as a society find ourselves in.

I am the co-leader of the Green party of Aotearoa New Zealand – the third biggest political party in our small democracy. We are two months from our general election, and we’re in a tight tussle to change the government.

Yes, a small party in a small democracy which nevertheless requires two leaders. A small party which in 6 general elections has never convinced enough voters that they are fit to govern.

Over the weekend, at our party’s AGM, we launched an incomes policy which would create the most significant changes to New Zealand’s welfare system in a generation. It’s a comprehensive piece of work that rolls back many of the benefit cuts and sanctions that have been put in place by successive governments in New Zealand (some of which are mirrored in other countries).

Sanctions (which result in cuts) that require the beneficiary to attend job interviews, pass drugs tests and tell the state who the father of their child is so he can play his part in financially supporting them - alongside the taxpayer.

 I decided this weekend I would tell supporters, the media and the country that two decades ago I lied to a government ministry while I was receiving a benefit.

I also lied while training to be a lawyer but that seems neither here nor there. Neither does the fact that I now want to make laws seem to be under any sort of ethical scrutiny.

This is why I did it.

I had my daughter, Piupiu, at 22. I was a single, young mum with no formal education qualifications. After she was born, I knew I needed to forge a career for myself so that I could financially support us and give my girl the best life possible. I made the choice to go to law school.

Over five years, I received a training incentive allowance (a benefit that has since been ditched by our current government), as well as a payment for single parents. I also had help from my family, and my daughter’s father’s family.

Actually I also kept the father's identity from the "goverment ministry" so he wouldn't have to pay child support. Some other strangers with children of their own to feed could face that responsibility.

Despite all that support, which is much more than many people in similar circumstances have, I did not have enough money to pay the rent and put food on the table. And so, like many – but not all – people faced with that choice, I lied to survive.

I lived in a few flats over the years with a few different flatmates. I didn’t tell the government department in charge of my benefit about some of those flatmates. If I had, my benefit would have been reduced, and I would not have had enough money to get by.

I told the government department that I was paying the rent all by myself or maybe with just one or two others. And the other flatmates won't come forward now because they were possibly doing exactly the same. None of us could get by. We'd never heard of pooling benefits.

Of course, I had no idea that when I made that decision that 20-odd years later I’d be a politician, campaigning on benefit reform, two months out from an election.

"That decision" was many decisions, year-on-year. It wasn't a solitary desperate mistake.

I am in a privileged, fortunate position now; I have a voice and I have a platform. Thousands of other New Zealanders who are on a benefit don’t have that. In fact, they’re routinely silenced, marginalised and persecuted for the mere fact that they are poor.

Everybody on income support has a voice and a vote. If the benefit system was so mean and so degrading and so inequitable, the Greens would have been in government long ago.

That came into sharp focus a couple of weeks ago when we were preparing for our policy launch. I came across a news story about a woman who took her own life after she was accused of benefit fraud and told that she was to be prosecuted. It was eventually found that she had committed no offence but it was too late for her and the family she left behind. Reading about that case is what spurred me to tell my story – the whole story, not the redacted, PR version.

Some people have asked why it took me 15 years as an MP to do it. To that, all I can say is that nobody wants to be defined by a lie – I certainly never wanted to be. But the outrage and the urgency I felt after reading that woman’s story was unlike anything I’d ever experienced. For me, it felt like it was now or never.

So "never" was a consideration? That just adds to the sense of mistrust the Greens (via Turei) have engendered.

I also think that as a country we are ready to have a conversation about what life is really like for people on benefits and for the 200,000 Kiwi children growing up in poverty. How the welfare system set up to help people actually keeps them living beneath the poverty line; how the government uses the threat of further poverty against the poor; how the best thing we can do to lift people out of poverty is simply to give them more money.

And if we don't just "give them more money" they should take it. Like I did. Oh, and by the way, if you don't vote Green you may just have to. Don't follow the rules that have been designed to make the system sustainable and fair. And make sure you tell your children that you are ripping the system off to set a good example. Inter-generational fraud should be the goal.

In the days since the speech, I have heard from scores of people, mostly single mums, who have had to make the same choice I did. I’ve had people come up to me on the street and say the same. That reaction was unexpected but has been quite amazing.

So many people have admitted benefit fraud to me but despite being an MP, their secrets are safe with me. I made them kneel down and I touched their shoulders.

I’ve also heard from people who are outraged. They think I’m a fraud and a criminal. (Of course, as I’ve said, I will pay back what I owe.) 

Well, I ruminated over that decision for a few days (and years prior to disclosure.)

But importantly, all the abuse and vitriol that beneficiaries face today, by the agencies and in private, is now being levelled at me, in public. That reaction was expected. And it has broken the silence about how awful life on a benefit really is.

I don’t know whether people’s feelings towards me will change over time. And actually, it doesn’t matter at all. What matters is what comes out of these conversations, and whether we will see the day when our welfare system is restored to its original purpose – to be a true safety net that helps our people when they need it.

Which is what it already is. At the very least.

Overt media bias

From today's DomPost (though the on-line version differs from the hard copy offering I have responded to, you'll get the gist):

Kiwi baby death rates not improving as experts blame poverty

"New Zealand's high rates of infant deaths places it near the bottom of the OECD, with opposition parties blaming inequality and poverty for the country's poor record compared to the rest of the developed world.

Poor healthcare; poor housing; lack of access to a midwife or maternity carer; and poor health in the mother have all been blamed by experts for the poor statistics."

My response:

Dear Editor

The DomPost ran a headline on July 20, "Poverty cited as baby death rates get worse."

While not strictly 'fake news' it is outdated news, drawing on OECD data from 2012/13. Since then the infant mortality rate has dropped to its lowest number ever in 2016 - 3.58 deaths per 1,000 infants.

How difficult would it have been for your reporter to access this data from Statistics New Zealand? I could.

Instead the article was peppered with quotes about poverty, family violence and poor housing. Undoubtedly these factors contribute but the trend is positive - not negative.

Lindsay Mitchell

"Society is not a family, Government is not a parent."

Here's a thoughtful offering. It's from an Economics Professor. Imagine if we had academics in New Zealand who prescribed to these views.


"...when the government takes on the role of “parent” or ‘big brother” and takes responsibility for all such things, it weakens the personal and familial senses of duty and obligation most people in a free society would ethically and voluntarily feel “the right thing to do” to help, handle and work out with others in the narrower or wider circle of actual relatives."


There was however a time in NZ when the law forced sometimes even distant family members to take financial responsibility for indigent relatives. Not sure I am comfortable with that either. But the pendulum has certainly swung way too far towards state involvement in matters they should keep out of.

People in the interventionist-welfare state soon are desensitized and even dehumanized to these matters. After all, “isn’t that what government is for?” Besides, “I’ve paid my taxes” to pay for those “social services.” And, in addition, “shouldn’t that be left up to the qualified experts in the government who know how to handle these things?”

Now that rings a bell.

More

Clearly a lifestyle choice

Doesn't Meteria Turei provide clear evidence that living on a benefit is a lifestyle choice? Whenever I call having a baby/ies and staying on welfare long-term (National's definition is over one year) a lifestyle choice, people scoff. "Do you know what a struggle being on a benefit is?" they say. "Who would choose to live like that? Give me a break."

Meteria did. She made it her 'job' to be the rent collector in each house so she could charge flatmates. She knew how long her degree would take and that she would use this arrangement - living off the taxpayer and her fellow flatmates - for the duration.

It was cynical and illegal.

That so many people are prepared to not only excuse her, but deify her, is bewildering to me.

After a period in the UK, I returned to NZ in 1992. At the height of the 1990's recession unemployment. I had worked since aged 18 (1978)  full time. Unemployment was foreign to me. Months passed and I was unable to find a job. Luckily I was living back home with mum and dad. By chance I ran into an old work mate now employed by WINZ. She was adamant that I should apply for the dole. I distinctly remember her saying, "You worked for years and paid your taxes." I was reluctant, but starting to get a bit despondent and desperate. I am sure I didn't go into the local office (or have wiped the memory of it) but equally sure I received the dole for two weeks - about $60 a week because I wasn't living independently. Then I found work.

This is related only to illustrate the contrasting attitudes that people have to welfare - the chasm that has kept this story hot for 3 days now.

I would suggest that if Turei's attitude prevailed, the country would grind to a halt.  Whether she is right or wrong there is only so much of her morality the country's coffers can finance.

Politician commits benefit fraud ... in UK

A councillor and former Parliamentary candidate has been sentenced to 40 hours of unpaid community work after pleading guilty to two counts of benefit fraud which resulted in overpayments of more than £10,000.

Hanna Toms, Cornwall Councillor for the Falmouth Penwerris Ward, made monetary gain after failing to tell local authorities about an increase in income between 2008 and 2014.

The 40-year-old came clean about a "genuine mistake" two years ago and says that she will not be stepping down from her role as councillor.

She was sentenced at Truro Magistrates' Court.

Cllr Toms was set to stand as Labour's Parliamentary candidate for Truro and Falmouth in 2015 before withdrawing just months before the election.

In a statement, she told the BBC: "I was under the impression that as I had advised Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs of changes in my personal circumstances, this information would be passed on to Cornwall Council. I was wrong.

"I would like to publicly apologise to my family and friends, my constituents, my fellow councillors and to people in Cornwall for letting them down in this way."

The money has since been repaid using a bank loan.

Source

Which Minister said this?

"The Minister said that the ministry takes a zero tolerance approach to benefit fraud for the same reasons it takes a zero tolerance approach to staff fraud. Benefit fraud is unacceptable because it undermines people’s confidence in the benefit system. If taxpayers suspect that some people are defrauding the ministry, this could cause a backlash against beneficiaries."

Green's shot at outbidding Labour

The Greens have announced their latest bid to achieve government:

"It includes a big overhaul of social welfare, with all benefit payments increasing by 20 percent and all sanctions and obligations for beneficiaries removed.

It means those receiving welfare won't have their benefits cut if they don't search for jobs or fail drug tests, or if mothers don't name the father of their child.

Working for Families also gets beefed up under the policy, with weekly payments increasing by at least $72. However, the threshold of eligibility won't be changed.

Ms Turei has also made the bold move of introducing a new top tax bracket of 40 percent, which kicks in for all income over $150,000.

The tax rate in the lowest bracket, presently 10.5 percent, will reduce to 9 percent.

Minimum wage will also go up immediately by $2, from $15.75 to $17.75."

Turei went on to admit defrauding the welfare system when she was a beneficiary. I wonder if she ever paid it back when able to?

Baby Bribes

Labour is promising to pay the poorest  people in NZ over $3,000 a year to have a baby. That's the essential upshot of their Best Start package. Catch is, the payment only lasts till the child is two. What then ? Simple answer: have another baby. Stupid answer but simple.

Their next bribe - which will have Winston downing doubles - is extra cash towards electricity costs for ALL superannuitants (and beneficiaries). Yes, that surprised me, even for Labour.

They expect 80 percent take-up among pensioners. Who knows what that is based on but even at 80 percent there will be a truckload of people applying who do not need the money.

Will this get a good chunk of the usual non-voters out? Because that is surely their overarching game plan.

(If my response is harsh, even those I generally disagree with - the CPAG - don't like the package.)

Assisted dying polls

From ACT's Free Press:

"The End-of-Life Choice Society have released a Horizon Poll showing 75 per cent of New Zealanders want assisted dying legalised. Taking out don’t-knows, only 11 per cent are opposed. This is extraordinary support, and is consistent with previous polls from Reid Research (71-24) Colmar Brunton (75-20) and Curia (66-20). It is time for opponents to concede that, whatever other arguments they may have, public opinion is overwhelmingly in favour of change."

As previously stated, I'll not try and persuade or argue with detractors. Each is entitled to their view and they can express it here. Just don't tell me that there is some 'greater good' reason for ceding autonomy over my ending (within the context of this bill).

Do you own my life?

This is the question to be put to all of the anti voluntary euthanasia  stalwarts who will emerge over the coming months.

Thank goodness David Seymour's bill has been pulled from the ballot.

That's all from me.

Trump's food stamp plan

Food stamps - more benignly known as SNAP (Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program) - make up a huge share of the US government's welfare bill. It only ever seems to grow (though has steadied in recent years.) The Daily Signal explains why and what Trump is proposing:

The food stamp program is 92 percent funded by Washington. Washington sends blank checks to state capitals—the more people a state enrolls in food stamps, the more money Washington hands out.
A dirty secret in American politics is that many governors, both Republican and Democrat, regard this type of “free money” poured from Washington as a benign Keynesian stimulus to their local economies. The more spending, the better.
The Trump budget recognizes that the food stamp program will become more efficient if the state governments that operate the program have “skin in the game.” Therefore, it raises the required state contribution to food stamps incrementally from 8 percent to 25 percent.

"...none of the state's business."

When a sole parent refuses to name the father of her children a penalty is incurred. This is because the state is unable to recoup any of her benefit from the liable parent. But Green MP Jan Logie says:

"Is it appropriate to deprive women of essential income when the reasons people don't name a father are personal, private and, frankly, none of the state's business?"

So if the reason a mother isn't naming the father is because she has come to a private arrangement with him to  receive a sum greater than $28 (but less than his otherwise calculated child support liability)  it's none of the state's business?

It is people like Jan Logie, who believe everyone should have unconditional eligibility for state support in all its guises, that have encouraged the state to grow so big. Big states rob individuals of freedom and privacy. So I have little sympathy for her when she turns around and says some personal decision is none of the state's business.

For statists of all ilks: you cannot have your cake and eat it too.

"Old school"?

The treatment of those who questioned the behaviour of the now infamous Ministry of Transport fraudster was atrocious. Two have spoken to Radio New Zealand anonymously. This caught my eye though:

"When we raised issues sometimes we were told 'you're only here to pay the invoices and if they're signed and approved that's all you have to worry about'.
"But we were old school - and we were loyal and we were conscious of it being taxpayer money."

Which infers they were loyal to the taxpayer. Good for them.

But if they are old school, what is new school??

"1,300,000 fewer years on main benefits"

That's the prognosis since benefit reforms were implemented in 2012.

It's good that the ministry is actually measuring dependency in year terms. Mere numbers dependent hid too much. Reliance on the dole is, on average, much shorter-lived than reliance on the DPB (now Sole Parent Support).

From the Minister, this is hugely important:

“Almost half of children who grow up in a benefit dependent household end up on a benefit before the age of 23, which is why we’ve invested millions in providing intensive support and training as well as help with study and childcare so sole parents can go into work.

“With the number of sole parents on a benefit decreasing 32 per cent since 2012 and nearly 60,000 fewer children living in benefit dependent households than in 2011, it’s clear this investment is helping break the cycle of intergenerational welfare dependence.

In their last incumbency Labour never got close to addressing or moving on this central problem.

“Those who have been on a benefit before the age of 20 make up about 75 per cent of current liability, with teen parents having some of the highest lifetime costs of any group on welfare.

This is what I was banging on about 13-14 years ago when addressing select committees and Labour sneered, holding that the average single parent was only ever dependent for 3 and a half  years. That was factually wrong. But worse, Labour used images that would conjure up public sympathy to divert from the chronic inter-generational problem, while their supporters painted me as a beneficiary-bashing pariah.

I confess I haven't the energy or inclination to trawl through the detail of the latest actuarial report. It might exaggerate or be overly optimistic. But the crux is that the government (or THIS government) now understands the problem.

Just another manifestation of the war on drugs

Why can't the government 1/ understand the ramifications of the war on drugs, and 2/ extrapolate them to the war on tobacco?

Simple behavioural and economic rules apply.

Criticism of Oxfam's approach to wealth inequality

The following brief article from the Acton blog is reproduced in full due to its substantial merit:

"If people of faith want to reduce global poverty, they must begin by accurately measuring the problem. But a well-publicized report on international poverty distorts the problem and promotes solutions that would leave the world’s poorest people worse off, according to two free market experts.

Every year, Oxfam releases a report on global wealth inequality to further the agenda of the World Economic Forum. This year’s entry, titled “An economy for the 99 percent,” was released with the headline: “Just 8 men own the same wealth as half the world.”

The group’s executive director, Winnie Byanyima, said, “It is obscene for so much wealth to be held in the hands of so few when one-in-10 people survive on less than $2 a day.” But Philip Booth and Ben Southwood of the Institute for Economic Affairs (IEA), based in London, point out that there are significant problems with the report.

First, its method of measuring wealth (not income) is misleading. “Those at the bottom of the net wealth distribution include, for example, recent Harvard graduates with high levels of student debt and yet huge earning potential: they are supposed to be amongst the poorest people in the world,” Booth and Southwood write. Not that long ago, that would have included the Obamas, no one’s idea of the dispossessed and powerless.

Second, the report does not take into account life’s natural fluctuations. “A lot of people in the world have little or no net wealth,” Booth and Southwood note.

People accumulate wealth over the course of their life cycle, and even the better-off in this country do not tend to accumulate significant net wealth before their 30s. So if you consider that the global median age is about 28 years, it is hardly surprising that a huge proportion of the world’s population does not own any wealth.

Their conclusions reiterate the findings of a recent report from Canada’s Fraser Institute, which details how different stages of life bring different average earnings. Assets usually increase throughout one’s working years, until they are drawn down during retirement.

Oxfam recommends that Davos attendees pursue the global redistribution of wealth. Byanyima encourages politicians to “stop obsessing with GDP” growth, and the report recommends governments “increase the amount of progressive tax.”

But crushing poverty has fallen, thanks in large part to the free market, Booth and Southwood write. “Globally, extreme poverty has fallen from 44 percent in 1980 to around 10 percent today.” One could call as the first witness Oxfam itself, which stated recently, “The growth generated by private actors has contributed to an unprecedented reduction in poverty around the world in recent decades.”

The IEA cites examples from South Korea and Kenya to India and China. In Vietnam, income per capita rose from $100 a year to $2,000 after the country took measures to liberalize its economy 31 years ago. China saw the same measure increase from $193 in 1980 to $6,807 in 2014. “This is not due to redistribution,” the authors write; “it is due to trade and the liberalisation of some markets.”

Growing global wealth produces innovative products and services that serve the world’s poorest. For instance, Frank McCoster notes at The Conservative Online that internet connectivity is transforming the way Africans access vital services like electricity.

And as French President-elect Emmanuel Macron, the former economy minister of a socialist administration, said, “We must first produce in order to be able to distribute.” The richest 0.003 percent of the world’s population, those with a net worth of at least $240 million, donates $25 million to charity during his life.

People of faith who care about feeding the world should embrace policies that stimulate the growth of wealth, the structures that allow flourishing in the developing world, and the religious and philanthropic worldviews that encourage us to become our brother’s keeper.

You can read Booth and Southwood’s article in the Spring 2017 issue of the IEA’s Economic Affairs."

A flat white each day?

Bracket creep amounts to the equivalent of "a flat white each day". This trivialises the fact that the government is taking more tax from individuals in the latest financial year than the previous.

David Seymour expresses it better when saying that New Zealanders have just lost another week's work to the government.

But the increase also tends to overshadow that you are working for the government until May 8. MAY 8. Not March or April. MAY.

Mainstream coverage in Wellington amounts to a small snippet in the business pages. No wonder National gives the issue of over-taxation no priority.

What giving up looks like

A meeting was held in South Auckland last night. The dangers being experienced by dairy and bottle shop owners was the subject addressed by several MPs. However some attendees were unconvinced:

"Nothing is going to happen, they have come here to complete the formalities and wipe our tears," liquor store owner Narinder Singla said.
"I don't have any faith that they'll be doing something."
Last Friday, Mr Singla was left traumatised after two men entered his liquor store wielding screw drivers and stole money, cigarettes and alcohol.

This may be a mere matter of opinion but then again, Mr Singla might have been looking at the latest Public Service targets:

Which?

Feeling  admiration and respect for Prince Phillip as he stands down from public life, a twinge of nostalgia for his generation touched me. He's only slightly older than both of my living parents.

I wonder, do I share more values and attitudes with their generation or my adult offspring?

Tough question.

(Or, is characterization of distinct generations just another collectivist denial of inherent individualism?)

A 65 year-old woman will live quarter of life on Super

The qualifying age for Super has to rise.

Latest data from Statistics NZ show:

In 2014, 650,000 people were aged 65 and over in New Zealand. That’s about 14 percent of our population. This number is projected to more than double by 2039, to 1,286,000 people, almost one-quarter of the population (Stats NZ, 2014).
People are also living for longer. In 2012–14, a 65-year-old woman could expect to live another 21.3 years, and a man for another 18.9 years. This is up 6.5 years for women and 6.1 years for men since 1950–52, when they could expect to live another 14.8 years and 12.8 years, respectively (Stats NZ, 2015).

(Notwithstanding any individual savings scheme would be preferable to taxpayer-funded pensions.)