Thank God for the Sallies becoming Judas (what would Jesus rent?)

Sallies betrayed us over housing tenants' group
A state house tenants' group has accused the Salvation Army of betrayal because of its support for transferring some state houses to charities. The pretense that this Government under John Key is 'moderate' is well and truly gone. This Government have planted ideeological flakes onto advisory boards to create the hard right social policy they want.

We saw this with the Welfare Razor Gang and we see it again with the Housing Shareholders' Advisory Group with Alan Jackson, director of Fletcher Buildings, plus investment banker, a former property company manager and of course dear old Major Campbell Roberts from the Sallies. What did the Housing Shareholders' Advisory Group come up with? Flog off the responsibility of the State to provide housing for the poor by handing it over to 'charities' and the private sector.

Why the hell should we allow corporate slum lords and Church slum lords run the state housing of NZ when they all got to sit on the Housing Shareholders' Advisory Group to carve this up amongst themselves?

Perhaps someone needs to read some scripture to the Sallies, something along the line of it being more difficult for a man to hand over his wealth than a camel pass through the eye of a needle?

This is simply a privatization of state housing with corporations hiding behind the robes of the Church. The responsibility of providing housing for the poor is the Government's, not the bloody Church or private corporations. As the state house tenants' group put it...

Ms Henry said the proposals would amount to bringing back the last National Government's 1990s policy of market rents, because tenants in non-government houses would have to apply for subsidies through Work and Income just as state tenants did in the 1990s.

Tenants Protection Association co-ordinator Angela Maynard said the report represented a philosophical shift away from state responsibility for housing people in need.

She warned that restricting state houses to "the duration of need" would force families to leave friends and force children to change schools, disrupting their education.

...first the bennies, then the public hospitals and now the State Housing tenants. I know a lot of young NZers voted for John Key because they thought he was 'change' without really knowing what 'change' meant - I've lived under a National Government before, many first time voters never remembered anything other than Aunty Helen, well now they are getting a crash course in understanding that National is the political party for the rich, by the rich and in the interests of the rich.

How's that change feeling folks? Ready to admit Key isn't nearly as moderate as he pretended to be when he won your votes yet?