The Crippling of the Welfare State
"Of all the preposterous assumptions of humanity over humanity, nothing exceeds most of the criticisms made on the habits of the poor by the well housed, well warmed and well fed."
Herman Melville
Sweeping benefit changes 'horrifying'
Proposed welfare reforms that aim to push people into work are "vile" and the punitive sanctions on beneficiaries will only put further strain on community organisations, advocates say.
Eight Cabinet ministers have been appointed to the ministerial group that will consider the Welfare Working Group's 43 recommendations.
Prime Minister John Key said yesterday that National would campaign on any changes the ministerial group decided on.
The Welfare Working Group aimed to cut the number of people on a benefit from 360,000 to 100,000 by 2021. It suggested the creation of a single Jobseeker Support benefit to replace the dole, domestic purposes, sickness and other benefits. All but the seriously ill and disabled would be required to find work.
Why are the media talking about John Key's son planking on the Herald Front Page and not the crippling of the welfare state? Can we expect Key to leak pxt's he's taken of his penis when National announce full State Asset Privatization? Crosby and Textor you herd sleepy hobbits like no one else.
I can just imagine the press conference: "Hi all. Having a good day? I had a sausage for lunch. It was yum. Now I'm afraid we have to fuck the poor and the sick and the mentally unwell and the solo mothers up by forcing them all back to work in a 6%+ unemployment labour force because our raising GST to subsidize a tax cut for our rich mates didn't turbo charge the economy like we said and in fact left a billion dollar deficit in revenue we need to fill with the hopes, dreams and aspirations of an entire class of New Zealanders. Here's a picture of my son planking".
In a tactic that National have used again and again, the ideologically stacked welfare razor gang gave the Government the radical policy they needed and managed to add an element so fascist that it made Genghis Khan wince with their 'back to work after 14 weeks' for a second child which allowed John Key to reject it creating the perception that he's moderated what is still a radical attack on society's most vulnerable and weak.
National did it with the mining of conservation land, they put up Great Barrier when they never had any intention of mining Great Barrier so they could remove it from the list to make them look like they had 'listened' and create the perception of moderation.
Key had the audacity to describe the forcing of mothers back after 14 weeks as making him 'queasy' which is funny because his comments that poor people who take food parcels are to blame for their own poverty alongside his claim that if he cut welfare to all beneficiaries then bugger all would starve made me pretty queasy.
National's tactic of proposing 100% crazy and selling 80% crazy as compromise is like getting the National Front to write immigration policy and then look aghast at what they come up with while implementing most of it.
Why should the most vulnerable; the solo mums, the sick, the mentally unwell, the disabled, why should they be forced to do with less because of an economic global crises caused by corporate greed that they had no hand in making?
How many solo mothers were on the phone to their Wall St Stockbrokers in 2007/2008 buying lite crude in Euros and speculating on Goldman Sack derivatives?
In the words of Scribe. Not many if any.
It is this Government's economic turbo charged incompetence that has led to the crippling of the welfare state aided by John Key's out of touch bubble world millionaire lifestyle which concludes for him that poor people needing food parcels choose to be poor and that if he cut benefits, bugger all beneficiaries would starve.
All stick and no play makes little Wiremu a prison statistic.
This crippling of the Welfare State is evil. It's evil to treat the weakest and most vulnerable in Society during a recession as steep as this with such 'work sets you free' contempt, and it's time for people of conscience to call NZ on it.
posted by Bomber @ 8:18 am
13 comments
13 Comments:
Ok, so my theory is John Key is the opposite of Roger (New Zealand) Douglas. He is trying to do the extreme opposite of what he believes in because he really cares about people and the only way the sleepwalking lambs will wake up is by keep upping the ante to the extreme right that we keep getting. He cares so much, but the only way to wake the people and the limp opposition up is to put forward these extreme policies. I think he is like Brian in the Life Of Brian, where he tells the followers to grow some balls and stop following him. Or maybe a little like Adolf in his early Nuremburg rally days where he was taking the piss out of his brain dead followers who couldn't be bothered to think for themselves. I am sure these and all despot "Leaders" were all shaking their heads wondering why anyone would follow their pathetic preaching.
I have given up wondering why so many people think being screwed by our polis is our new national sport and follow unquestioningly, so I am going to believe that at least John Key is really a nice person and not the evil leader that is taking this wonderful country into economic oblivion and he is really trying to scare the sheep awake.
Do you have any evidence that people are starving in New Zealand?
Please note this means that there are people unable to get enough calories over a sustained period of time, (Weeks not days), not that someone misses out on a meal now and then.
If you have this evidence it would be useful to your case if you present it.
Many of these changes look like they will be beneficial to all involved.
Especially those aimed at youth and drug/alcohol abusers.
One of the few things the Nat's have done right.
Look a bit deeper BobbyD, what causes youth to take to drugs and become 'unruly'? Its the economic system that breaks up their families, dumps them on the dole and pushes drugs to cool them out. When that doesnt work, it becomes 'their fault' so they're labelled by rightwingnutjobs in parliament as addicts and crazies. You think that 'treatment' at this point is a solution? No the solution is youth outrage that mobilises to throw out the banksters and their parliamentary money laundering machine.
I'd like to make a new law. One that requires all politicians to live in off the benedit in south auckland for one month.
That way a few off them may actucally learn something before they get the real power. As a happy bonus some may be shot.
Gosman,
So you think that a person who is so poor that they need to miss an occasional meal is not 'poor enough'?
"Do you have any evidence that people are starving in New Zealand?"
Are you saying that is the point at which we should do something Gosman? Kind of like, walk to the petrol station with a bottle once you've run out on the motorway rather than fill the tank when you can see it's getting empty.
Do people literally have to starve? I know a few solo mothers, a few managing to work hard, find opportunity and make ends meet, just! Both educated with established careers pre-motherhood, and another not so fortunate who feeds herself and her daughter on $60 a week, with butter at $6 a block that's kind of tough, needless to say they don't eat it. And the daughter is constantly sick and undernourished and so misses school and so the cycle continues. You got a well paid job for her Gosman - she wants to work - and if not, what do you suggest she does?
You can only pay for all the various beneficiaries if you have sufficient income. This is not rocket science. There is not sufficient income. There are also insufficient savings (as Keynes advocated to accumulate during boom times, but we have not done). You can [i]try[/i] to tax the rich, but this can rapidly backfire completely since they can at any time take themselves and their businesses overseas. We are out of easy solutions. The inevitable default that will result from both the left and the right wing "solutions" to this crisis will ultimately lead to national bankruptcy. You think the government is draconian now? You ain't seen nothing yet. THERE IS NO MONEY!
If were talking welfare- I assume they will be interested in doing something about the excessive millions that get handed out in the name of corporate welfare and consultancy fees.
What a few bludgers who don't appear at a job interview cost us is miniscule to what we are handing out to SCF, AMI, drought assistance packages, accountants, lawyers, engineers and banks who are all on the public payroll. How much are we handing out to scope the selling off of our SOEs at the moment?
Oh and they might want to look at the $500 mill Auckland Council is about to pay out to IT consultants because Rodney trashed our local government system up here in AKL. Thats where the real welfare waste is going at the moment
Hopefully they will tak some interest in the billions of corporate welfare the govt uses to hand out favours.
SCF, AMI bailouts and all those millions we spend on consultants who do things like prepare our SOEs for selldown.
Tahts where the real welfare crime is.
@Tim "it'll be the decision I make between staying or departure. "
I understand your sentiment, I'd like to bail to some utopia too, and I know a bunch who have either just left or are about to. Catch is where to? Australia? Is Australia a better example of a society, plundering coal to satisfy a desire that China won't maintain. Given that they are talking about intentionally slowing their growth to avoid a bubble that may arrive before they have a chance to manage it. Cameron in the UK? A Greencard? Spain's not looking too hot these days!
The point is, Gen X&Y need to find a way to influence the narrative so that New Zealand can be a more viable option. We do after all produce commodities in a world of increasing scarcity when it comes to clean air and water, we have proven ourselves to be innovative and creative. We just need to get over the hump of these two groups that alternate in Government and fiddle around in a middle ground courtesy of the current dogma in Washington and slowly and surely move further to the right.
New Zealanders need to walk like Egyptians, not run away to Australia.
What the Rebstock beast and her cohorts, along with a good majority of citizens, don't seem to get is that good old WINZ keeps a lot of landlords in rent money, supermarkets and power companies ticking over and social workers, health professionals, councillors, winz workers etc etc in jobs. The sickness goes in both directions, n,est pas?
@ Tragik
Did I actually state what you seem to think I stated?
I think you need some help with reading comprehension.
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