Citizen A with Chris Trotter & Selwyn Manning

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Citizen A with Martyn Bradbury, Chris Trotter & Selwyn Manning:

  • Issue 1 Has the Consensus Building Group been a giant waste of time? What now for meaningful traffic management in Auckland?
  • Issue 2 The latest welfare reforms are being rolled out, when does beneficiary bashing stop being politically attractive?
  • Issue 3 Why is the defamation case against the NZDF by a journalist so important? (please note, since this episode broadcast, the jury overseeing this case returned without be able to reach a majority decision. Read here for more…)

Citizen A broadcasts weekly on FaceTV and webcasts on The Daily Blog, Live.TheDailyBlog.co.nz & LiveNews.co.nz.

4 COMMENTS

  1. Haha … IRD & WINZ have been snapped already. What they have been doing in collusion is; contacting those people that have had a part-time or casual work and then (guess) estimated their income for a 6 month or 12 month period and then reported that as “actual earnings” to Work and Income who would then report them to the Benefit Fraud Squad! Oh thats right there’s a poll coming up!

  2. Takere – yes it was a conveniently arranged press release by the Associate Minisiter for Social Development, who I believe once was a cop.

    As the introduction of the new draconian, inhumane and in part even illegal welfare regime started to even be reported on in the mainstream media, and as a fair few in the public are starting to realise how mean spirited the “reforms” under Bennett and her master Key are, the government also started getting concerned about its reputation.

    Hence the hit back at alleged “fraudsters”. Of course it will turn out to mostly be cases of some over-payments for short periods to those starting new work and earning a wage or salary. But the media sadly does not bother investigating, and serves so reliably as the messenger or propaganda spreader for this government.

    Once the details come out, none of it will be reported on, as the main story will be forgotten. Many more in the public will be brainwashed, seeing “proof” again that their “hard earned” taxes are being wasted.

    So much for balanced, well researched reporting. The only one who got stuck into the Minister was Mary in Checkpoint on Radio NZ National on late afternoon the same day the “news” broke. She at least does not take the mere words of some ministers for facts, and she demands more explanations. Hence the Minister backed down and would not given any indication about what of these numbers would be proved to be actual fraud and thus be prosecuted.

  3. Thanks to Chris Trotter to raise the worrying fact that WINZ has a highly biased Principal Health Advisor (who mentors, trains and manages the Regional Health and Disability Advisors WINZ employs for making assessments and recommendations on sick and disabled)!

    This is stuff the mainstream media should be looking at, but you hear and read NADA! It is disgusting that MSD and WINZ employ an “advisor” (who is a common GP), who dares to compare benefit dependence with “drug dependence”. He is well known for his hard stand on sick and disabled having to be “ushered” back into work as soon as possible. His presentations to GP conferences expose his bias, but apparently MSD and the Minister Bennett are quite happy with his pseudo scientific “findings”, which are nothing but handpicked bits of statistics, that largely come from one supposedly “international” source, namely a department at Cardiff University headed by a Professor Mansel Aylward.

    That man was involved in creating the ‘All Work Test’ for the Department of Work and Pensions in the UK in the 1990s, which has been followed by the newer, but little changed Work Capability Assessment used there.

    Aylward claims that about 75 per-cent of mentally ill, same as those suffering musculo skeletal illnesses, do simply have their illness “in their minds”. He has only recently qualified his earlier statements on “illness believers”, and he has in his own presentations shown his also biased position. So if there are no detectable physical signs of any illness, he thinks there is no actual, serious illness. Hence these people should be pushed into “suitable” work.

    Now MSD and Paula Bennett have fallen for this convenient “science” from the man and his few supporting colleagues (Gordon Waddell, Kim Burton, Carol Black, also a Dr David Beaumont working here in New Zealand now, and running his own “agency” to get sick and disabled back into work).

    We can expect a rise in suicides, self harm and more people ending up on the streets begging, committing crimes and selling their sexual favours to make a living.

    This is what David Bratt stands for:
    http://www.gpcme.co.nz/pdf/GP%20CME/Friday/C1%201515%20Bratt-Hawker.pdf

    http://www.gpcme.co.nz/pdf/WS%20142%20Bratt%20-%20Shifting%20Your%20Primary%20Focus%20to%20Health%20and%20Capacity.pdf

    http://www.gpcme.co.nz/pdf/2012/Fri_DaVinci_1400_Bratt_Medical%20Certificates%20are%20Clinical%20Instruments%20too%20-%20June%202012.pdf
    (see pages 3, 16 and 33)

    The All Work Test in the UK – by Aylward
    http://www.square-sun.net/bamsawt/descriptors.htm

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