Here come the brutal beneficiary crack down

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Jobseeker beneficiaries to get more intensive support, as numbers rise

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Social Development Minister Louise Upston have announced new targeted management of Jobseeker beneficiaries, as new quarterly figures reveal more people on Jobseeker support.

According to the Government’s figures, 8000 more people were receiving Jobseeker support in the last quarter, to 204,800 people – stressing the coalition’s goal of reducing the number of Jobseeker beneficiaries by 50,000, to 140,000.

The number this time last year was 190,000.

Upston announced the introduction of new needs assessments for people on the Jobseeker benefit, as well as phone-based case management. Every person with a case manager will be eligible for a work-readiness assessment and a personalised plan.

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When that ghoul says new needs assessment, what she means is they are putting together a punishment team who will go to the unemployed with harsher sanctions and more brutal requirements. The goal now is to find ways to say no to the benefit.

The problem Ghoul is finding is that beneficiaries are doing what they are being threatened with…

Upston said 1% of beneficiaries were in the red part of the Traffic Light System, while 90% were complying with their obligations.

“It’s lower than we thought we might see. Over 98% are complying with their obligations when they’re ‘green’.”

…so despite meeting their work demands, National needs to purge the numbers so if you don’t answer the phone when they call, that’s enough to be pushed off welfare.

Then there is this horrific admission…

Ministry for Social Development ‘concerned’ one-in-four beneficiaries are paid wrong

The Ministry for Social Development (MSD) is “concerned” that nearly one-in-four beneficiaries are not getting their correct entitlements.

Its latest annual report, the subject of scrutiny in Parliament on Wednesday, shows 77.6% of working-age benefit entitlement assessments were processed correctly.

That’s below the ministry’s target of no-less-than-95% and down from 82.7% last year. It means nearly one-in-four were getting incorrect entitlements.

The Greens’ social development spokesman Ricardo Menéndez March told the Herald more needs to be done to address a serious issue.

“At a time when benefit levels already sit below the poverty line, the consequences of not having your benefits correctly assessed are dire,” he said.

“You could be slapped with huge debt if you’ve been over-paid, or worse, leave families without the means to put food on the table or a roof over their heads.”

…so the complexity and purposely obtuse manner in which MSD runs benefits so they can catch you out in a ‘relationship’ and claim you have committed benefit fraud alongside a broken system that entraps beneficiaries into debt all combines to make a system as unpleasant and brutal as possible.

The idea is to make living on the benefit so stressful you either drop out or self harm.

Unemployment is 4.8%, 9% for Māori-  where are all the jobs these beneficiaries are supposed to be going to?

This Government has used an Austerity program to borrow for tax cuts while purposefully underfunding public services and only implementing regulation change for their donors.

The poorest are collateral damage for National’s wealthy donor interests.

If you aren’t angry, you aren’t paying attention.

 

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27 COMMENTS

  1. once again you have to have a jab at Maori .Why is it not sufficient to say there are 4.8% of workers unemployed and leave it at that .But no we have to point out that 9% of Maori are unemployed so the white folk can say that Maori are just lazy bastards .If we stopped putting a race label on everything that is not going to well for the whole of NZ we might just get people working on a solution as apposed to going ,oh those bloody Maori are ding this or that .

    • I’m white and I take it that the 9% figure reflects how difficult it is for Maori people to get employment. I suspect that the racist people who complain that Maori are lazy would do that regardless of what any evidence says as they don’t want any evidence interfering with their opinions.

  2. Good, it’s long overdue. We need harsher sanctions, including the cancellation of benefits for six months if any work or other requirements are broken.

    I would strongly support the extension of euthanasia laws to give individuals the option to be eliminated from the gene pool if they are struggling to survive.

    • Look dick head .Come and meet my son who is now facing redundancy before xmas because the blabbering Bishop has decided to close social housing down .He is involved in the repair side of state housing and the company was doing 180 houses a month and now are doing near to zip and what work they are doing is much like ripping the sleeve off your shirt and covering the hole in the roof then painting it to make it stick to the sheet for a month or so .
      My son would love to discuss the euthanasia option with you .
      Also people like you are part of the reason we have so many young men killing them selves when things like this happen .Get over your self you self interest prick .

    • What’s your address MNZGA?
      In case beneficiaries would like to euthanize you.
      A world with no beneficiaries and everyone on a million dollars a year!
      Looks like you were at the bottom of the intellect gene pool so you’re the first to go.

    • So your vision of Make New Zealand Great Again is not a country where people aren’t struggling so much that they see being topped as their only option.

    • If you can’t love your brother who you can see how can you love God who you can’t see? Life is a lot easier if you don’t deliberately create division by arbitrarily condemning people on the basis of employment when you have no idea of the circumstances of each individual.

  3. The last time we had a national government my grandson was 3 days old and my daughter was phoned by a WINZ employee enquiring if she had applied for any jobs in the last week .Being in hospital having a kid by c section was not deemed as a good enough reason .Paula Benefit was the minister at the time .

  4. The intention behind loudly and publicly harassing beneficiaries is to send a strong message to the employed – pull your head in or this is what you get. They won’t get people into jobs (unemployment is rising) so that doesn’t make sense – but putting a dampener on the labor market and weakening wage and conditions for workers that will be helpful and encouraging for investors.

  5. National and ACT unbelievably vacuous.
    There is nothing more stupid than forcing square pegs into round holes except for trying to force them into non-existent holes.
    Create work, do not punish those who are unemployed due to deliberate government policy, it solves nothing.

  6. “Its latest annual report, the subject of scrutiny in Parliament on Wednesday, shows 77.6% of working-age benefit entitlement assessments were processed correctly.”

    The solution to this would be to fire the MSD benefit guard dogs and just let people apply by sending a form to IRD and let IRD say yes to all payment applications like during covid. The IRD already know from the PAYE if someone is employed or not.

  7. They have to meet their prison quota and over-run the Health system to meet their fundamental dystopic agenda

  8. ‘We need harsher sanctions, including the cancellation of benefits for six months if any work or other requirements are broken.’
    Spoken by someone who has obviously never needed to deal with MSD and their lack of competence and indifference.
    In my retirement I have taken to helping beneficiaries in their struggles with MSD and over a ten year period I have these observations.
    Most MSD staff are working there because they cannot get a better job. Almost all are seeking to escape the hell on earth that is employment by MSD.
    Most frontline staff who face the public are decent people but they must had over cases to remote officialdom who have retreated into mantras like ‘reducing welfare dependency’ and ‘encouraging self help.
    The people who are loudest in their condemnation of welfare benefits are generally those who have never done a day’s hard work in their life, never been hungry or cold and get most of their entertainment from the torture of harmless animals( because they are not allowed near children).
    As regards euthanasia I suggest Make New Zealand Great Again leads by example.

  9. It is starkly obvious that there are not enough jobs. That is the reason for the numbers on JobSeeker. But idiots like Luxon don’t seem to be able to do the maths. Or is it they just want to kick people while they are down.

    The terminology JobSeeker ffs is abusive. The are unemployed. They should be receiving a livable amount no questions asked. They paid their taxes.

    • Luxon is just an idiot along with most of his ministers from the 3 parties who have no idea of living in the shit hole they are creating .I fear for my grand kids who appear to have no future in NZ when they finish their education if that still exists in the next ten years .In fact they might be expected to get a job next year as there is no longer a massive influx of slaves willing to be exploited other than those being trafficed here by their fellow country men

Comments are closed.