National’s beneficiary bashing isn’t social welfare policy, it’s a Right Wing Revenge Fantasy
Jesus wept this is becoming a spite election…
More sanctions for unemployed beneficiaries under National
National has pledged to introduce more sanctions for unemployed beneficiaries who “persistently” do not meet benefit obligations.
The sanctions could include mandatory community work experience of up to three months, benefit suspensions or reductions, and Work and Income having a greater role in managing a beneficiary’s money.
National would also require jobseekers to reapply for the benefit every six months, require documented proof of job applications and interview attendance to continue receiving the benefit, and impose a one-month benefit stand-down for people evading arrest warrants.
…this follows on from ACTs attack on the mentally ill and drug addicts…
NZ election 2023 live: ACT announces welfare policy, targets drug addicts and mentally ill
The ACT Party has released its welfare policy today, which calls for benefits to be taken off people who can’t work due to drug addiction or mental illness and aren’t seeking support.
…ACT and National are slipping in the Polls, so they do what the Right does best – bash the dirty filthy bennies!
Targeting drug addicts and the mentally ill is so on brand for ACTs petty fascism, what the play is privatisation of welfare.
Private welfare companies will be brought in to take contracts and they get bonuses from either transitioning the mentally ill and drug addicts into work or cut them off welfare altogether for breaking some bullshit rule they invent.
This is welfare privatisation using drug addicts and the mentally ill as the punching bag.
Once established they will come after solo parents, the unemployed and the disabled with the same cruelty.
This is where we are in the election cycle right now, beating up on drug addicts and the mentally ill.
This isn’t social policy from ACT or National, it’s a fucking Right Wing Revenge Fantasy!
Research shows these sanctions DON’T work, they simply cause misery and that’s fine with ACT and National voters because they are sir furious at Labour they will enact any malice to win.
This is the bitter nasty Kiwi who lurks at the edge of the BBQ.
It’s racist, it’s bigoted and with the Alliance of Arsehole we have beneficiary bashing climate denying anti vaxxers in charge.
I would call ACT and National Cunts, but they lack the depth and warmth.
This is pure spite and malice politics now and the backlash to this right wing revenge fantasies will be blistering.
National and ACT voters wan to use the ballot box to punish those they despise.
David looked very sheepish on Q+A on recently as Jack grilled him over how much money ACT would get going after beneficiary welfare fraud when it cost $50m to investigate and only resulted in $2.5m back.
Jack compared this to the $7billion in Tax fraud and the pittance in welfare fraud and it was obvious the focus on the poorest instead of the richest was nothing more than political spite on behalf of ACT.
Similarly, ACTs call to destroy the Human Rights Commission…
“The Human Rights Commission is nothing but a Wellington managerial-class quango desperately trying and failing to justify the funding it receives from taxpayers. It’s time for it be abolished,” says ACT Leader David Seymour.
“One of New Zealand’s most serious problems has been met with one of New Zealand’s most serious wastes of money.
“Today they released a report, following a two-year inquiry, where their key finding is that housing is a human right and their solution is to create another useless organisation to act as a ‘watchdog’, and integrate te tiriti o waitangi into policymaking.
“There’s not a single recommendation that would, you know, make it easier to build more houses. Which is the fundamental issue here. ACT on the other hand has a detailed GST-sharing policy that funds councils to provide infrastructure, and will cut red tape around building.
“Time and time again, Paul Hunt and the hapless Commission have proven they have no clue. They trot out tired left-wing platitudes and talking points and barely even try to dress them up as something resembling genuine policy work.
“They fundamentally misunderstand human rights. A human right is only meaningful if someone fulfils a duty to furnish that right.
“A human right to housing is meaningless unless someone fulfils the duty of providing you with housing. The Commission couldn’t tell the difference between a hammer and a nail.
“If it was as easy as the Commission makes it out to be, ACT would simply say “it should be a human right to not experience a cost of living crisis” or “it should be a human right to not have to dodge hundreds of potholes on the highway” or “it should be a human right to not have to put up with a Labour Government until the election in 100 days.”
“It is shameless that they have spent two years on the taxpayer dime ‘investigating’ this issue and still can’t come up with a single solution. A group of fifth form economics students could come up with better in a few periods, that would cost taxpayers a lot less and the students might even learn something.
“The Commission is at best irrelevant and at worst dangerous. It has become a highly-politicised, left-wing organisation, and when it comes to actually helping people with human rights, it doesn’t help at all.
“ACT sees no purpose for it and would abolish it completely.”
…Look, I’m not saying ACT are fascist, but amputating Pacific, Ethnic, Māori, Women’s and Youth political voices ALONGSIDE the Human Rights Commission make their shirts a shade of Sepia doesn’t it?
A light chocolate? A bark?
Sepia, chocolate or Bark, whatever the shade of shirt colour, it is a brown though right?
Not over the top fascism, that takes too much effort and we are far too laid back a culture for goose stepping, but we enjoy a casual fascism in NZ.
A gun centric, public service mutilating free market level basic bitch bigotry we are talking about here right?
Amputating the political voices of Māori, Women, Youth, Pacific and Ethnic Kiwis ON TOP of killing off the Human Rights Commission ON TOP OF ankle bracelets on 11 year olds ON TOP OF allowing the gun nuts to abolish the gun registry ON TOP OF billions into prisons ON TOP OF vast cuts to welfare ON TOP OF sacking thousands of public servants ON TOP OF vast tax cuts to the rich ON TOP OF a referendum to redefine the Treaty and force it upon Māoridom which will spark a civil war ON TOP OF bashing drug addicts, the mentally ill and beneficiaries.
These are extreme policies which will cause enormous social dislocation and a level of civil disobedience that will make the Parliament Lawn protests look calm and rational.
Add to that National giving rich Landlords $250 per fortnight funded by robbing 2 year olds, mutilating public transport and literally robbing the climate change funds and we have a class war being waged without the political vocabulary.
ACT and National are drunk on their own sense of power and are promising ever more radical change which they intend to implement, no matter how many riots it inspires.
They are wide eyes acolytes who are believers and I don’t think the vast majority actually understand their policy platform and how dangerous it will be to implement.
You’ve all seen how useless Luxon is, there’s no way he’s going to be able to stop someone as smart as David Seymour getting everything he wants in a post election negotiation.
We will get 100% ACT policy with no filters.
The country needs to understand what that looks like before they vote.
This isn’t an election, it’s a grudge fuck and racist, beneficiary bashing antivax conspiracy theorists are about to take over.
Weep dear NZ, we are about to go to a very dark place if ACT/National and NZF take over.
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The HRC is a racist, sexist, ageist organisation run by a bunch of lanyard wearing pearl clutchers.
They achieve nothing
Defund them
I just watched Luxon try and defend this. He is an idiot. I can only think this a tactic to get people off talking about their bullshit tax numbers.
The 1ZB crowd will be surprised to learn the vast majority of these beneficiaries are white males between 17 to 40 ish. They are already bashed anyway by the current system. If you want to go after freeloaders go after the religious institutions. They just need to believe in a faith and hey presto no tax.
There is a scope of being able to care more in this policy – I don’t see bashing.
I think if they can confidently identify the “15%” that are less compliant, there must be a better way not to make the 85% jump through endless hoops for no good reason.
It seems now the mask is finally off. The thing that separates the average person from the right, is the rights Justification for cruelty(someone quoted brilliantly). Uriah Heep and Scrooge are no longer fictional characters, but fully fleshed out and living among us. The throw people to the streets while at the same time, take millions from multiple property and big business who have lined up to buy your mothers house from her. And like global climate change it’s only going to get worse unless you realise the problem. Them.
“David looked very sheepish on Q+A on recently as Jack grilled him over how much money ACT would get going after beneficiary welfare fraud when it cost $50m to investigate and only resulted in $2.5m back.
Jack compared this to the $7billion in Tax fraud and the pittance in welfare fraud and it was obvious the focus on the poorest instead of the richest was nothing more than political spite on behalf of ACT.”
Anyone commenting on benefit fraud, let the above sink in first.
7 billion in tax fraud and 2.5million in benefit fraud?
Act and National performing to their voter base.
Clueless ….They really are clueless…National & ACT are vying to see who can come up with the most dumbest unworkable, stupidest ideas.
They have zero idea about the complexity and hardship suffered in many peoples’ lives whereby holding down a job is an impossibility. Some people have found themselves in these positions through no fault of their own, some are their through their own stupidity and a lot are their due to the behaviour of their parents, who in turn, were like that due to the behaviour of their parents, and so it goes on down the chain.
What National, and therefore ACT and N.Z First…the 3 headed monster, are proposing, will not shift the dial at all.
The fake story that National came up with, stating that an unspecified ‘business owner’ had a beneficiary turn up for a job interview in pyjamas, is a sign of desperation. The media never pursued that story, or the supposed ‘business owner,’ to check the veracity of the story. Why not?? Lets get all these hard done by business owners on and hear about the pyjama garbed applicants…what the job was? …what was said?..
It was a big claim by National …i want to know the full truth of the story…the facts!!
It wasn’t that long ago that the complaint was that the unemployment figure was getting too low and people were spending to much at the desperate ‘businesses’ around the country and that that was adding to inflation.
Now ‘businesses’ say the can’t make ends meat or get any staff. ‘Businesses’ need to stop whining and be grateful that they got huge support from the taxpayer during the full length of the Covid lockdowns.
What an ungrateful lot!!
However, the good news is, it’s pretty obvious that National/ACT/N.Z First will not win the election, despite all the commentators doing their best to try try and talk National up and make out that it’s a foregone conclusion.
They are on the way down now and there’s some big bombs to be dropped yet between now and election day!
The TV3 debate tonight will be a fascinating watch….
A.C.T. and the Tories supported the abolition of the Full Employment Policy — that is, after unemployment had already been abolished, they deliberately reintroduced it on a mass scale, in order to lower wages (‘labour market flexibility’), thus successfully transferring this wealth upward (to the top 10%).
Their corporate donors have long promoted the idea that all social programmes be replaced with costly insurance policies from Wall Street. This highly unpopular policy can only be pushed through if workers are turned against one another.
Have to go after corporate welfare as well and white collar criminal s.
5%of Real estate s pimps fees should going into a fund to manage bad slum landlords.
More privatised prisons under a NACT Government need to keep the pipe line full. Benefit bashing will result in more criminal activity.
Nothing like some raw meat for the tory faithful–a good old Bennie Bash usually suffices to get them snarling. In reality in the 21st century punitive, sadistic, welfare should be done away with and replaced with a basic income for all citizens, abated by tax as you earn more.
Unemployment is not a moral failure–it is an intentional feature of capitalism and finance capital to put downward pressure on wages and worker organisation and fight backs. Even if there are some who do not want to work who could blame them with such an ugly system of exploitation?
The funny old thing with a lot of Natzos who demonise other citizens is that they are “Bennies” too, on National Superannuation and Winter Heating payments.
One thing is for sure dirty old torys always vote, whether driven to the booth or tottering in on walking frames. That will be the tragedy of this Election–alienation and low voter turnout from younger people and those living off shore.
Some are salivating for all oppression that the Epson Twerker wants to deliver on fellow AO/NZers including Māori especially–but mark these words–we are in for some heavy duty social unrest and anarchy.
Shepherding unemployed persons into community work is quite a constructive move. It reconnects people with the community, they can pick up skills, and the volunteer sector is crying out for helpers. Some charity shops operate with only one worker on hand, and that is not safe. Most need help with transportation and processing issues.
In theory, the Human Rights Commission sounds good, but when it has racist advisors, and when the Commissioner himself objects to women being allowed to speak in public places, it’s not so very good after all.
Whether the MSD has the expertise to handle any expansion of its role is a separate issue, and a big ask, when so many politicians are pretty damn useless themselves.
Casual cruelty at a safe distance is in the NACT DNA. It is how you “get ahead” in life after all – so it must be good.
NZ First marched in lockstep with these political bludgers as well, threatening the most vulnerable who have the least. What sort of wonk would want to upset the fragile economy and what’s left of social cohesion even more with ideology from the 80’s and 90’s? I thought Winston was coming back with his policies to combat standover men, violence and drugs. Turns out he is the standover man preying on law abiding citizens with his social policies. You’d think Winston would have empathy for jobseekers after his Super debacle but no, he is in this for himself. He has in fact enriched himself with taxpayer money intentionally for decades as have many of these politicians, and has the gall to get on his high horse and criticize low income communities who have no choice. He helped create the gamed, privatized employment sector, enabled the sell out of the country’s assets and propped up the right wing governments. He lives in the most deprived region in the country so he must understand what little choice many people have there. But all he has is bile, and his comfortable life built from the pockets of the taxpayer, all the while drawing down a Superannuation benefit. You know, like a bludger. Superannuitants are the biggest cost to the New Zealand economy and to suggest Jobseekers are the problem is pure political spite. Let’s put a cap of two years on Superannuation and then go on the telly and ridicule old people. My advice to the unemployed and the underemployed if you can manage it, if you work one hour a week you are classed as employed and your HUMAN RIGHT to have your wages topped up to the living wage by the state should be honored. Then you should tell Winston and his Kapos in National and Act to fuck off and leave you alone.
Arbeit macht frei
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Arbeit_macht_frei
Arbeit macht frei is a German phrase meaning “Work sets you free” or “Work makes one free”.
It is a Right Wing trope of the political representatives of wealthy New Zealanders (who mostly live off the work of others and do do little if any productive work themselves), that beneficiaries, particularly the unemployed, don’t want to work. And therefore must be punished.
Only ten months ago we had the reserve bank governor telling us that the number of unemployed New Zealanders must be increased for the good of the economy.
This exposes a reality of capitalist economy. To increase the rate of exploitation of working people, what Marx called “the reserve army of labour” that must be kept in state of destitution and wretchedness in competition with those in work, to exert a downward pressure on wages.
Adrian Orr: Beating inflation will mean higher unemployment
By Liam Dann
27 Oct, 2022 05:35 PM
5 mins to read
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/adrian-orr-beating-inflation-will-mean-higher-unemployment/WO3WLQQUGWEC5NVK3AQTR2BN5A/
….”Of critical importance to overall financial stability will be the robustness of the labour market.”
Orr warned that the interest rate hikes needed to beat inflation would mean higher unemployment.
“Returning to low inflation will, in the near-term, constrain employment growth and lead to a rise in unemployment,” he said.
“The actual extent of this trade-off remains unclear, however, given the significant labour shortages globally and the very different means of employment being adopted post-Covid.”
“Importantly, it is highly unlikely that we are at maximum sustainable employment if inflation is still high and variable,” he said…..
When Adrian Orr talks about “the robustness of the labour market” he means high unemployment and competition for jobs.
When Adrian Orr talks about “inflation”, he means wage inflation, a very bad thing for capitalism because it cuts into profit margins and takings. Increases in profit takings are referred to, not as inflation, but as “Growth” a good thing, because it allegedly leads to the rich investing in more profit taking industries. Of course all this infesting is at the discretion of the wealthy who are more likely to invest in property holdings rather than productive industries, fueling speculation in house prices.
Just a reminder; Rising house prices are ‘growth’, a good thing. Just as unemployment is a good thing for capitalism, so is homelessness.
if you are unable to work or can’t find a job or you are homeless, the Nats and ACT will tell you it is your fault and you must be punished.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/rise-of-the-ghost-homes-more-than-33000-auckland-dwellings-officially-classified-empty/3JXSEQNUK36SBG7UBQMJ3VUPGU/
Looks like all you feral bums are going to have to get a job. Up the nats.
The problem Bomber as his religion he is not sayin where the slash and burn is happening, or like his religion, he spent years in America, is his religion a fundamentalist one, like don!t drink alcohol, don!t smoke, all nice things, yet we are a country not a sect, is this loose jaw going to treat our country like a religious sect, and probably if getting is, swearing allegiance to a King, as most politicians do with reverence, or is this slack jaw hostile to questions, about his religion and also hostile about the budget numbers of the slash and burn his proposed if in their taxation and employment numbers they will slash and burn.
Magic. Rub the bottle and the magic genie will appear to make all difficulties and failings disappear. Always keep the love alive; people must never get to actually see the magic bottle.
The leader of Oz did it with a green curtain and green smoke – we have something similar, magic is all around us swirling and changing us. Just follow the yellow brick path you perfidious right-wing children and sexist-non-sexists – don’t know which way to read that; try Searle’s Non-Sexist Dictionary of which one person said:
It’s obvious from this book’s content that Ronald Searle was not only an accomplished caricaturist and a cartoonist, but also a coward who was so deathly afraid of women’s rights movement that he had to draw a ‘satire’ to demean it.
A clear mind, sharp eyesight, and a torch is what we need to see through magic, or will we get sawn in half in this societal magic cycle? See confusion about the end of this man – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Jamal_Khashoggi
If NACT get in the lower socio-economic groups are in for a rough ride.
Indeed Ngungukai. I’m voting TPM. There’s some awesome staunch kiwis in their party, speaking up about our people, Kiwi people.
Plus they’ve got the best policies.
Stick it to white fragility with a vote for TPM.
Or just vote for TPM because we f.n care, and it’s their turn now to shake up this mess and bring some mana back to us all. My opinion.
Always, the numbers.