WAATEA NEWS COLUMN: Why are the poor paying for a war New Zealand didn’t start?

As petrol prices surge, fuel relief New Zealand has become a critical political issue — raising a simple but urgent question: why should low-income and rural whānau carry the cost of a war they had no hand in creating?

As petrol prices bite deeper into already stretched household budgets, the question is becoming unavoidable: why should ordinary New Zealanders, especially low-income and rural whānau, be forced to carry the cost of a war they had no role in causing?

The fuel shock is hitting the poorest first

We are into week four of America and Israel’s illegal war in Iran and I don’t need to tell you we are all already feeling it at the pump!

Every time we fill up, it feels like we are getting mugged!

Many, many, many whānau who were just holding on by their fingernails with the Cost of Living Crisis have been given another kick in the teeth!

The Government’s response leaves too many people out

The Government’s response has been too narrow.

They have built a false political narrative that Labour was so feckless in spending during Covid that the Government is paralysed with inaction to do anything now!

I say it’s a false narrative because if Labour was so feckless with spending, why is the National, ACT and the NZ First Government borrowing more than Jacinda and Grant did?

This Government is leaving this crisis to the free market and hoping you won’t blame them for their inaction.

The Greens have put forward an actual plan

To date, the Greens have shown real leadership with their proposed package.

Making public transport free for users:

• A relief payment for low income people or people who live rurally to help meet additional transport costs;
• A Windfall Profits Tax to prevent corporate price gouging;
• Reversing changes to school bus eligibility and routes, and temporary expansion of eligibility for school buses;
• Reversing the Government’s intended reduction in Total Mobility Support for disabled people; and
• Increase mileage rates to the 23,000 care and support workers to meet their actual travel costs.

That is what real leadership looks like!

The Government is too frightened to act with this crisis because they will sink their own narrative about how Labour acted with the last crisis.

This crisis is too serious for political cowardice

This crisis is too important to leave to politics.

This is not just an economic question. It is a moral one. If the cost of this war is being pushed onto those who can least afford it, then the response cannot be timid, selective or ideological. It must be immediate, broad and fair.

This is not just an economic crisis — it is a test of political will. If the burden of this war is being pushed onto those who can least afford it, then fuel relief New Zealand must be immediate, meaningful and fair — not selective, not timid, and not shaped by ideology.