Child poverty should be eliminated in New Zealand

I am please to see Labour moving away from its former position regarding Working for Families and children of beneficiaries.  While it was defensible from the "encouraging people into work" position, the reality is that it meant more kids living in poverty.  As Annette King says in the release:  "We are not going to create a more productive economy while significant groups of children are experiencing the disadvantages highlighted by the report".

We should not tolerate child poverty (or any poverty for that matter) in our country.  I would hope to see any future Labour-led Government commit to eliminating all poverty from New Zealand and creating the policy settings to do that.

Comments

[tim barclay]

Lets all get a welfare benefit. Better still stop paying people to have babies when they have no means to support them. That will eliminate child poverty.

[Tony Milne]

What scares me about that comment Tim, is that I don't think you're kidding.

[rhonda]

I dont think we should stop paying them or they would starve . However I do believe that we should encourage them to stop breeding and to take responsibility for the children they already have.
I think its called behaving like an adult.

[Cherie]

The cycle of welfare dependency among young mothers, depending on the DPB, is sad! They lose the sence of purpose & hope for a better life. Because the kids come first! Not much of a good life, living on the DPB. I think we need mandatory courses, for all those on DPB, to address the issues that cause those to rely on state dependency. Who wants to live with poverty, paying the bills - week by week? Poverty breeds poverty. While we can address the issues of breaking the cycle of family violence or abuse....we should address breaking the cycle of poverty. Starting first, with basic personal responsibility. I can't have children (because i'm gay), but if i could adopt or if i could have children...i would want them to have the BEST life & i'd ensure that i was in a really well-paying job, to give them everything they needed and wanted...like every other kid.

[Hugo]

I would hope to see any future Labour-led Government commit to eliminating all poverty from New Zealand and creating the policy settings to do that.

they had nine years and they fucked that up, why give them another shot?

[Albatross]

It takes guts to admit that mistakes have been made. Unfortunately politicians are human and many voters don't like this fact.

Misconceptions about mothers "breeding for a business" or the benefit being a luxury only harm people in poverty. Most mothers who don't have a disability would like to get off the DPB. Mothers on the DPB would like to feed their children more healthy food than worrying about the power bill.

If labour can get in next election I hope they can amend working for families so it wont discriminate against single parents, unemployed families and the disabled. There are fears about people abusing the system but welfare has always been a safety net.

I know some people will be holding the idea that people on welfare are leeches to society. But this number will of significantly lessened after this recession is over. By then most would know that unexpected things happen to all of us and the ones we care about.

[tim barclay]

Most mothers on the DPB probably deserve it and do a good job and get off the benefit as soon as possible. But "most" still leaves a significant minority who see having endless babies as an income stream to get money to buy drugs and alcohol. That minority undermines public confidence in the welfare system. The Labour Party says lets forget about that minority - give them more taxpayers money.

[Chris Diack]

Lets make a rule against poverty - declare it illegal - all with a high ringing moral tone that is all the more countertenor pure with being out of political power.

Try reading the report.

"The consensus is also that some of the remaining relationship of income to child wellbeing is causal. But in terms of effect sizes, the causal effects are modest. What is clear from the research is that income transfer programmes to children in poor families, while certainly of value, are not a magic bullet for solving issues of poor current or future childwell-being." Page 168

http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/19/2/43570597.pdf

I suspect that our poorest families are already in receipt of largess from the State and considerable intervention already and this over a number generations.

Regarding the young people killing themselves, I am not sure this has much to do with poverty - many come from middle income families. There may be poverty but it is not necessarily material poverty.

[Tony Milne]

Rhonda - any ideas for how Central Government should encouraging some people to stop "breeding"?

Interesting that this conversation has turned into a conversation about DPB mums. I assume you all know that there are plenty of kids with two parents who are living in poverty (and that includes some families where parents are working)?

Hugo - In Labour's 9 years in office 130,000 NZ children were lifted out of poverty. If that is fucking up, I'd like to know what success looks like. If National achieved that in Government, I'd even consider voting for them. Unfortunateley, there will probably be more, not fewer, kids in poverty at the end of this National Government.