LINDSAY MITCHELL: Laugh-out-loud hypocrisy

If Labour is good for anything it is continuing to provide a rich source of irony and humour.

On Monday morning, responding to government plans to put beneficiaries who do not meet their obligations on partial money-management via payment cards which can only be used for essentials, the opposition leader Chris Hipkins told NewstalkZB news this would only make "more people dependent on the state":

"There is plenty of evidence to suggest that the more subservient you make people, the less likely they are to end up in sustainable long-term employment where they can stand on their own to feet."

This is laugh-out-loud hypocrisy. Let's remind ourselves what happened under Labour.

Average estimated future years on a benefit grew from 10.7 to 13.6 years (Sept 2022). For sole parents it is now a staggering 17 years (which does not include any time already spent on benefit.)

The number of beneficiaries jumped from 289,788 in Dec 2017 to 378,711 by Dec 2023 - by almost a third.

Yet Hipkins has the audacity to claim National's change of direction will make more people dependent and subservient. More subservient? That is rich irony from the Covid minister who demanded and exploited subservience in an unprecedented manner.

But back to welfare. Labour (supported by the Greens) had made benefits much easier to access. Case managers were directed to spend  their time ensuring beneficiaries were receiving their Full And Correct Entitlements (known as FACE) rather than helping them find jobs.  Obligations were played down and few sanctions imposed.  This must be what Green MP Ricardo Menendez now calls "autonomy" or freedom which he claims the coalition government's new rules will take away.

On Tuesday, opposition responses became even more ridiculous.

Housing Minister Tama Potaka announced that the number of households living in emergency housing had dropped from 3,141 to 2,133 between last December and June this year.

How to attack this good news? Undermine it by accusing the government of not knowing or caring where these families have gone.

Labour housing spokesman Kieran McAnulty told the NZ Herald:

“[They’re] trying to crow about fewer people accessing support when they’ve made it harder for them to access ... Where have the families they’ve turfed out gone to?”

If McAnulty was familiar with the data he would know that between May 2023 and November 2023 - the last six months of Labour's administration - the numbers also fell by 10%. Prior to that, they had fallen from a peak of almost 5,000 in Nov 2021 to just over 3,000 by Nov 2023. Did the then opposition, National and ACT demand to know where these families had disappeared to? Of course not.

But today I stopped laughing.

In a further push to rubbish National's attempt to reduce long-term benefit dependency, Chris Hipkins told Nick Mills on NewstalkZB:

"... the vast majority who go onto a benefit come off a benefit within six months. That's a fact that gets missed in this debate."

This year, to date, there have been 122,331  benefit grants and 115,269 benefit cancels. This illustrates significant churn, and people using social security as it was intended.

But at a given point-in-time (let's use June 2024) 72 percent of beneficiaries have been dependent for more than a year. The 'vast majority' in fact.

To curry favour with credulous voters Hipkins is still trotting out the counterfactual he and Carmel Sepuloni used to defend the growing dependence under the Ardern/Hipkins government. He is still in denial. There is still no problem. It's scandalous obfuscation.

Then, in a welcome reversion to comedy, asked if he thought the plan would actually reduce the number of people on benefits he replied, "No. I mean I think government are finding in a lot of areas now, slogans don't change things." 

Just as 'In it for you' was no more effective than 'Let's do this!'

More somberly, correction of the many problems generated over six reckless years is vital, unavoidable and unfortunately hurting a lot of people. Those responsible for the recklessness, many of whom are now opposition spokespeople, haven't a leg to stand on when it comes to forming a logical and credible objection. And yet they continue to insult the intelligence of New Zealanders daily.

Lindsay Mitchell blogs here