Rodney Hide’s hypocrisy

I’m not impressed with Rodney Hide’s apology. It has now become a stock in trade for wayward politicians to apologise and expect the public to forgive.

Early last week I thought we’d got to the bottom of his hypocrisy with the $25,163 of taxpayer money spent on trips for his girlfriend which included a round the world jaunt with him as Minister of Local Government (an extra $25,000 for taxpayers) only to find out later in the week taxpayers also paid 90% of an earlier holiday for the couple in Hawaii. Hide had quietly paid the holiday money ($10,000) back to parliamentary services and hoped no-one would notice.

Enough has been said about the ACT leader’s double standards. Not only did he build his political career on strident criticism of MPs perks but ACT made its name criticising wasteful public spending. Now in the middle of a recession Hide sneakily bypassed the Prime Minister’s directive for ministers not to use their ministerial allowances to take partners overseas. Instead he used his parliamentary allowance as an MP elected before 1999 to achieve the same result. Taxpayers would pay.

Taxpayer subsidised travel for Hide’s girlfriend is more than a worker on the minimum wage could expect to earn in a year and much more than a solo parent struggling below the poverty line. Somehow Hide sees his girlfriend as more deserving of taxpayer support.

After relentless criticism of MPs perks the ACT Party leader stopped the gravy train just long enough to jump on with his girlfriend and then kept telling us we all had to tighten our belts during the recession while he was taking his off.

It’s an interesting commentary on ACT. This is the party which prides itself on policies which demand low taxes, less government spending and expecting individuals be more responsible in their personal lives. However it’s all just window dressing. Like most hardened capitalists they believe the rules of restraint and personal responsibility apply to others. Earlier this year former ACT Party leader Roger Douglas used his parliamentary perks to spend $44,000 on a trip to London to see his son’s family while demanding cuts to government spending in the recession. Double standards again.

More interesting than Hide’s two-faces of personal responsibility were his comments reported at the ACT breakfast fundraiser last week when he criticised John Key as not doing anything as Prime Minister – except launch the national cycleway. Hide complained that ACT did everything but was hated while the PM did nothing and was liked. He went on to say he had no trouble getting his ideas through cabinet. The other ministers were too absorbed in their own portfolios to take much notice apparently.

This is likely to be substantially true. Despite ACT gaining just 3.6% of the party vote at the last election Hide negotiated for himself a very powerful position within Key’s government. As Minister of Local Government he is keen is to push through what Green MP Sue Kedgley calls Rogernomics Part 2. In other words to bring to local government the same user-pays, privatisation, community-destroying policies which Roger Douglas brought to the 1984 Labour government.

Most National MPs are keen on these policies and are happy to see the Epsom MP drive the agenda they know is unpopular with the public. They are happy for ACT to be hated while their smiling assassin John Key avoids public wrath.

Hone Harawira’s misdemeanours are mild by comparison. He was wrong to leave his parliamentary delegation leaderless and head off to Paris for sightseeing. It looked bad because it was bad. And his angry email to Buddy Mikaere was also unacceptable. He reacted angrily when his side trip was questioned and responded with a race-based comment which assumed it was just pakeha criticising his jaunt.

I’ve often been critical of Maori Party MPs who react to race when it’s the behaviour which is wrong. The party’s refusal to criticise Zimbabwe’s Mugabe, its automatic support for the likes of Donna Awatere Huata (former ACT MP and convicted fraudster) and disgraced Labour MP Taito Philip Field (convicted of bribery and corruption) was based on their ethnicity as was Hone’s attack on those criticising his Paris jaunt.

We will always have badly behaving MPs but what we lack is the ability for voters to recall MPs who abuse their position. A petition signed by say 10% of voters in an electorate should be sufficient to force a recall poll which would give an electorate the ability to remove their MP from parliament. Such votes wouldn’t be held lightly and in the cases of Hide and Harawira would probably not be activated.

However simply the existence of the power to recall an MP would be enough to keep most of them a lot more respectful of taxpayers than we’ve seen from recent events.

ENDS

Personal responsibility starts with the brewers

Another appalling road crash. Two teenagers killed with others hospitalised in serious condition. This time it’s Hawkes Bay and a late night collision near Napier on a bridge over the Tutaekuri River where a van with seven young people going home from a party collided with a car.

There are horrendous pictures and distraught faces as devastated families are trying to come to grips with the tragedy. At the centre is the all too familiar combination of alcohol, teenagers and cars.

The family of the 16 year old at the wheel of the van deny alcohol was a factor but it seems the police hold the opposite view. And who would be surprised. Young people killing themselves and others in road crashes where alcohol is a factor are a common feature of life in New Zealand.

In the coming weeks there will be much mourning the loss of these young lives and plenty of finger pointing at young people not acting responsibly when it comes to alcohol. The young driver will be held responsible and it appears the police are likely to lay charges.

We all expect young people to be responsible for their actions but just pause a moment and look what these teenagers are up against. There is a whole industry spending two hundred thousand dollars a day encouraging New Zealanders to drink more and it’s young New Zealanders who are at the sharp end of alcohol promotion.

The alcohol industry are creating new products every day to target teenage drinkers. Alcopops or RTDs (Ready To Drinks) were popularised by Michael Erceg’s Independent Liquor and are targeted at teenagers. And it’s not just boys but increasingly young girls are in the alcohol industry spotlight. These sweet drinks which disguise the taste of alcohol are popular with young women – they have become cocktails for teenagers. Erceg left a billion dollar business when he died four years ago and the empire continues to grow on the backs of popular youth drinks such as Woodstock and Pulse, not to mention the KGB parties (KGB is a popular alcopop) which the company sponsors. Again the focus is on encouraging young New Zealanders to booze up large.

And then there is Lion Nathan and Dominion Breweries who are promoting in the same youth market. Dominion Brewery’s Tui brand shamelessly uses sex to promote alcohol and along with its various promotions such as the Miss Tui competition and Tui Brewery Girls Calendar it’s no wonder we have problems when we expect our teenagers to navigate such a vigorously-promoted, booze-sodden culture.

Personally I’ve had a gutsful of hearing about the failure of teenagers to take personal responsibility for their actions when no-one is calling for alcohol industry leaders to show the same personal responsibility.

Where are the questions for Geoff Ricketts, Chair of Lion Nathan since 2001? According to the December 2008 issue of Management magazine Ricketts philosophy “is to deliver strong returns for shareholders while conducting the business in line with deeply held values of integrity and doing the right thing for the long-term health of the business, the environment and the societies in which Lion Nathan operates”. Yeah right. It seems the dangers of alcohol abuse come a distant second to heavy promotion of alcohol to our youth so the company can deliver “strong returns to shareholders”.

And what about Brian Blake from Dominion Breweries which pushes the Tui advertising campaign targeting young New Zealanders? Where is his personal responsibility in all this?

Similarly with the director of Independent Liquor. I’m sure there will be the usual tut-tuting around the boardroom about irresponsible teenagers before the directors get down to salivating over the graphs showing increasing sales and growing profits from alcohol abuse.

Why is it that personal responsibility passes the corporates by? Why does it only apply to a 16 year old taking her friends home after a party?

These companies are all expecting teenagers to drink responsibly while they cynically push, push, push their products at young New Zealanders.

I’d like to see Geoff Ricketts and Brian Blake and the private equity directors who own Independent Liquor turn out on a Friday night to pick up the human remains of young lives lost from the irresponsible promotion of alcohol to youngsters.

It will be a good day in New Zealand when these booze barons take some personal responsibility for their actions rather than leave it to a hapless 16 year old to explain why she was drinking before the horrendous accident which killed two of her friends.

ENDS

National Standards threaten public education

The most encouraging aspect of the launch of the government’s so-called national standards last week was the decision by teacher and principal groups to boycott the gathering.

Despite Prime Minister John Key labeling the event the most important development in education in 20 years serious concern among educators is so widespread that those who job it is to implement the standards stayed away.

Predictably the Minister of Education was furious but is determined to force the changes through. She says she is “delighted for the first time that parents will now have information on what their children should be able to achieve and by when.”

She also said “Parents want, and deserve, clear information on how their children are doing at school.”

Prime Minister John Key took up the theme saying “parents want, and deserve, clear information on how their children are doing at school.” He said the standards were supported by parents, would lift achievement standards and provide “clear signposts” on a child’s progress.

It all sounds like motherhood and apple pie. Anyone would think schools were deliberately keeping parents in the dark and the government was stepping in to force those know-all teachers to toe the line.

In fact the vast majority of schools do provide parents with high quality data which tells the parent how their child is progressing, what the areas of weakness are and what needs to be done to improve in any particular area or excel further in areas of a pupil’s strengths. They also tell parents how they progress compared to other kids of the same age.

So why are teachers and principals so opposed to national standards? Simply because they will not raise educational achievement one iota but will bring a host of negatives for schools and pupils. There is not a single credible educational academic or school leader who supports the government on this one. Educators know the government is playing politics with our kids’ futures.

It is true the government of the day has the responsibility to set the direction of educational policy and the responsibility of the sector to implement it. But there is also a profound responsibility on education professionals to let the public know when a government has got it wrong.

So it’s good to see them kicking up a fuss. Their responsibility to parents regarding the education of kids is greater than their responsibility to the government of the day.

So this comes down to a battle for the hearts and minds of the public. The government is wading in with simplistic rhetoric which tries to convince parents that teachers and principals and preventing parents getting good information. They are claiming the national standards will improve student achievement but there isn’t a skerick of evidence to back up this claim.

On the other hand our education professionals can point to a host of overseas examples where national standards have had a dreadful and demoralizing effect on students and student achievement. The government is insisting on a policy which educators know does not work.

Waiting in the wings are the media who are siding against schools and championing their right to compare schools with league tables, based on national standards. They did this with secondary schools where they lauded praise on the likes of Cambridge High School and Avondale College and slammed low decile schools. Heaven knows we don’t want primary schools emulating Cambridge with its artificial 100 pass rates and what the media told us was inspiring leadership.

National wants national standards because it supports the idea of competition between schools and is quite happy for the media to publish the data to pit school against school. When this has happened overseas the effects have been wholly negative with teachers changing focus to “teach to the tests” and children getting a narrower curriculum.

The damage associated with national standards far outweighs the supposed benefits. It’s good to know our principals and parents will resist this most damaging development from the Minister who slashed night classes.

ENDS

ACC under threat from privatisation

I’ve been lucky enough to claim ACC only twice in my life.

The first was when a stack of dumps (two wool bales compressed into one for shipping) in a Napier woolstore collapsed and broke my leg. The compound fracture left me with five months in plaster and several weeks of physiotherapy to follow.

The second was a week off work with an infected knee after being pierced with a wool hook. For most of the time since then I’ve worked in relative safety as a classroom teacher but at the time I needed it the ACC was a godsend. It paid 80% of my working income throughout that time with medical treatment and physiotherapy paid in full. I hadn’t experienced life before ACC which had only come shortly before my first accident so I took it for granted. And so should we all.

National are itching for a chance to undermine this pillar of community-provided welfare for accident victims and last week launched their first foray with a raft of proposed changes to increase levies and reduce cover.

Firstly ACC Minister Nick Smith set the scene for policy change with a dramatic announcement of ACC liabilities being far beyond the ability of the fund to cover. He said it was a billion dollar disaster and would wreck the economy if not reigned in. One might have thought he was talking about the big four banks but somehow their billion dollar taxpayer gouging is not on National’s agenda. Instead its state-provided services he has his ideological eye on.

As several commentators have pointed out clearly and succinctly Nick Smith’s announcement was grossly misleading but there is nothing like claims of economic crisis to soften up the public for bad medicine. The scheme in fact is cheaper and run than comparable schemes anywhere else in the world. The ACC architect back in the 1970s, Owen Woodhouse, points out it cut administrative costs from about 30% in private insurance schemes to just 10%. He blames the problems with the scheme to the National government’s decision in 1998 to allow private sector insurers to compete for accident insurance.

The government’s proposed increases in levies will hit motorbike riders the hardest and it’s true this group have a higher accident profile. When I was in the male orthopaedic ward around three quarters of the other patients had broken bones from motor bike accidents. So should these riders pay a higher levy? I can’t see why. There is no evidence bike riders are more responsible for accidents they find themselves in than are car drivers. It’s just that bike riders are much more vulnerable in accidents. In fact there is a case for reducing ACC levies for bikes. They are more efficient with a smaller carbon footprint and we could dramatically reduce the need for more roading if a higher proportion of road users were on two wheels.

But National’s further differentiation of levies is another step to “user pays” rather than “community pays” and this is a necessary element to privatisation.

Meanwhile Smith’s proposal for reducing cover for the families of suicide victims is thoughtless as were his comments comparing loss of life through suicide with that of terminal illness. But the biggest impact of the proposed reduced cover is for seasonal and casual workers. Calculating ACC payouts using the average of their yearly earnings rather than the previous four weeks’ earnings will result in lower payouts for these already vulnerable workers. Why should their down-time between employment be used to reduce their accident income? They are already the lowest-paid workers yet do essential work for the economy in the likes of horticulture and hospitality. Why should their payouts be cut simply because they are vulnerable workers and easy to pick off?

Meanwhile all of us will face stiff increases in ACC levies. This is another important prerequisite for National’s plans to privatise the service. Higher levies and the chance for bigger profits will encourage the private sector to move in. A cheaper public-service based approached is anathema to National.

Their plans are for the most valuable parts of the service to be run for private profit while the bulk of what remains will be left for the taxpayer to pick up. This follows a familiar pattern. The first step in privatising rail for example was selling off the profitable freight forwarding section which left the rump in an even more parlous economic condition.

Nick Smith isn’t having it easy. His proposed plans are under threat because he can only proceed with ACT backing and Rodney Hide wants the privatisation speeded up. National went into the last election with plans to privatise provision but want to leave the “p” word out of policy till their second term of government. ACT is putting the pressure on and John Key says he’s open to the idea. The rest of us shouldn’t be.

Infratil puts the boot into low-paid bus drivers

Last Friday I joined a protest by Auckland bus drivers locked out by their employer, the Infratil-owned NZ Bus company.

It was a lively, spirited protest by some 400 drivers and supporters. Many are from the Pacific and an entertaining feast of singing and dancing accompanied open defiance of the company’s best endeavour to starve these workers into submission.

Earlier in the week the drivers had issued a work-to-rule notice saying they would not drive buses with faults, buses without radio telephones and wouldn’t break the speed limit when faced with tight timetables. They took this action after a full five months of bargaining.

It’s not surprising they want a better deal. These drivers have a starting rate of just $14.05 an hour and can be rostered anywhere between 4.30am and 1am the following morning. Their shifts will often be split leaving them with four hours unpaid work in the middle of day and they can be away from home for up to 15 hours at a time. They don’t get regular morning or afternoon tea breaks and can be rostered up to 5 ½ hours without a break.

When the NZ Bus drivers announced the work-to-rule to achieve the same as other bus drivers in Auckland the company response was to lock them out. No work till they agree to the company’s terms.

This is just the latest in a series of lockouts of workers around the country as employers go on the offensive against workers. Lockouts were once a rare event but have recently become commonplace. In the last two weeks companies have closed the door to workers at Bridgeman Concrete in Auckland and Open Country Cheese at Waharoa and at a number of smaller worksites around the country. These employers have had it so good for so long they aren’t used to workers fighting back. They are reacting with high-handed arrogance and aggression when Oliver Twist comes back for another ladle of gruel.

A worker fightback is long overdue. One of the locked-out bus drivers told how he has been a bus driver for 30 years. In 1982 he was paid $7 an hour when this was the median wage in New Zealand. By the late 1980s, when allowances were included he was earning $15 an hour. Now in 2009 he is on just $16 an hour with minimal allowances. The median wage in the meantime has risen to $18.70 (June 2008) but if his wage from 1982 had kept pace with inflation he would now be earning $21.66 an hour. Over the 30 years he has been driving the median wage has dropped in real terms by 15.8% while the purchasing power of his pay has decreased by no less than 35.4%. In other words all low and middle-income workers have gone backwards but these drivers have gone backwards much further than most.

On Infratil’s website there is the usual corporate spin about how visionary they are and how they invest in people. They should mention this applies only to director and senior management salaries – certainly not their bus drivers.

Much more insightful though is the bald statement “Infratil’s primary goal is to provide its shareholders with a consistent return of 20% per annum over the long term.” So there you have it. Lowly paid workers are being locked out so Infratil can keep passing fat cheques to its shareholders.

One might think the company would consider Auckland commuters before locking out the drivers but this doesn’t seem to bother them. They are running a monopoly on most bus services so they can afford to ignore public sentiment which seems to be firming up behind the drivers. People are asking why this very profitable corporation can’t pay the same rates as other Auckland bus companies.

Infratil claims the problem is strike action by the union and hopes the public will blame the drivers. It’s all spin – the workers are locked out by a resource-rich corporation which puts profits before people – either employees or the public. Families on low rates of pay don’t have the financial resources to sustain a longer-term lockout and this is what the company is counting on.

NZ Bus gets huge subsidies from Auckland ratepayers in a win-win deal for Infratil. On the profitable routes they get to keep all the profits while the ratepayer makes up any loss on routes which are not profitable. And it’s not chickenfeed. Auckland ratepayers give them over $58 million every year.

NZ Bus is a good example of why essential services such as public transport should be in public hands where they can be run more cheaply, more efficiently and reliably with better pay and conditions for those who do the work.

Devastation in Samoa and South Africa

There’s only been one story on New Zealand’s mind this week with devastation in Samoa and Tonga dominating the news with the heart-rending stories of families ripped apart by the tsunami which killed so many and destroyed so much.

I agree with those who say New Zealanders have reacted well. We have taken to heart the suffering of the victims and generous donations from many quarters are helping in the immediate relief effort. It’s as though New Zealand now sees itself as a South Pacific country rather than an outpost of the British empire as it did until not so long ago.

Most of us are Pacific Islanders now it seems which is a pleasant change from earlier decades when feelings often ran high against Pacific migrants coming to New Zealand.

Our government has not reacted with the same generosity of spirit with only a million dollars allocated at the front end of the tragedy and another million belatedly added. Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully says there will be more and Prime Minister John Key reiterated this during his weekend visit.

However it’s worth remembering the extent to which the New Zealand economy has been built by Pacific Island labour these past 50 years.

Compared to the $2 million the government is donating to the relief effort Pacific Island workers have helped businesses here accumulate billions in capital. This was, and still is, predominantly in low-paid, insecure, family-unfriendly work. These jobs have benefitted the Pacific as money remitted from here helps keep the local economies afloat but the benefits are lop-sided in favour of New Zealand business.

There is always the tendency to see the Pacific as dependent neighbours and treat them paternalistically while eyeing whatever resources and business opportunities they may have available. In reality the dependency is as much the other way round.

It’s important we remember this when it comes to further aid from New Zealand for reconstruction. In Disaster Capitalism author Naomi Klein describes how similar disasters have been used to rebuild economies to the detriment of local people. New Orleans in the US for example was rebuilt after Hurricane Katrina with so much of the public sector services such as schools now operated via private contracts. Murray McCully won’t be averse to looking for such opportunities to provide “aid” with strings attached. We need to keep an eye on him.

Another story touched a raw nerve with me last week when an armed gang of 40 men attacked the Kennedy Road shack settlement in Durban, South Africa. Three were killed, many injured and over a thousand people fled their homes. The attack was nominally ethnically based but it quickly became apparent the real target was the very successful Abahlali baseMjondolo (Dwellers in the Shacks) organisation which has its headquarters there.

ABM is the largest movement of the poor in post-apartheid South Africa. It has developed links across the country with other shack-dwellers and while it is politically independent it is deeply resented by the ruling African National Congress. ABM is telling the world the emperor has no clothes. ANC policies are benefiting the wealthy but impoverishing the people.

After the initial attacks the police turned up the following morning and arrested members of ABM rather than investigating the attack. Local ANC officials blamed ABM for the violence and said people wanted ABM out of the settlement. The police chimed in and what has been reported is such a tissue of lies as would do credit to the old apartheid regime. Death threats have been issued against the quietly charismatic ABM President S’bu Zikode and his family and the organisation has been forced to meet in secret.

I visited Kennedy Road in April this year and was privileged to be welcomed at one of ABM’s regular monthly meetings where representatives from many squatter camps come to develop policies and address day to day issues and campaign for a better future. It is a profoundly democratic organisation.

The informal settlement is now run by a local ANC representative with police backing. Attendance at meetings depends on being able to produce an ANC membership card. It is a dark time for South Africans fighting for better government policies to support the majority of the population. 15 years of ANC rule has left most worse off while the number of ANC millionaires increases each year.

Whether the problem has a natural cause, as in the Pacific, or is man-made, as in South Africa, it is the most vulnerable who suffer the most.

ENDS

The loss of Sue Bradford

Sue Bradford will be a big loss from parliament. Her decision to resign after 10 years as a Green MP removes the strongest voice for the most vulnerable groups in New Zealand.

It’s not a case of another MP stepping up to fill her shoes. There is no-one. Amongst other Green MPs there are sincerely-held concerns about social injustice but they tend to be at a more intellectual level. With Sue it’s about the unvarnished, gritty reality of life for the marginalised. She has her feet close to the ground and advocates with more passion and purpose than anyone else in parliament.

In the last few days her parliamentary career has been summed up with three achievements via the private members bills she introduced and navigated through to law; the divisive Section 59 law change which gives children the same protection from violence as adults; allowing mothers in prison to keep their babies with them for longer and raising the minimum youth wage to the same as the adult minimum.

These are significant achievements but her greatest influence has been in keeping issues of unemployment, worker rights and children in poverty to the forefront. Her mere presence will have cautioned Labour against moving even further to the right and will be having a similar tempering effect on National. If there is such a thing as a parliamentary conscience then Sue Bradford is as close as it gets.

Taking her parliamentary place will be David Clendon who says environmentalism and social justice are two sides of the same coin. This is fair enough but where will the determined advocacy come from?

It’s true the Maori Party MPs also speak with passion for low-income families and they were instrumental earlier this year in having the minimum wage increased by 50c to $12.50 However their strategy focuses on gains for Maori and through Maori institutions. This doesn’t extend across the board to all low-income families and for Maori not connected to their tribal roots little can be expected to change.

Sue Bradford’s resignation shows in sharp relief just how unrepresentative our parliament really is. We often debate Maori representation or how many women MPs we should have but what about worker representation? Or beneficiary representation? Based on our national profile we should have about 7 MPs from amongst the unemployed and half our parliamentarians from jobs earning less than the median income of around $39,000 per annum. I doubt there would be more than five percent of current MPs in that category and not a single MP would have entered parliament from a job paying less than $15 an hour despite 450,000 New Zealanders being in this category.

Our parliament is dominated by professionals, intellectuals and business people many of whom sniffily comment they have had to take a pay cut to come to parliament. I’d hazard a guess that around 90% of MPs entered parliament from jobs in the top 30% of incomes. The result is a parliament of the well-off, by the well-off and for the well-off.

The main parties don’t seem to worry and political debate revolves around the notion that’s what’s good for business is good for New Zealanders. This has never been the case and never will be.

When times are good for business we have booming profits and low wages as we saw over the past decade under Labour. Then in the recession we have redundancies, pay cuts and shortened hours. Either way the lowest paid suffer the most and yet have no effective parliamentary representation. The big parties are there for the middle class while low-income workers are expected to shut up and be grateful.

I can hear a chorus of voices saying we need so-called “successful” people to represent the country in parliament. Democracy says otherwise. I also hear the suggestion that those on low incomes should form their own political parties to advocate for economic change. This is easier said than done because of the huge costs associated with political campaigning. We won’t see a host of corporate donations going in that direction.

We have a deeply distorted system of representation which is government for the corporate and the comfortable. And that is why Sue Bradford’s voice has been so unique and so important. Prior to her election as an MP she was a spokesperson for the unemployed and has spoken out more strongly and consistently than any other MP on behalf of the growing proportion of the population who are struggling.

Auckland Mayoral candidate Len Brown says he’d welcome the chance to work with Sue on the new Auckland super city council to be elected next year. It would be good if she agreed.

ENDS

Michael Laws and the charge of the anti PC brigade

Whanganui mayor Michael Laws will always be the froth on top of the wave; bubbling, hissing and occasionally roaring but with little substance.

His claims of racism against the Geographical Board early in the week over the proposal to include the ‘h’ in Whanganui were matched later in the week with his foam-flecked ranting against groups calling for an increase in welfare benefits to ease the lives of families living on the breadline.

It’s populist politics with a dark steak of racism. Whether it’s Maori gang members wearing patches, Maori children writing to criticize his stance on the name of the city or ugly statistics of levels of child abuse in Maori families the Laws answer is the same. He says Maori are to blame and they should fix up their social problems before they dare venture into public debate.

It’s a venal attitude. He may as well blame Pakeha for Clayton Weatherston’s crime. Such intolerance and a ruthless refusal to engage in argument above self-righteous sloganeering are the hallmarks of the anti-PC brigade of which Laws is the unelected leader.

Being anti-PC is the current political fashion. It avoids taking responsibility for anything outside one’s immediate self and family. It says each individual is responsible for their actions and their circumstances and ignores the context within which social problems fester. It absolves the guilty and condemns the rest. It blames the victims for their predicament and pours abuse on anyone who points to the elephant in the room which is our economic policy.

The brigade has a stronghold in the Sensible Sentencing Trust which feeds cynically on public anger at appalling crimes and serves up various vengeance-focused policies which are as outrageously expensive as they are ineffective. Again there is no need for thinking; no point in looking for causes, reasons or explanations for crime. Crime is crime they say and we need more prisons and longer sentences. End of story. Compassion is the dirtiest word in their vocabulary.

Lots of good people have been drawn into supporting the brigade and as the social gradient continues to steepen it will thrive as fear increases among working New Zealanders that they could themselves slip down the economic ladder. At other times in history this fear has provided the foot-soldiers for fascism.

It’s a grim picture of poverty, struggle and strife in a land of plenty.

It’s ironic that the people Michael Laws rails against are the victims of policies he championed as a National MP and then New Zealand First politician. There’s no need to detail them here. Suffice to say they make the Sheriff of Nottingham look like a do-gooder.

Despite unemployment rising and poverty deepening for families the transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich continues and there is not a glimmer of hope for any significant change in direction. Take the debate about capital gains tax for example. It’s been directionless and hopeless. We are the only significant developed country which does not have such a tax. Australia, the US and UK which we like to compare ourselves with all have one but despite the fact we face economic problems from regular housing bubbles there is no political impetus for change. Even Treasury supports such a tax but John Key is unmoved. It seems we are paralyzed with political inertia because so many politicians are themselves property speculators who refuse to countenance a tax which would hit them in the pocket but help make homes more affordable.

The combination of leadership by the wealthy for the wealthy and the fear of working New Zealanders falling behind in the recession is fertile ground for the likes of the anti-PC brigade who have a ready-made group to blame for our growing social dysfunction.

Last week the New Zealand Christian Council for Social Services released a report revealing we have 219,000 children now living in poverty – up 20,000 in the last year. One in six children born in New Zealand this year will be born into poverty.

Executive officer for the NZCCSS Trevor McGlinchey says children whose parents or sole parent receive welfare assistance were far more likely to live in poverty.

“If you were not taking any notice you would think New Zealand was full of happy, healthy kids, wouldn’t you? But no, it’s not the case. There are a couple of hundred thousand kids in NZ whose next meal is not guaranteed.”

There was a time when New Zealanders led the world with policies which promoted dignity and respect for everyone. However to the extent it once existed the decent society is gone.

ENDS

Déjà vu with Labour

We’ve seen it all before.

In the aftermath of an election defeat Labour apologises to the country for getting its priorities wrong. New leader Phil Goff says it should have put people, families and communities at the centre of its policies but allowed itself to be sidetracked with so-called nanny-state policies of energy saving light bulbs, efficient showerheads and discouraging parents from smacking their kids.

According to Goff the party lost because it gave the impression it had taken its eye off the ball. But no-one should worry says Phil. Labour is now getting refocused and back on track with the things they do best.

The last time the party took stock like this was after its election defeat in 1990. At that time it had spent six years ripping the heart out of the economy; privatising state assets; reducing tax on the rich; kneecapping the manufacturing sector; increasing unemployment; destroying the welfare state; commercialising public services; enriching its friends and betraying the people who voted for the opposite of what the party delivered. Not bad for a two-term Labour government.

The latest apology simple starts the cycle of betrayal again. Labour activists are moving back to “reconnect” with community groups. After nine years of silence on the back benches Labour MPs now show up on marches and address rallies calling for policies they spent nine years in government ignoring.

Labour now apparently supports a capital gains tax, compulsory redundancy payments for workers, cuts to electricity prices, curbs on loan sharks, better funding for adult and community education and a decent start in life for our kids.

Just as it did after its 1990 election loss Labour is once more positioning itself as the champion of working New Zealanders. But next time it’s elected it will produce another pledge card with six promises, do them in the first few months and then revert to managing the market-economy on behalf of the corporate sector. This is now the stock-in-trade Labour Party approach. It became so obvious in its last term in government that Labour was frequently outflanked on the left by National.

Goff’s apology was for the wrong things.

Why not apologise for policies which saw company profits rise at twice the rate of workers’ wages? Why not an apology to the 220,000 children still living in poverty after three terms of Labour? Or the increase in pokie machines from 14,000 to 23,000 leaching the life from low-income communities? What about the failure of public television to deliver less than 90% rubbish? Or the failure to fund schools so every child gets a fair go? What about apologising for the much less-equal society we have now than before Labour took office?

Goff ignores the big failures and says his refocused Labour Party will be putting jobs, the economy and giving children the best possible start in life at the top of the list while focusing on what he thinks Labour is best at – health, education and social policy.

Don’t hold your breath. Goff spent his nine years in the Labour cabinet trying to out do National and ACT on law and order. He introduced numerous irrational policies in the justice and corrections area which have saddled the country with a rapidly growing prison population at an unsustainable cost.

But surely Labour did some good things? Goff highlighted the best as including Kiwisaver, Working for Families, tax relief and lowering unemployment. Unfortunately none of these stand scrutiny.

Kiwisaver began the privatisation of government superannuation. It gives the biggest benefits to those on the highest incomes while reducing government responsibility to provide retirement income through taxation. Tax relief under Labour was likewise delivered more to the wealthy than those on low incomes who continue to struggle.

Working for Families did make a positive difference for many but it only came towards the end of the second term of government and for many families it has been too little, too late. And because it excludes support to children whose families receive benefits, we still have hundreds of thousands of kids living in poverty.

It’s true that unemployment decreased under Labour but this disguises the fact that job growth has been in insecure, low-paid, casualised jobs in the service sector with no guaranteed hours of work. Neatly camouflaging this problem, Labour declared a person working just one hour per week would no longer be recorded as unemployed.

And so the Labour political cycle begins again. In its last two governments Labour used the votes of the poor to advance policies for the rich. Don’t expect any difference next time.

ENDS

Social deniers dominate debate on kids

It says a lot about how distorted our view of children has become that another report highly critical of how we treat our kids disappeared from the media in just 24 hours last week.

The report, Doing Better for Children, was the first time the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development had reported on the wellbeing of children across 30 developed countries.

It’s a dismal read. We spend just half the amount other countries spend on children under five. We have low family incomes, high child mortality and high child poverty rates.

The OECD says our government should be spending a lot more on younger, deprived kids as well as ensuring we meet the needs of older disadvantaged children.

The lack of media interest is probably a reflection that plenty of other reports have delivered similar messages in recent years. The New Zealand Family Violence Commission says between 2000 and 2004 39 kiwi kids were murdered while a 2007 Unicef overview of child wellbeing in developed countries said New Zealand and the US are the worst countries for deaths for under-19-year-olds by accidents, murder, suicide and violence.

The list goes on. Most of us grew up to believe New Zealand was a great place to raise kids but what was once a source of pride is now just a discarded urban myth.

So where have we gone wrong with our kids? Why the big difference in attitudes between now and a generation ago?

The reason is simply that the debate on children has been hijacked by the same lobby which brought us the destructive economic policies of the past 25 years. These are the people who declared war on the welfare state in the 1980s and through a combination of free market policies drove hundreds of thousands of New Zealand families into poverty.

This lobby has successfully blamed rising social problems on the families they consigned to poverty.

This was nicely illustrated in the minor media storm around Whanganui mayor Michael Laws last week and his bullying letters to Maori students from a local intermediate school who dared to criticise his views over the spelling of the town’s name.

The pompous mayor got on his high horse and berated the kids. He did it because they were Maori. He said they should get serious with issues such as child abuse among Maori rather than worry about the spelling of the town’s name.

Yes the rates of child abuse among Maori are much higher but this is less a race issue than a reflection that Maori make up a much higher proportion of families living in poverty.

There is now a wealth of robust research which dispels the myths about social issues such as child abuse, health, education, crime, violence, teenage pregnancy and drug abuse. These problems arise directly from income inequality and have exploded in New Zealand because the gap between rich and poor has become a chasm.

We had a timely reminder of this last week with the news Telecom CEO Paul Reynolds took home over $5 million in salary and bonuses last year.

In 2000 a chief executive earned about eight times the average wage but by 2006 this had more than doubled to nineteen times. Now in 2009 we have the Telecom CEO earning 100 times the average wage.

With figures like these it’s no surprise we have among the highest income inequality in the developed world and soaring social problems. Policies which drive families into poverty through no fault of their own are policies which demoralise, dehumanise and alienate whole communities.

It’s no surprise that Laws was a National Party MP when these destructive economic policies were enthusiastically pushed through parliament. Having set vulnerable families up to fail Laws and his fellow travellers now blame them for the problems he helped create.

He has become a social-denier, barking madly up the wrong tree. All sound and fury but ineffectual in helping anyone except himself and his talk-back ratings.

Maori Party co-leader Tariana Turia summed up the best place to start in dealing with our rampant social problems. She advocates removing GST from healthy foods, extending the in-work tax credit to families of the unemployed, making the first $25000 of income tax free and lifting the minimum wage to $15 an hour.

Further on we should be introducing a capital gains tax on all but the family home, a financial transactions tax, steep death duties and abolishing GST altogether.

There are no excuses for child abuse but there are no excuses either for ignoring the reason we are no longer a great country to raise kids.

ENDS