Beneficiary Bashing?
Both KeepingStock and Kiwiblog have posted on National’s “new” policy for the DPB – Solo parents will be required to spend 15 hours working or job seeking once a child turns six and part-time earnings go from $80 to $100 per week before the DPB begins abating. As KeepingStock points out, the second part of the policy is a definite plus for solo parents. The first part of the policy, while it may be unpopular, certainly accords with the findings of the Children’s Commissioner Cindy Kiro – that “paid work was the best way to lift families out of poverty”.
However, the reason why I am interested so much is the curious statement of Helen Clark, commenting on individualising the DPB:
“Miss Clark said circumstances differed, with some solo parents looking after children with cystic fibrosis or autism.”
Now that’s weird. Why would you want a solo parent benefit to accommodate disabled children? Surely these are, and should remain, separate funding issues? Apparently, Labour would like to amalgamate all the benefits into one, but, regardless of the pros and cons of this, it would be a nightmare to try and amalgamate disability funding into some sort of super-WINZ. Disability and health funding are normally put together because the vast majority of people involved in caring for the disabled- excluding the immediate caregiver – are heath-related personnel.
Clark must know this – that the DPB has nothing to do with care of disabled children – so her use of this example is rather disingenuous. Worse, when you consider that recently CCS has lobbied the government to fund support as soon as a disability is diagnosed, her comment borders on hypocritical.
I have seen how many parents (solo and otherwise) struggle to care for their disabled children because funding is both poor and hard to access. As a doctor, I should be able to register a child as soon as a diagnosis of disability is made and funding should kick in automatically, as should the required ancillary care, such as physiotherapy, occupational therapy and specialised child care facilities. Instead, these parents are often left to fend for themselves in truly difficult circumstances. I call that “beneficiary bashing”.
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Aug 11 08 1:47 pm
Excellent post MacDoctor – the Single Core Benefit idea, which Labour has been trying to implement ever since it was elected. Surely the whole purpose of benefits is to address a need; no more so than in the disability arena. Labour’s “one size fits all” agenda merely blurs the line between need and dependancy.
Aug 11 08 8:24 pm
The disaiblity issue is a complete red herring and has nothing to do with benefits for able bodie people who don’t/can’t work.
Assistance for children with disabilities is to help with the extra costs invovled in caring for them, not to support a family as other benefits are.
Our sons had degenerative brain disorders which were undiagnosed but thought to be genetic. The people who treated them were great, the system was a nightmare.
Through our younger one I met a boy exactly a year older than him who had received brain damage at birth and so received ACC. Our son had the same level of disability but was eligable for only a tiny fraction of the help that is available through ACC was given to him.
It may be too expensive to provide ACC type assistance for people with non-accident related disabilities but your suggestion would be a great improvement on what happens now.
Aug 11 08 11:44 pm
Homepaddock: you have my sympathies. Getting any sort of decent funding for childhood disabilities is a nightmare both for parents and for GPs. I don’t accept the “too expensive” argument. After all, there are few things more important than allowing a disabled child some chance of a relatively normal life.
Besides, I strongly suspect we could fund it just by insisting sickness benefit forms were routed through a neutral doctor, not the patient’s own GP. At least 80% of the ones I have signed are dubious (but as a locum, I can hardly brass off my colleague’s patients, can I?)
Aug 12 08 11:10 pm
Hey MacDoctor did you know some dubious patients wanting sickness benefits specifically target locums such as yourself, because they are more likely to get away with it? They wont see ‘their’ GP because the benefit is likely to be questioned or end. As a locum you have to cover your butt quite a bit, and do end up doing stuff you wouldnt do if it were your practice. So your experience of inappropriate SB signing is an aberration, they seek your sort out
Doctor shopping. It’s big.
Aug 12 08 11:19 pm
PS its all very well saying you can ‘earn; 80 bucks a week now without losing your benefit,a nd they will increase that to $100pw
But every dollar you earn over and above the benefit gets deducted from your addons, like accomodation supplement (everyone on a benefit has one)
So yes, you can now earn $80 pw without anything being deducted from your CORE benefit, but large parts of every dollar earned are removed from the money you get to pay your rent. It is very hard for a person on the DPB to make on the $80 a week before your benefit is cut deal, and Nats arent saying any different for $20 more.
These things are punitive, and dont encourage people to do better for themselves. They just encourage them to stay the same.
You can work your butt off trying to get ahead and just stand still. So people mostly dont bother trying for part time work on the DPB. Whats the point, you have to find care for your kids, transport, clothes and are likely to be worse off than if you stayed home.
What we need is genuine transition to work measures and for people to gain a net financial benefit from work on a benefit. Then people would do it.