Community Services Card Debacle Shows Need For A Family Focus

Another example of family needs being ignored is the present controversy surrounding the Community Services Card healthcare access, says United Future leader Hon Peter Dunne.

Cabinet announced on Monday the income threshold for the card for beneficairies and superanuitants will be raised, but not for nearly 50,000 wage and salary earners on the same income level.

"This makes a mockery of all fairness by penalising working low income Kiwis. Of more concern the announced changes are predominantly anti-family because they penalise families who are low-income earners, for no other reason than the Government wants to save a small amount of money.

"This mean-spirited decision will impact on families' access to health care which will lead to unnecessary resentment and potentially greater health bills down the line if medical assistance isn't sought in the first place," says Mr Dunne.

He says decisions like this highlight the Government's piecemeal approach to policy.

"United Future is calling for a Commission for the Family, to ensure policy decisions recognise and embrace the family as the building block of our society.

"Families are the cornerstone of our society and they deserve better recognition than they are getting from the Government. Only when they do can we move forward with common-sense, integrated social and economic policy," says Mr Dunne.

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>