20 July 2009
Media Statement

Dole queue continues to surge

The number of people signing up for the unemployment benefit each week continues to grow, with reports it increased to over 1,300 last week, Labour Social Development spokesperson Annette King says.

“This is an extremely worrying trend and underscores how toothless the Government’s claims to be blunting the sharp edges of the recession have actually been.

“In late June there was a net increase of 1,100 people signing up to the dole each week. The number subsequently grew to 1,200 and TV3 reported tonight that it had gone up again last week with 1,342 people signing up.

“Just last week we learned that by the end of June an additional 52,000 people had signed on for benefits in the last year. That meant there are now more than 310,000 Kiwis reliant on the Government for their income,” Annette King said

“If the trajectory of recent weeks continues, there is no doubt that Government projections of the numbers of unemployed growing to 90,000 by 2010 will instead be realised early next year.

“And that is just the number of people on the unemployment benefit. Significant increases in the number of people on the DPB and on sickness and invalids benefits were also recorded in the year ending in June.

“New Zealand needs fresh ideas and solutions to tackle unemployment, but the National Government doesn’t have any,” Annette King says.

“Labour Leader Phil Goff and I announced today that Labour intends making changes to the party’s policies to get unemployed workers off the dole, into training, and back into work.

“Our Recession Response Package, which will be detailed shortly, will extend the time Labour’s proposed Job Search Allowance would be available to redundant workers during the recession.

“It would also make Labour’s proposed Job Training Allowance available to many more workers by significantly reducing the amount of time people have to have been in the workforce before qualifying,” Annette King said.

ENDS

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