Job creation and welfare assistance targeted to meet the needs of individuals and give a ‘hand-up’ to work have today been launched as ACT New Zealand’s policies to get New Zealanders off welfare and back into work.

Launching ACT’s Welfare to Work policy at Otara’s Rangatira Trust today ACT Social Welfare Spokesman Dr Muriel Newman said that as a small country New Zealand cannot afford the waste and lost potential of 163,000 working-age New Zealanders out of work and on a benefit.

“The human cost is crippling and the failure to tackle unemployment is costing taxpayers $30 million per week.

“New Zealand’s current unemployment rate is too high. That is why job creation is our key goal. ACT understands that the majority of jobs in New Zealand are created by small and medium sized businesses. ACT has the policies to enable our businesses to create real jobs.

“That goes hand in hand with our policy to give New Zealanders a hand up into work. We say those on a benefit deserve better than a hand out. That is why ACT stands out from all the other parties. We reject Labour and National’s tired approach. We reject the Alliance’s $20 vision for people on benefits.

“ACT’s Welfare to Work policy is about breaking the cycle of dependency. It is time for the courage to change. It is time we gave New Zealanders a hand up, not just a hand out.

“ACT will help them overcome the barriers and get them working again. “There are excellent community-run programmes around the country that are achieving outstanding results. These programmes are focused on the needs of individual job-seekers and that is why they are succeeding. The ‘one size fits all’ approach to out-of-work New Zealanders is unfair and is not working.

“ACT says it’s time to set goals to get New Zealanders working again. That is a full-time commitment,” said Muriel Newman.

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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>>