December 16, 2004

Welfare Dependency Still Rife

Steve Maharey's claim today that 3.8 percent unemployment is "hardly welfare dependency" is a cover-up, said Lindsay Mitchell, petitioner for a Parliamentary review of the DPB.

"3.8 percent is a measure of individual joblessness but ignores household joblessness. Put simply there are over three hundred thousand households headed by people on benefits, most of whom are not classed as 'unemployed'. There are now more children relying on the sickness, invalid and domestic purposes benefits than when Labour was elected in late 1999."

"In addition, dependence on these benefits is, on average, of much longer duration than dependence on the dole."

"To his credit I believe Steve Maharey has tried in various ways to deal with the problem, and he has taken a lot of flak from ungrateful beneficiary advocates and bleeding-heart academics in the process, but his solutions are simply not working."

Lindsay Mitchell petitioner for a Parliamentary review of the DPB forms available from www.liberalvalues.org.nz contact dandl.mitchell@clear.net.nz

ENDS

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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>>