New Focus On Children Good, But Not Enough

The Green party today welcomed Labour's move to place children at the heart of policy making.

In her speech to the Labour party conference, Deputy Leader Annette King acknowledged that poverty and inequality are increasing.

"Inequality, the gap between rich and poor, increased under the last Labour government, despite Working for Families, because the most important economic inequities remained,” said Green Party Co-leader Metiria Turei.

“Benefits were kept low, as was the minimum wage. Labour left office with 10,000 people still on the state house waiting list.”

Mrs Turei said there was not investment in the poorest households under the Clark government, and that New Zealand remained the 6th worst country in the OECD for income inequality.

"John Key’s Government has driven ordinary families further into hardship, so real solutions that guarantee the basics are needed more than ever,” said Mrs Turei.

The Green Party released in May this year a program called “Mind the Gap”, which is a set of economic policy solutions to combat inequality. It includes the following:

a capital gains tax excluding the family home;

a comprehensive state house building programme to both house families and create 28,000 jobs;

significant changes to Working for Families and the benefit system to increase the incomes of the poorest households.

“Our proposed solutions will achieve the aim of reducing inequality, and make all New Zealanders better off,” said Mrs Turei.

"So I welcome Labour’s restated commitment and invite them to work with us on practical solutions that will directly help, for example, the 300,000 children currently living in cold damp houses that make them sick.

"But a truly child-centred set of solutions focuses on guaranteeing the essentials: a warm dry home, a decent public education, and a family income that leads them out of, not trapped into poverty.

“Labour has made no commitment to raise benefits, nor to eliminate the discrimination in the Working for Families package. Under Labour, New Zealand's poorest families will remain that way.

"My challenge to Labour is to ensure that every child, no matter what their family’s income source, is guaranteed the same essentials so that every New Zealand child can succeed,” said Mrs Turei.

Link to Green Party's Mind the Gap Programme:
http://www.greens.org.nz/mindthegap

ENDS

© Scoop Media