Newman Muriel: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
Newman Muriel: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:627;Page:22012] 
Dr MURIEL NEWMAN (Deputy Leader—ACT) 
: 
 I am rising on behalf of the ACT party to take a call in this estimates debate. I would like to start off by saying it really is a tragic fact that Labour has failed to take advantage of the unique opportunity provided by the great economic conditions it inherited to address the very serious problems we have in welfare and with families. 
The reality is that the economy has done well not because of Labour but in spite of Labour. This Government has failed to set New Zealand on a path to prosperity. That opportunity was within its grasp and it has failed dismally. Instead because of ideological reasons Labour has introduced some 30 new taxes charges and levies which means that wages that had risen in households around New Zealand have in fact been wiped out and working families are no further ahead now than they were before. 
 It is a shame that the Labour Government has not taken the opportunity to address the problem in welfare because welfare is the biggest cost to New Zealand. That cost would not have to be made if the Government worked with the welfare system properly. I am pleased that tax cuts are now a major election issue because ACT members have campaigned on that area since we came to Parliament. 
ACT members have also campaigned for welfare reform. It is a great tragedy that Labour has abused the goodwill of New Zealand taxpayers by failing to require able-bodied New Zealanders who are being paid benefits—being paid to waste their lives in a dead-end way I might add—to go out to work. The interesting thing is that Labour has also sat on its hands with regard to evidence that shows children raised in families on welfare fail to do as well in almost all areas of life. The Labour Government should have reformed welfare not just to get parents back into the workforce but to also give a better go for children. 
It is a scandal at a time when the country has a shortage of workers that is crippling our economy that 74000 adults are still reliant on the dole. They are being paid to do nothing. The Minister shakes his head. I am talking about people receiving the dole and their spouses or partners. The Minister’s figures show that there are 74000 such people. There are some 50000 sole parents on the domestic purposes benefit whose children are at school and who could be working as well. It is a disgrace that when we add up all the people of working age who are on welfare the total comes to almost 320000 New Zealanders. Half of them could be working. 
This Minister and his Government have failed to make the provisions to ensure that those people go and get jobs. There are jobs for Africa in our economy at the moment. The Minister and Government members can shake their heads but their failure to make the welfare system work is an abuse of the taxpayers of New Zealand and it is keeping our taxes so high. By the way if we brought in proper welfare reform lower taxes would be affordable in the long term. 
What is worse is that Labour with its soft-on-welfare policies has made benefits easier to get on to and harder to get off. It has increased the welfare net through the Working for Families package and has turned working families into beneficiaries. It has gone soft on benefit fraud. It is allowing beneficiaries to rip off the system and is doing very little about it. 
And of course it is fiddling the figures. We all know that the number of people who have moved from the dole to the sickness benefit or the invalids benefit has escalated. We know that a lot of people now call themselves students and do dodgy courses. We also know that the public service has expanded dramatically and I suggest that there are a lot of make-work jobs there. 
Having said that it is better for people to be in any job than to be on a benefit but the point is that Labour is so desperate to make the figures look good it has failed to get people who could work off a benefit in order to fill the jobs out there that need filling.