And I wonder what percentage of her turnover was taxpayers money ?
Those private clients were they iwi organisations or organisaions whose bill was meet with taxpayer money ?
Yes David I do know how the consultancy games works for those Maori
involved.
Experts in their field they say, a rather artificial field is it not ?

[DPF: I've not worked for GPL and my memory is from discussions some years ago but my impression was a significant number of private sector companies, including several on the NZX]

[DPF: Actually GPL had many private sector clients, off memory]

What a pity, taking away most benefits sounds like a great idea to me.

You could be right… the trouble is “the state playing a lesser role” is often code for “benefit cuts”, but it may not be in this case. It’d be helpful if she were to clarify how she sees this lesser role working in practice. Even if the same budget is spent, but “filtered through organisations that worked and lived with the people affected” then that’s exactly what will happen – a filter traps some things (part of the money) while letting some through.

And I don’t think jacob was accusing Parata of wanting to defraud the state, merely pointing out that privatised welfare delivery carries with it the very real risk of misuse of those funds – either with good intentions but risible outcomes (e.g. Hip hop courses) or bad intentions and even worse outcomes (e.g. Awatere-Huata).

Which is not in any way to imply that welfare doesn’t need a major overhaul – it does.

..er recipe for doing so was for the state to play a lesser role in communities and instead be filtered through organisations that worked and lived with the people affected..
filtered through organisations … sounds a bit like more Donna Huata and her presigned cheque books

You don’t remove “capricious officialdom” (i.e. government support) from welfare without also removing it from the productive enterprises that can generate wealth, jobs and foreign exchange. For a perfect example look no further than the dire warnings about doing something with 2ha of your own land posted here today.

Government regulation and interference has hogtied a lot of small to medium business activity, and no support is offered for activity like R&D. Then IRD comes along and gouges what little profit they’re able to make.

As a result they’re constrained in the numbers of people they can employ, and we end up with more unemployed than we would otherwise have.

What needs to be done is to first remove the “capricious officialdom” that stands in the way of progress. Then when growth has had a chance to happen we can look at reducing community supports because hopefully they won’t need any.

But to suggest the state play “a lesser role in communities” without also suggesting it play a lesser role (or better yet, no role at all) in regulating and punishing and taxing to death people who’re trying to create economic growth and jobs sounds to me very much like the same old beneficiary bashing.