Insurance based welfare?
August 9th, 2010 at 6:07 am by David FarrarThe Herald reports:
Employers may be asked to pay part of the costs if their employees have to go on sickness or disability welfare benefits under an insurance-based reform of the welfare system flagged in a new report today.
A working group on reducing welfare dependence chaired by economist Paula Rebstock, in its first report, says employers need to be more actively involved in managing their workers’ health issues – keeping them well, and getting them back to work quickly after an illness.
It cites a system in the Netherlands where employers have to pay for most of the costs of their former workers on sickness and disability benefits.
Ms Rebstock said sharing the costs with employers would be “part and parcel” with a possible move towards funding welfare benefits through a social insurance system as in most developed countries.
Her group’s report is cautious about shifting welfare on to an insurance basis, one of the issues it is required to address in its terms of reference.
But Ms Rebstock said the group felt an insurance approach would give everyone involved in the system – employers, Government and beneficiaries – an incentive to get people back to work as soon as possible.
I’m cautious about shifting costs to employers, but I think the pros and cons of such a model are worth exploring. The status quo where the proportion of the working age population on sickness or invalids benefits increases year after year is not sustainable.
I’ve tried to find an copy of the actual report by the working group, but have not yet been able to.
Related posts:
- Armstrong on Welfare Reform
- Treasury’s welfare prescription
- The Welfare Working Group Options
- National’s welfare reform
August 9th, 2010 at 6:17 am
Assumes that an employer will actual remain in new Zelaand and not move to a more “profitable” location.
And will it entice new employers?
Just what we need more disincentive to employ people.
Guess when the last tax payer or employer leaves New Zealand, the welfare dependents and the state servants can start afresh.
Not sure what they will eat though.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 6:58 am
I certainly want to see the report- the Netherlands of the 1980s was screwed up, but they are trying to fix their new system.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 7:34 am
Looking to employers to finance welfare is looking in the wrong direction. Most people who lose jobs find new jobs, they have a work habit. By far the biggest problem are the welfare lifestylers, people who have never or rarely worked and don’t have rich employers to fund their lifestyle.
There is another problem – not enough jobs. You can shuffle responsibility for who pays for benefits as much as you like, but they will still be an overhead paid for by society if there aren’t enough jobs for everyone.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 7:46 am
Well before you and the rest of the socialists dump more upon us employers you might like to read an upto date state of the Nation comment. Now I know its from Paul Holmes but I can echo his sentiments with both my businesses and those of quite a few acquaintances. And the BOP is faring better than most places.
When will you socialists ever learn?
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=10664400
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 7:49 am
Well Bill the Conservative took away the accelerated depreciation allowance on new plant so rather than being like Germany and all go in manufacturing etc we revert to No 8 wire and old second hand junk to make stuff.
Sure it needed to go from property, it was never intended to be for that and from motor vehicles as that’s a bad use of money but on world class manufacturing plant?
Vote:What a disaster
August 9th, 2010 at 8:20 am
I’m glad John Key didn’t get elected in 2008 and we still have Helen. God, wouldn’t that have been hell? All costs would have moved to the individual. Reduction in taxes would have ruined our state support system. Mining would have gone ahead, any kind of ETS would have been scuttled and parents would be thrashing the living daylights out of their kids. Wonder what happened to him? Sort of just dried up and blew away.
What’s that?
no.
National did win?
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 8:23 am
Genius, add MORE costs to being an employer.
Employers are evil and must be punished!
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 8:36 am
It is almost in evitable that the percentage on sickness benefits will gradually increase over the years becuase it is easier to get sick than to get well, easier to have an accident than to mend the body. It seems to me that the discussion is always on getting these poor people off the benefit instead of improving conditions in the workplace so they don’t get sick, have accidents. This is not just the responsibility of the often mocked OSH but of every person in the workforce, worker and employer alike. I guess that means more and better education about how to work at various activities. Not to forget the problems caused by out of work activities with sport and around the home, the most dangerous place we occupy. Personal responsibility sums it up I think.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 8:37 am
Sure slug the employer … they are made of money from the pockets of the poor worker.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 8:40 am
Is there ever ever EVER going to be a time when one of these half brained wank fest’s actually contemplates the possibility of personal responsibility in this country???
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 8:44 am
@budgieboy – It’s important that we’re all either helplessly dependent or woefully victimized. The state finds is difficult to control the masses unless the majority fall into one or both of these camps.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 8:45 am
On what basis should employers be expected to bear insurance costs for employees’ personal sickness and disability cover? Rebstock seems to imply that the idea would help overcome the customary ineffectiveness of Government itself in running its welfare programme, adding to employers’ cost structures as a way to get sick people back to work more quickly.
Employers are already required to pay part of their employees’ retirement costs (via KiwiSaver), sickness costs (sick leave) and certain other social costs (bereavement / compassionate leave). If the notion of employer social benevolence continues to spread, who can predict whether employees’ housing costs, medical fees, public transport costs and council rates are ultimately to be picked up by the employer?
Other than the oppressive public sector machine, both central and local government, most employers’ businesses need to be efficient in their use of resources in order to survive and provide a return on risk capital. In particular they need to be highly competitive in their cost base, especially those involved in exporting or import substitution. If we insist on saddling businesses with social costs beyond their sphere of practical responsibility, we consign the country’s productive sector to a dismal future. And with it, the country’s standard of living.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 8:45 am
What if some welfare costs were transferred to employers, and at the same time company tax rates were reduced at least enough to compensate? Companies that pay welfare via tax now would benefit, and companies that would pay more are those who avoid paying their share of tax.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 8:50 am
>>>Ever noticed the high correlation between lefty voters and lower educational attainment?
Actually, I’m pretty sure that the university-educated are more likely to be left-wing.<<<
Vote:Surely this is just an indication of the pointlessness of putting so many through the academic world instead of out in the real world of proper jobs.
August 9th, 2010 at 8:53 am
What if some welfare costs were transferred to employers, and at the same time company tax rates were reduced at least enough to compensate?
The great socialist money-go-round. Break an issue into a million tiny pieces, distribute the cost randomly to anyone you can find: ice cream vendors, nurses, tree surgeons, cat breeders and whores. Pretty soon, no one will be able to see what the problem was, or if it really exists. People will just be left poorer for some unknown reason. Statistics will at least become obsolete, unable to measure anything at all. And as things get worse, the permanently depressed population will learn to squat in the gutter and think about how things once were.
Pitch the idea it to Key. I suspect you’ll find he’s already well versed in it, though.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 8:58 am
No,, budgieboy, I don’t think there will be a time when any of these half brained wank fests actually contemplates the possibility of personal responsibility in this country.
The fact is that soon (if it has not already happened) there will be more people on welfare than there are actually working. The rot has already set in to the extent that the electorate has been conditioned to vote for parties on the basis of how much of other people’s money they will get, rather than on what any party will do….. so almost everybody has been conditioned to TAKE rather than to PRODUCE.
This latest wank fest (thank you for the phrase!) seems to be merely wriggling and squirming by the government to shift even more of the burdon onto those who PRODUCE. Would you employ anybody if you thought you were going to be held RESPONSIBLE for them like children even after they have left your employment?
Nothing will change until the country crashes socially economically and politically in a burning heap. At this point one of two things will probably happen. A) there will be a social and economic revolution which will put the country back on the path to economic cohesion and development, or B) There will be a violent military revolution which will plunge the country into totalitarian dictatorship from which we will never recover.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 8:58 am
Is this what you are looking for DPF?
http://ips.ac.nz/WelfareWorkingGroup/Downloads/Issues%20Paper/WWG%20Detailed%20Paper%20-%20Long-Term%20Benefit%20Dependency%20-%20The%20Issues%20-%20August%202010.pdf
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 9:06 am
@Dave Mann – “The fact is that soon (if it has not already happened) there will be more people on welfare than there are actually working.”
Last time I checked it was fewer than 1.7 taxpayers for every welfare recipient. Some of those are in both camps (eg WFF) but the point is that few and few NZers have economic independence, meaning the future is all about the power of the ruling elite, not about the potential I see in my children.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 9:08 am
Surely this is just an indication of the pointlessness of putting so many through the academic world instead of out in the real world of proper jobs.
I don’t know about that. If it were not for academics, and their bastard children who hold degrees in the Arts, every man would be armed at all times, impelled to shoot first and wouldn’t know how to phrase a question. The real world is an ugly and unforgiving place and not at all like the imaginings of those who offer it as a sensible alternative.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 9:17 am
Michael Laws is discussing this subject right now on Radio Live….. should be an interesting morning!
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 9:20 am
^^^ This is not necessarily a good thing. We already have an ACC mechanism, (staffed by eager young desk jockeys who are paid for closing down ACC accounts and “know” that 6 weeks is long enough to get over a smashed heel) that compels the injured to go back to work before they are anything like well, causing all sorts of complications and further injuries. And all of the costs and pain that go with those.
Oh and I don’t want the guy in the cubicle next to me to “heroically” come in to work half-dead with a cold, and doggedly battle through the day coughing and sneezing over everything. Because within a couple of days me and two or three of the other guys will pick it up also, and that only ends up costing the boss more.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 9:40 am
An insurance based welfare scheme is a great idea, it already exists and it’s called income protection insurance.
Vote:It should not be paid for by employers (except if it’s negotiated as part of the package), it should be optional and it should be paid for by the employees if they feel they require it.
August 9th, 2010 at 10:02 am
Excellent, another radical social change without cross party concensus… yes a total flip flop in social policy every 6-9 years is exactly what NZ needs right now…. The two horse popularity contest we call governance in NZ fails us again.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 10:02 am
Heard Rebstock say that a persons health actually declines once they become unemployed. How does that work? I keep telling my wife that if I worked less I would be a lot more relaxed and healthy.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 10:04 am
Oh, I think we need reform but I don’t call political pissing competitions and red team/blue team policy flip flops reform. Reform is setting a new target and putting policies in place long term.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 10:05 am
bchapman
It’s all about what you measure to create your stats. Long term unemployed who abuse their bodies with alcohol & drugs courtesy of the few remaining tax payers could be used to justify any reform.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 10:10 am
Will employees have to pay for the insurance of the employer as protection from the business failing?
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 10:11 am
Rebstock, chair of the working group also said that insurance is “a red herring”.
Curiously, the size of the problem as a % of the working age population hasnt changed for 20yrs for (DPB, invalids and sickness) – dont let anyone tell you there’s a great, ever increasing hoard of the great unwashed stealing your hard earned taxpayers $$$….
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 10:12 am
Murray
Socialist minds will devise the perfect system. If an employer hasn’t got enough money in reserve to pay the salary of the worker for the rest of their natural life they won’t be allowed to employ them. A job is for life remember….
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 11:05 am
Yet another incentive to contract Chinese* labour instead of employing NZ labour.
===
Vote:(*meaning the country, not the ethnicity).
August 9th, 2010 at 11:15 am
More reason not to take on a staff member even though we could afford to do so and could grow our quietly successful small business a bit. I’d much rather just toddle along rather than take on the risks and costs again. I wonder how many SME owners are like me and for the same reasons?
There’s no doubt we have to start again and make benefits much less of a lifestyle choice. Of course, part of the problem is that many of the long-term beneficiaries who are also gang members etc supplement the benefit with the proceeds of crime. Sadly, the system almost encourages this kind of lifestyle with all the dreadful long-term effects on kids etc.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 11:26 am
It’s amazing these politician clowns managed to get out of bed in the morning, they must suffer pounding headaches when getting to their feet, their brain cells rolling to the bottom of their heads. Yeah bring it on you full flushing socialist twits, mos well kill what’s left of the private sector. Won’t it be neat when we live in the socialist utopia of la la land. Fuck, who needs a enemy when we have such glorious leaders.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 12:27 pm
When the Welfare Working Group and its “mandate” were announced on 13 April by Social Development Minister Paula Bennett, the press release seems to have omitted the credentials / occupations of the group’s members. After some basic research I have concluded that the membership of 8 people is not sufficiently broadly-based, and has little experience of business employment outside of sectors funded by or subsidised from the public purse. Assembling this Welfare Working Group was probably the least impressive piece of work that I have seen so far from Paula Bennett, a Minister who has shown some signs of promise in her demanding portfolio.
Brief comments on Working Party members:
Paula Rebstock (Chair): Economist. Came to NZ from USA in 1987. Worked for Treasury, Dept of PM & Cabinet, Dept of Labour, then chaired Commerce Commission till 2009. Now Deputy Chair of KiwiRail.
Des Gorman: Professor of Medicine, University of Auckland
Kathryn McPherson: Professor of Rehabilitation, Auckland University of Technology
Ann Dupuis, Assoc Professor of Sociology, Massey University
Catherine Isaac (formerly Judd): MD of Awaroa Partners – public relations, communications training, etc. Former Chair of ACT Party.
Sharon Wilson-Davis: CEO, Tamaki Ki Raro Trust – community education and advisory services.
Adrian Roberts: Founder & MD of In-Work NZ – provider of employment services to those on benefits with a history of repeated unemployment.
Enid Ratahi Pryor: CEO, Te Tohu O Te O Ngati Awa – a Maori social and health services provider in Whakatane.
A number of these people operate in and around the fringes of NZ’s social welfare system. But with the best will in the world I can’t envisage them having the collective experience and wisdom to produce meaningful and workable solutions to this country’s welfare dependency time-bomb.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 12:44 pm
That’s just nitpicking calendar girl, the Working Party chair provided this wisdom:
It’s amazing what meaning an outside view can provide. That could become a guiding principle of all businesses.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 12:52 pm
Agreed, Pete. The Working Party is clearly zeroing in on the perfect solution. We ordinary folk are just ignorant.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 1:00 pm
lol – you kiwiblog right lot are being unusually knee-jerk about all of this
Under the Employment Relations Act it is possible to recover lost income that was incurred due to an employer over-working an employee. However, the case law shows only several such cases have been succesful.
80% of New Zealanders are employed by businesses that have over 20 employees – so they can generally afford to have a proper HR team to make sure workers are looked after properly. They have no excuses – and should at least, in part, pay for the damage that they do to people and society, if they behave irresponsibly. Nothing makes them sit up and pay attention like a negative impact on the bottom line! I would be hesitant to place such costs on small businesses however. Medium to large business owners have just been handed a huge income boost in the form of a personal tax-cut, so the “we’ll lose all our businesses” hysteria is unwarranted.
New Zealanders work amongst the longest hours in the developed world according to OECD studies. Time to give a little meaning to the phrase “work-life ballance” i reckon.
It’s also worth
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 1:01 pm
Do any of you seriously think, taking into account the performance of the Gnats thus far, that any of these ideas will see the light of day?
Shit, the Gnats won’t even pick a fight with the schoolteacher unions over Roger Douglas’s “bulk funding” bill. What chance they will attack welfare reform? Zilch I reckon!
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 1:03 pm
The Working Paper also suggested that if nothing is done, the welfare system that currently costs $6.5 billion could end up costing $50 billion which would be unsustainable. But that would only happen, it also concedes, if everyone currently on a benefit stayed on it for life. I wonder why they didn’t include the cost if everyone left school and went on benefit for life.
Is this Working Party set up for the same fate as the 2025 party – choose a group that delivers something that’s easy to ignore?
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL1008/S00051/gordon-campbell-on-welfare-bashing-afghanistan.htm
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 1:49 pm
Pete George – Key also said the interest free student loan bill was unsustainable and he was right there too. Superannuation is unsustainable. Lots of other things in this country are economically unsustainable – including the state-funder Health system when one considers the agin population. The issue is what gives you any confidence the Gnats (and Act to an extent) will attack them with a vengeance? Performance over the last two years gives me no confidence at all.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 1:52 pm
Do any of you seriously think, taking into account the performance of the Gnats thus far, that any of these ideas will see the light of day?
Unlikely, indeed. However, National’s purpose in raising the issue will have nothing much to do with welfare reform, and a lot to do with needing a good popular issue to run with for a re-election campaign in 2011. Once the govt is re-elected, welfare reform will go the way of “step-change,” reducing the wage gap with Australia, and suchlike.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 1:54 pm
DPF:
“The status quo where the proportion of the working age population on sickness or invalids benefits increases year after year is not sustainable.”
Ok – but do you acept that this is partly due to us having an aging population? i.e. once you hit your 50s you’re more likely to encounter health problems. Just saying..
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 2:01 pm
Nothing, apart from the hope that surely they know that they have to go to the electorate next year with a visionary albeit realistic plan, that they get a mandate, and that they start acting on it.
As you suggest there is a lot that is unsustainable. My support for National is also unsustainable unless they use the best opportunity this century for bold reforms. I don’t mean drastic overnight changes that cause at least as many problems as they solve, but a flexible strategy that takes us forward.
Stuff Australia. We should have our own aspirations, goals, and determination.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 2:11 pm
Interesting they use the example of Holland. I lived there for quite a period and still have in-laws over there. It had what was termed a ‘Royale’ welfare system. The word used by the Dutch themselves. Examples abound:
- It was well nigh possible to fire anyone for incompetence and staff had to be coached to leave – We had employees one literally dare not give work to
- Pay rises had to match the CPI by law – the groans when, through recession, they had negative CPI were impressive.
- You could take a year off on either 80% or full pay under very flimsy health issues. I saw this abused regularly.
- Dutch friend of ours remained on the benefit for 5-6 years and worked for charitable endeavours and as he pointed out they never pushed him back in to work and he did it as a lifestyle choice
- Top tax rates were ~ 70%
- There were zones where one could only live if below a certain income. These were rather nice the ones I saw. Better than what I had to pay 4 times the rent for.
Surprisingly, abuse did occur but was relatively low, mainly because the Dutch in general were self disciplined. North Sea Oil helped a lot as well. Rampant abuse has them winding back their welfare state in recent years. They cannot afford it.
Pretty sure I would not want to use Holland as an example – well perhaps as a failing one.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 2:29 pm
Dame Margaret Thatcher hi-lighted the biggest problem with socialism “that you eventually have no one left to fund it”, we have passed that tipping point already except that it is masked by borrowing, IMHO.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 2:46 pm
When Rebstock returns to the real world I’ll take some notice of what she says. Another useless wordsmith, aka “teacher”.
Her time with the Commerce Commission does not count as “real world”.
The problem with all such groups is that, with one or two exceptions, the membership is proposed by the Department. They always choose “reliable” academics over coal-face practitioners since they can be relied upon to produce crap (aka thousands of words and impractical recommendations).
As John Key said this morning” When we get their final report we will reject some of their recommendations and agree to some.”
It would be nice if, just once, our money was NOT wasted.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 2:48 pm
Hi folks,
I have been reading these posts for a while now. I am amazed at the negativity around the way this country is run. It’s almost like people just think we are going to become a future Zimbabwe! I for one am reasonably happy with the way things are going. I think National have done an OK job but the pressure is starting to mount for them to do more. They need to really step up their game next election if they want to stay in power for another 2 terms. I think they will win the next election regardless but unless they are more bold, will most likely lose the one after.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 3:01 pm
Honest John: You seem to be implying that work-related stress is the sole or major problem being “addressed” here. Even though many believed that the boundaries of that particular affliction would be widened quickly once relevant cases commenced under the Act, few of us envisaged it being portrayed as the principal cause of employee illness. You are being highly selective with that argument.
Secondly, you believe that any business with more than 20 employees (let’s say 25, shall we?) “can generally afford to have a proper HR team to make sure workers are looked after properly.” Do you think 10-20% of the workforce would be enough for your purposes if you owned the business?
Thirdly, you argue personal tax cuts for business owners as the reason why businesses won’t suffer under your employer welfare funding prescription. You might have been good enough to acknowledge that such tax cuts are to be offset by increases in personal GST liabilities. More selective reasoning.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 3:08 pm
More ad hocery. Yesterday it was affordable housing. The answer was: “throw money at it”.
Today it’s looking after sick and injured workers. The answer: “throw someone else’s money at it”.
Yet as I pointed out yesterday in relation to housing, and Viking2 notes today in relation to the business sector there’s a whole raft of inter-connected issues (Viking2 cites the abolition of the accelerated depreciation allowance on new plant) that ought to be considered as a whole, but aren’t.
As Jibbering Gibbon says:
These “think tanks” do what they were established to do: look at an issue in isolation. The people we pay to see the big picture, think about it, and come up with an interwoven plan based on an underlying philosophy and as much robust research as they can find and/or commission, are our politicians.
Clearly they’re not doing the job we pay them to do. For instance, you can’t advocate welfare reform without understanding its impact on the economy and business, and its impact on the balance of trade, and its impact on the domestic economy and its impact on… employment. But can anyone seriously imagine taking Paula Bennett out of her beneficiary-bashing comfort zone and exploring those issues intelligently?
It’s by no means just her, I meerely cite that as one of the more obvious examples… as Viking2 points out, even our Minister of Finance seems to have, at best, a limited grasp of the wider implications of decisions. And those sitting across the aisle are generally no better.
We accuse them – with good reason – of troughing and generally wasting our time and money. But have we ever asked why? Perhaps one of the reasons is that many simply don’t have the intellectual capacity required for the positions to which they’ve been appointed and, overwhelmed by the size of the task at hand, figure they’ll just lay back and gouge as much as they can before their inadequacies are inevitably exposed and they’re replaced by a new band of incompetents?
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 5:30 pm
“And while Mangere Budgeting Service’s chief executive Darryl Evans agrees that changes need to be made, there are inherent problems around employment. He says there needs to be more focus on getting people real jobs and, more importantly, paying New Zealanders wages they can live on”.
Both are true but adding things like super and various other costs like unemployment insurance onto employers won’t create meaningful jobs.
That’s driven by Govt. and Reserve Bank policy.
Govt.policy that discriminates and legislates against the rights of NZer’s to decide their own futures and agree their futures with other people won’t create either condition.
The Govt.’s arrogant, bullying, uneducated and stubborn stance against YOUTH RATES is a good example of the mindless that create these problems.
Try borrowing anything from a bank at the moment and you will get a look at Bollards behavoir, I know best. Well he simply doesn’t. He only knows what he knows.
Time we had some hard nosed pragmatic people in charge. And that doesn’t mean the hopeless Richardson beat the beneficiary type but people who understand what it takes to make work and create growth. Time we had Cabinet Ministers that were at least capable of knowing something about what they are responsible for instead of time serving numbskulls whose passion is for their pocket and power.
Vote:Who pray tell me represents the major investors in NZ INC.?
Who represents the business owners, the manufacturers, the farmers, the wealth producers in this Govt.? who tell me because they are certainly not evident out there.
Who represents the exporters, yes who? we have a Tourism Minister but do we have a right at the top Export Minister, Hell No but we have all sorts of Social this and that Ministers who do SWFA.
Who represents the biggest investors in the non business category in NZ. The housing category. That wimp and useless Maurice who doesn’t even care enough to do anything right.
Time NZer’s got angry with their overpaid public representatives and demanded action.
Will it happen never in a million years.
Why because they want to change the voting rules rather than rules of their own institution.
They don’t want to grow our country, they don’t know how.And that’s the Nats for you. Always has been and always will be.
Socialists to the core.
August 9th, 2010 at 5:30 pm
Indeed Rex.
I was thinking about this issue today from the point of view of how many government reports or commissions have been undertaken since about 2000 and how much has been done as a result of them (Auckland governance aside).
I can think of two that annoy me (due to total inaction): The McLeod Report on Tax, and the Shand Report on the land rating system.
I don’t believe any recommendations were picked up in the McLeod report, and maybe two or three out of 90-odd in the Shand Report.
More recently there has been the Don Brash taskforce (Report 1) which was ignored. Report 2 is due out any day soon, probably ignored too. There was the latest tax review of which the government hand-picked a few little tiddlers as vote-catchers. Then there is this report on Welfare and undoubtedly there are others.
From all of these there will be a few hundred recommendations that mostly, I suggest, will be for the benefit of the country. You need to remember that these reports are not commissioned and prepared for the detriment of the country.
But arising from them all comes nothing. The report-writers earn a lot of money, but the reports mostly gather dust. Then when an incoming government arrives they commission them all over again on the basis that the dust-gathering ones are outdated and new evidence is needed.
The complaint I have is twofold: too much report-writing and not enough acting, and cherry-picked recommendations from them. The latest tax report is a classic example where the authors went to great pains to point out that this was a structure they were recommending, and the recommendations could not be implemented in isolation. But the government implemented the ones they thought would generally get votes, in isolation.
I have made a few comments around the traps over the last week about the government’s lack of a plan by pointing out there is a plan: http://www.act.org.nz/plan.
Plans are there as a whole, not as individual pieces. There is no broad vision in this country because things are done for political reasons, not because it’s right to do it.
And that’s very frustrating.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 6:46 pm
Actually Gooner the important beginning is to have a set of principles. No one other than ACT has any as far as I can tell.
Vote:Principles guide plans and execution of those plans in the right direction.
August 9th, 2010 at 7:46 pm
Gooner notes:
Which is precisely what the Australian government did with the Henry tax review, which proposed a raft of interlocking tax changes, each dependent on the other. The government threw 99% of them out, chose one – the “mining super tax” – that looked like a vote-winner, and proceeded to make a dog’s breakfast of the thing to the extent that it was that which eventually led to Rudd’s knifing. Then Gillard backed off it… or said she had. Made a reat show of signing a truce with the miners. But only some miners. So now the rest are back to campaigning… rarely have I seen such a mess. Except… well, other messes iover which Gilard has presdided, like the huge rort that is “Building the Education revolution” aka “This one room tuckshop will cost ya $600,000″.
So it’s not just NZ politicians but all politicians who do exactly this, proving we need systemic reform not just a swap of the players every three years… but how to convince the rest of the country?
Meanwhile Viking2 points out:
How absolutely true. Even though NZF hadn’t had time to work up detailed policy for every single issue before the 1996 election I was never stumped for an answer for media wanting to know what we’d do on a specific issue. I’d refer to the party’s “Fundamental Principles” and they almost always provided a clear indication of how we’d react to a proposal.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 9:26 pm
“I’d refer to the party’s “Fundamental Principles” and they almost always provided a clear indication of how we’d react to a proposal.”
Too bad Winston apparently didn’t read them, since he always seems a bit lost for an answer when the word “principle” comes up in conversation.
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 10:57 pm
Don’t businesses already pay ACC levies to accommodate for staff that get sick or injured through work related activities? Are businesses expected to pay twice now?
Vote:August 9th, 2010 at 11:39 pm
Just for the benefit of all, Rebstock is a screaming socialist. This proposal is just a means by which the so-called “poverty” can be collectivised via employers and needs to be resisted. If we are serriously to get ahead as a country we need to take responsibility individually. I have income protection insurance, why do some think the flotsome and jetsome should have their interests insured by me as their employer? Yes, I know I am evil etc, etc, etc, heard it all before, but why should I have to not only look out for myself, but take on the responsibility for others who can’t otherwise be arsed?
Better solution, time limit (for a life-time) all benefits so they are indeed a safety-net rather than a comfortable hammock. Every DPB recipient gets pushed off that hammock when youngest turns 5 and starts school (unless he/she is in the care of Her Majesty – in which case it is cut, and never re-instated, ever). No benefit whatsoever, is ever paid to a convicted criminal. So-called “sickness” beneficiaries are made to work to their ability, cleaning grafiti and shit spread by their spawn in the first place. The unemployed have to do like wise.
If society wishes to continue as is, and I remain paying for the welfare of others, I want to see some outcomes. In fact, I would have a billeting system, where each tax-payer gets a group of beneficiaries they pay for, billeted to them to put to work as they see fit. Wonder what that would do the the welfare rolls? Invaild’s crutches clatterring in the streets as they make their way to WINZ I should suspect.
Vote:August 10th, 2010 at 10:52 am
Pay the unemployed to wipe the asses of the invalids. The unemployed can also be put to work on farms to feed beneficiaries and prisoners. Shoot them if they refuse then they can be used as food.
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