Hon Carmel Sepuloni Minister of Social Development Email c.sepuloni@ministers.govt.nz Phone +64 4 817 8708
Dear Minister Sepuloni,
I am writing to you to express my strong disappointment with your policy of a new COVID 19 Income Relief Payment "a new temporary payment to support New Zealanders who lose their jobs due to the global COVID-19 pandemic" that you announced on 25 May 2020.
This is obviously a "Claytons" unemployment benefit/job-seeker payment targeted at people who can attribute their unemployment to the economic consequences of the pandemic.
As many welfare and community NGOs have noted, the proposed payment is significantly higher than the standard job-seeker benefit. Why are not all unemployed people deserving of the higher level of payment? You have retreated into right-wing prejudices of "deserving poor" and the "less deserving poor". I find that contemptible.
This arbitrary difference in the value of the payment is obviously unfair and discriminatory, I can't believe that it is happening under a Labour-led Government. "All this under a Labour Government" as Denis O'Reilly once said.
This ad-hoc policy is all the more galling given that you have rushed special legislation through Parliament to enact the policy. Where was the special legislation to enact all the majority of the 120 recommendations by the Welfare Expert Advisory Group that you have failed to adopt?
I do not see much "he waka eke noa" or "team of 5 million" or "be kind" in this policy. I think you are letting down the Prime Minister and everything she stands for in enacting such a discriminatory and anti-beneficiary policy.
Yours sincerely
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