Comments on: Home help cuts disgusting

By: Hilary

Hilary — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 19:16:31 +0000

It is happening all over the country. An elderly woman I know in Dunedin has had her already minimal home help hours halved. It is very distressing for her.

By: paul

paul — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 07:38:04 +0000

@blip – ‘As an aside – $10 bucks says John Key announces that New Zealand will, in part, fight its way out of the recession by mining our natural resources.’

agreed.

By: James

James — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 07:16:35 +0000

I know personally of a number of people, including my great grandmother, who have had their home support cut under national. The DHB “help lines”- total oxymoron- seem to have all the answers, and even suggested that if she needed that time desperately, she was welcome to cover it herself- thanks nick

By: Anton Craig

Anton Craig — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 04:42:17 +0000

Matt, I really hope you are right, but that’s what we thought throughout the 1990s, that Labour would fix all the nasty things the Tories did over that time. To be fair to Chris (and I don’t think his examples are that good) the Employment Relations Act was introduced, and a type of income-related rents scheme replaced HNZ market rents, but I’m talking more about how the poorest of the poor continued to be dealt to in the same way the nats hammered this particular group. There’s a whole untold story about how under Labour a series of changes were made to social welfare law that were just a continuation of the “blame the victim” mentality that became so prevalent from the time of the Ruth Richardson 1990 budget. The 1990s did more than just this, it destroyed the caring attitude that had up until that time marked the difference between Labour and the Tory bullies. Labour, however, now seems to regard it as unpopular to re-embrace that thinking therefore too risky politically. Going by the general climate of opinion they’re probably right – just look at how today’s generation of students simply cannot comprehend the value of a free tertiary education and the belief that “of course everyone should pay”. The “all beneficiaries get money for nothing” attitude is just too strong, I think, for Labour to take the what it sees as a risk of taking steps to address this. My prediction is that until Labour is prepared to reclaim its commitment to our poorest it’ll continue to amble along with no-one really seeing much difference between it and the Tories. Then, in nine or tweleve or fifteen years or whenever people get tired of john-boy nice-guy, they’ll say: “awh, I just voted Labour because I thought it was time for a change.”

By: Matt Collins

Matt Collins — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 04:16:54 +0000

Actualy i think it shows that Labour are waking up to reality and considering some policies that were prior to this term in parliament considered unthinkable to implement in Labour.

By: BLiP

BLiP — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 03:54:17 +0000

Bit desperate claiming a NZFirst policy as your own, don't you think?

By: Chris Hipkins

Chris Hipkins — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 03:24:23 +0000

@Paul – There is a limited amount I can do as the local MP but I have been helping people appeal their case to the DHB where I can. I’m not opposed to regularly reviewing the level of home help provided. In some cases people get a bit of extra help after a fall or accident and once they’ve recovered they don’t need as many hours. But the scale of the cuts we are seeing now extends well beyond what I would normally expect to see.

@Anton – I think Labour’s track record in government was pretty good: record low unemployment rates; significant cuts in the cost of healthcare, housing, tertiary education, etc; significant increase in super and intro of Super Gold Card; there are plenty of other examples. Sure, Labour didn’t get everything right, which is why we are now focused on the future. I give you my absolute assurance that I’ll remain opposed to home help cuts of this scale regardless of who is in government!

By: Peter Martin

Peter Martin — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 02:33:48 +0000

Seems like there is a bit of it going around…
http://www.3news.co.nz/Otago-DHB-cuts-costs-in-helping-elderly/tabid/423/articleID/140495/Default.aspx

By: BLiP

BLiP — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 02:08:10 +0000

C’mon, get with the programme!!

You know as well as I National Ltd™ are setting about the privatisation of the health system. Whanau Ora operatives are already out in the community scoping possible sites and carrying out market segmentisation studies on the demographics of particular areas. Ryall has just announced the shifting of hospital services out to “the community”.

The cuts now impacting across the public health system are designed to create the demand and the market for people to flood into their local privately-owned Whanau Ora “service centre” – no doubt handily situated right next to a transport hub and McDonalds.

Watch for further privatisation-by-stealth in John Key’s dribble tomorrow. in the first week after the election, the Hollow Men had “advisers” in place across the public service looking for just these sorts of opportunities.

As an aside – $10 bucks says John Key announces that New Zealand will, in part, fight its way out of the recession by mining our natural resources.

By: Anton Craig

Anton Craig — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 01:38:42 +0000

It really does get quite tiring hearing Labour slamming cuts this government is making with no evidence that they would do it differently or of whether they have never done it differently in the past. Of course, Chris, what you are saying is happening is horrendous, but can we rely on Labour to stand on it’s position to change things? There are countless examples of terrible policies the Tories brought in during the 1990s that Labour railed against endlessly then when elected proceeded to carry on doing the same thing, sometimes even with greater vigour. When in power there’s every excuse in the book not to change, often as a result of being bullied by officials who, at the very best, might in a case like this home-help issue, concede not to cut the help “over the phone” but proceed to cut the help nonetheless. There’ll be many many poeople who agree that what the MOH is doing is outrageous, and of course we’re living in a democracy so you can say what you like about nasty behaviour such as this, but it feels to me that the hypocrisy Labour’s guilty been guilty of when it comes to the poorest of the poor almost means it’s not entitled to say anything about it because there’s simply no evidence, and as its track record shows, that things would be any different if it was the government. I’m not saying you shouldn’t raised these issues publicly, I’m just trying to convey a feeling that I’m many people get when you raise them. It took Labour nine years prior to 1999 to rebuild trust after the Lange/Douglas debacles. Continuing from 1999 to treat the poor with the same contempt the nats did in the 1990s might mean it’ll take longer this time if all you do is complain about the Tories without at least making some effort to help us believe that you’d do things differently.