Hon Paula Bennett visits Takaka: money alone won’t solve New Zealand’s problems
Finance Minister Bill English calls his colleague Paula Bennett “New Zealand’s biggest spender”.
At a public meeting in Takaka last Friday, Ms Bennett, whose cabinet portfolios include Social Development, Employment and Youth Affairs, explained that she is responsible for 31 percent of Government spending – nearly $20 billion a year.
Despite the huge sums administered by the bureaucrats in her departments, Ms Bennett believes that money alone would not solve New Zealand’s problems.
“We’ve got some real turning around to do,” she said. “It’s not a lack of funding. Millions and millions of dollars worth of extra money has been spent in the last 10–12 years and we’re in a worse state than before. For example, CYFS received notifications about nearly 20,000 children last year. That’s a lot of children we know about who need the state to intervene in some way. Actually we need to be in a place where we are helping our most vulnerable people, but the reality is that we’re not going to be able to spend more, so we have to prioritise.”
Ms Bennett said that she believed Government could be a barrier between social services spending and delivery.
“We need to devolve power and control from Wellington to communities,” she said, adding that locally-based non-government organisations (NGOs) should not have to expend so much energy on compliance, box-ticking and applying for a multitude of contracts with government agencies.
“If they’re delivering locally-trusted and successful programmes and we know they are, I favour a high-trust funding model,” she said. “We should work out the total the NGOs are going to get, give it to them up front and audit them at the end of the year. I have trouble selling this to some of my officials, though.”
Ms Bennett’s approach heartened Golden Bay Community Workers manager Sheryl Nalder:
“When the minister talks about community-based NGOs that are known to be doing a good job, she’s talking about us. We’d qualify for the high-trust funding model, but it is actually about having enough money to support people making a difference in their lives.”
Ms Bennett came to Takaka with her colleague Chris Auchinvole MP to explain the recently-announced changes to benefit entitlements. Under the new scheme, beneficiaries need to be able to demonstrate that they have been actively seeking work or they can face reductions to their benefits. “There is a need for reasonableness, though. We’re not going to force people into unreasonable positions,” she explained.
The job-creation challenge, especially in Golden Bay, would eventually be met by her government’s policy, said Ms Bennett. Responding to a question, the minister said, “We want to build an environment that makes people feel more secure about going into business. Cutting down on bureaucracy and making the tax system fairer will create more jobs.”
Neil Wilson
