NZ Politics Daily - 2 November (liberation)

It’s fairly cynical stuff. National’s welfare policies are very much designed for electoral gain. There’s always a ready political market for populist ‘get tough’ posturing on solo mums and beneficiaries. Claire Trevett reports on the newly-announced welfare measures in the article Cradle to job queue. And John Armstrong’s National's stance on welfare not as tough as it seem provides a very good analysis of what it all really means. He questions whether National’s welfare rhetoric matches reality, saying that ‘The policy typifies National's overall election strategy so far - maintaining momentum through drip-feeding policy to demonstrate the party is focused on the issues that matter to voters, while at the same time not overly scaring the horses’. A similar point is made by TVNZ’s Guyon Espiner in his excellent commentary, National's no-surprises campaign. Espiner makes a number of important points: the policy will cost money to initiate, it’s less tough than the Welfare Working Group’s recommendations, and it seems unlikely to produce the promised savings and reductions in beneficiary numbers.

Espiner also observes that ‘Labour is not calling this punitive or labelling it beneficiary bashing’ and that it ‘too knows the public supports a tougher line on welfare and the party is conscious of not wanting to get on the wrong side of this issue’. And that’s an important point. As I argued yesterday in my Herald column, Left right rhetoric masks almost identical policies, National and Labour tend to converge more than differ in many crucial policies. This point is ‘partially’ backed up by Massey University’s Grant Duncan – see: Labour? National? What's the difference? Duncan argues that in this instance, National has essentially copied policy out of Labour’s own recent time in Government: key words in the announcement ‘could have come from one of the previous Labour-led government's "social development" policy documents’.

Whether or not National’s policies would actually work is discussed widely in the media and blogosphere today. The response has been that there are 22% (60,000+) more beneficiaries under National. Where are the jobs for beneficiaries and solo parents come from? All the signs are that the global recession is not going away and may actually worsen, especially if the European Union can't sort out Greece's debt problems very soon. For more on this see Radio NZ’s Welfare groups say jobs needed, the Herald’s Editorial - Key's benefit plan needs the jobs first, and Gordon Campbell’s On the welfare reform proposals.

There are also questions about whether National’s beneficiary bashing is in fact a bit out of vogue. While in some quarters beneficiary bashing will always be popular, there is quite a bit of skepticism about cutting incomes at the bottom as a strategy for economic growth. ‘Trickle down’ theories have little political traction these days. This ‘squeeze up’ version has a gaping hole in it without employment growth. The Occupation movement continues to challenge this sort of thinking, and it’s resonating with a large number of people questioning policies that increase austerity and inequality. In light of this it’s worth reading Matthew Backhouse’s Almost half of Kiwis just scraping by.

In terms of Labour’s latest broadcasting policy, not all are impressed – see: Russell Brown’s Ante Up and Steven Cowan’s Not doing the right thing. Other particularly interesting items include: Henry Cooke’s A check on politicians' social media use and Andrea Vance’s Hanging out with the political Wags. And also, there was a minor party leaders debate on Radio NZ’s Morning Report today that you can listen to here.[Continue reading below for a full list of the highlights of NZ Politics Daily]

Below are the internet links to all the NZ politics material from the last 24 hours that are either informative, insightful, interesting or influential. This list and the links are taken from a fuller document, NZ Politics Daily, which is emailed out, Monday to Friday, to various researchers, academics, journalists, MPs and so forth. The document is purely for research purposes only, and if you would like to be on the subscription list, please email: [email protected]

National’s welfare policy

John Armstrong (NZH): National's stance on welfare not as tough as it seem

Kate Chapman and Danya Levy (Stuff): Welfare shake-up called vindictive

TVNZ: National's welfare shake-up a 'nasty approach' – opponents

RNZ: Maori Party to weigh up welfare proposals

TVNZ: National promises welfare shake-up

Claire Trevett (NZH): Election 2011: Cradle to job queue

Vaimoana Tapaleao (NZH): Advocacy groups unimpressed with policy

Newstalk ZB: Doubt over jobs for those forced off the benefit

Guyon Espiner (TVNZ): National's no-surprises campaign

Duncan Garner (TV3): National’s welfare shakeup will see 57,000 return to work

Patrick Gower (TV3): Nat's welfare reforms make bludgers out of beneficiaries – opposition