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Finance Minister Steven Joyce delivers his first Budget this afternoon, and the Maori Party hopes it will mean more cash in hand for low income whanau.
Co-leader Marama Fox says as well as having influence in the Maori affairs portfolio, the party sits on the ministerial committee on poverty, which was formed as a result of its first relationship agreement with National.
She says governments tend to tinker at the edges of poverty by alleviating hardship.
"In order to eliminate poverty you have to put cash in people's hands because that is what poverty is. There are a number of ways you can do that and we have been trying to push Government to do that for a couple of years now. I hope they make real changes to availability of cash in hand for our whanau," Ms Fox says.
The Maori Party advocated strongly for the $25 a week increase in benefit rates included in Budget 2015.
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