August 16, 2022
Tax trap taught Tainui life lessons
A Māori filmmaker says being made bankrupt forced him to change his life in positive ways.
In an E-Tangata article, Whina producer Tainui Stephens revealed he felt shame and stigma as he was going through his 2018 bankruptcy for a decade-old tax debt that ballooned out from $166,000 to $675,868.88 with interest and penalties.
He told Radio Waatea Dale Husband host the experience made him stronger.
“It was kind of a liberating feeling to actually sell everything off and have to exist only with what you had. It was about the cash and I had to learn to knuckle down and I wasn’t too unhappy about that at all. I had to get my act together,” Mr Stephens says.