April 10, 2024
Economic slowdown pushes out dole time
Labour deputy leader Carmel Sepuloni says the Prime Minister is playing with numbers to justify an attack on beneficiaries.
Christopher Luxon has set a target of cutting the number of people on the Jobseeker Allowance by 50,000 – which will include people on the benefit for health or disability reasons.
He says 70,000 people moved onto benefits under Labour, and current projections are that under-25 year olds will spend 24 years on welfare compared to 13 years for people now over 25.
Ms Sepuloni, the former minister for social development, says Mr Luxon doesn’t understand the data.
“It’s not necessarily that these people are doing anything wrong or that they are expected to just be for the sake of it trying to live on a benefit. It is all attached to what the economic outlook is and the Government is deliberately not speaking to that particular issue being the basis for why there seems to be an extended time people are expected to be on the benefit. They should be dealing with the economic situation and ensuring people can get into jobs rather than publishing beneficiaries,” Ms Sepuloni says.