Social Welfare Minister Roger Sowry is reported as saying the parents would breach the Code if they refused to pick up their drunken kids from late-night parties. Jenny Shipley thinks beneficiaries should be obliged to get their children immunised.

Easton believes that once we start bifurcating society into "deserving" and "undeserving", there will be pressures to shift more people into the latter category perhaps encompassing those who receive health assistance, the physically and intellectually disabled, and the retired. Easton: "One suspects the government would be most reluctant to accept standards of social responsibility for its own behaviour comparable to the standards it requires of those unfortunate enough to depend upon it ..."

In the US state of Mississippi, beneficiaries have to sign a "personal responsibility contract" which imposes very explicit obligations, including: children must attend school regularly (and failure to comply means the benefits are cut by 25%); parents must make sure children are immunised (again, failure means a 25% cut); parents do not get extra income support for children born 10 months after the family has signed up for assistance; parents with children as young as 12 months are deemed work-eligible; benefits are progressively reduced for every refusal to participate in approved work programmes.

Beneficiaries in Mississippi hand over all rights to collect child support to state authorities. In return, the state agrees to provide cash support, training, work programmes, employment advice, and an "employability development plan". The state also promises to provide adequate transport to work, and childcare.

Sources New Zealand Herald 4 July 1997 "Welfare with `tough love hooks' by John Armstrong; New Zealand Herald 5 July 1997 "Behaviour codes is needed to make NZ First relevant" by John Armstrong; The Dominion 10 July 1997 "Charity for the deserving only" by Helen Bain; Dialogue No.95, July 1997 "The Irresponsible code" by Brian Easton

"Nobody begrudges state-funded support for those in need, but it is important to realise that this support does not excuse people from their responsibilities to themselves and their own family. Our expectations are fair, simple and achievable ..."
-- Treasurer Winston Peters, from his Budget speech

"The code takes welfare back to Dickensian attitudes ..."
-- Alliance leader Jim Anderton

" Assistance for the needy is absorbed by idle and useless persons rather than acting as temporary help for the self-respecting and the struggling poor ..."
-- complaint from the inspector heading a 1888 inquiry into charitable aid in Auckland. His report uncovered "the usual mass of vicious and fraudulent imposters" and saved £375

"It's all very well for Mr Peters to talk about the virtues of `actively seeking work', but where are the jobs? There is no use in a `Code of Social Responsibility' where the responsibility lies completely on the side of the beneficiary and not at all with the Government and society."
-- Sue Bradford, Unemployed Workers Rights activist.

"The Code may sound innocent but could be very insidious. It could be open to abuse and arbitrary decision-making over the lives of families who depend on benefits.
"Are the children going to be punished if the parents make what a social welfare bureaucrat decides is a mistake in their child-rearing or budgeting? Rather than encouraging and supporting people, it could grind them down further ..."
-- Major Campbell Roberts, president of NZ Council of Christian Social Services.

"It just suits the myth that government is trying to create that beneficiaries are living the life of Riley while neglecting their children and staying on the benefit until they get a retirement pension..."
-- Annette King, Labour's social welfare spokeswoman.

"Just because a person is on a benefit does not mean they are a bad parent. I just do not believe that."
-- Roger Sowry, Minister of Social Welfare

"This is exactly the wrong way to go. It assumes that people on benefits are mostly malingerers. They are not.
"I believe we should be doing exactly the opposite of what the Budget plans. We should be removing the restrictions on state support and moving towards a universal basic income for everyone, no questions asked. Yes, it would mean higher taxes on those in paid work not the tax cuts that the government has been promising. But its been well said that the measure of a civilised society is in how it treats its weakest members ..."
-- Simon Collins, editor of Wellington's City Voice.

"In welfare jargon, the debate is about a shift from benefits being a "unilateral right" to requiring "reciprocal obligations" from those getting a payment from the state ... National sees a hardening of attitude in the electorate towards welfare entitlements, and believes that this rightwards shift in thinking by NZ First is an opportunity for a centre-right coalition to dictate the social policy agenda rather than Labour..."
-- John Armstrong, New Zealand Herald political editor

"If you were to borrow from your brother, your sister, your mother, your father, they expect something in return. Here, you are borrowing from a stranger ..."
-- Treasurer Winston Peters, in a radio interview, as quoted in the Dominion 10 July 1997

How does the latest Budget predictions shape up? Treasury is projecting growth of 4.2% in 1998-9, easing to 3.5% in the year to March 2000. This may be an optimistic assertion. The Reserve Bank forecast is for 3.6% growth in 1998-9, and a further 3.8% increase in the year after that. The chief economist of the BNZ, Tony Alexander says that the "market concensus figure" is 3.5%.

The impact of the Peters economic policies on jobs is certainly debateable. Former NZ First MP and strategist Michael Laws perhaps sums up the scepticism: "Only a Treasury-inspired document could halve the budget surplus by 55% and still expect the market to believe an optimistic 4%-plus GDP growth rate for the next financial year ..."

Source Dialogue No.95, July 1997 "Boring Budget"

Source fax from Sue Bradford to the Jobs Letter 26 June 1997 "Unemployed Reaction to Budget"

When the Household Labour Force surveyor questions someone who is out of work as to whether they are "actively" looking for a job, they have to say "yes" before they are counted as officially "unemployed". If the person isn't really looking for work, and feels discouraged about their job prospects, then they go onto another list and are counted as "jobless". If the new government policies force beneficiaries to more actively look for work, and if the new jobs are not forthcoming, then the end result will be a rise in the official unemployment rate, as people move from the "jobless" list to the official "unemployed".

In May 1997, the official "unemployment" rate was at 6.4% and 116,000 people. The official "jobless" rate was at 10.6% or 201,000 people.

Apparel and Textile Federation chief executive Marcia Dunnett says that the government was, in effect, sacking 10,000 apparel and textile workers by pushing through the tariff reductions, while not cutting other costs for businesses, such as compliance costs. She wants to see the government lower the costs of doing business in NZ, particularly in lowering government-imposed costs such as ACC.

Automotive Component Manufacturers Association president David Tibby says that the earlier tariff review is effectively abandoning local vehicle manufacture without recognising other market distortions besides the tariffs. He says the government is ignoring the impact that the loss of the local assembly industry would have on about 5000 people manufacturing components.

Source The Dominion 2 July 1997 "Textile tariff cuts draw industry fire"

Chinese state-owned enterprises are increasingly unable to compete with a range of businesses run by newly independent entrepreneurs. These state enterprises may nominally employ thousands of people, but this doesn't necessarily mean these people actually have any work to do, or have even been regularly paid in the last few years. China consequently has a huge "hidden" unemployment rate, including a floating population of migrants, now estimated by the western media to number at least 100 million people, who are drifting around the Chinese continent searching for paid work.

Joanna McGeary reports in Time magazine that China's leaders have been paralysed by their failure to stop the spiralling losses of the state factories, and their need to maintain social security through the communist system that guaranteed lifetime employment. McGeary: "Failing to act could destroy China's economic miracle ... pushing ahead with reform depends on how much pain and suffering people will take before they resort to rebellion ..."

Source Time magazine 30 June 1997 "One country, many systems" by Joanna McGeary

The jobs conference will concentrate on six main themes: new employment opportunities for the long-term unemployed and other groups excluded from the labour market; welfare reform which encourages employment and balances rights with responsibilities; reforming tax benefit systems to ensure they support jobs; policies to deliver lifelong learning through educational opportunity for all; policies to support small businesses, the major source of future job creation; and action to open products and labour markets.

Source The Guardian Weekly 29 June 1997 "Brown pledges to give G7 jobs focus" by Mark Atkinson