Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston has unveiled a new traffic light system that will try to move people off Jobseeker Support and into employment by introducing tougher consequences for those who repeatedly do not meet their benefit obligations.
“There are responsibilities that come with receiving a benefit, and there will be no more excuses for job seekers not knowing what those responsibilities are,” Upston said in a statement today.
The cabinet has agreed to initiatives that will increase obligations and consequences for job seekers from early next year, including:
- extending the period over which an obligation failure counts against a beneficiary from 12 months to two years;
- requiring Jobseeker Support recipients to reapply every six months;
- making it mandatory for all beneficiaries with work obligations to have a jobseeker profile before their benefit is granted;
- a new money management sanction that will see half a person’s benefit go onto a payment card that can only be used for a limited range of essential products and services; and
- a new community work experience sanction that will require beneficiaries to build their skills and confidence to help them get a job.
According to data provided by the government, there has been an increase of 75,711 people on Jobseeker Support since 2017, making it 196,434 now.
Out of those, 113,931 are ready to work and 114,099 have been on the benefit for over a year.
“Our government will not tolerate people who accept the Jobseeker Support benefit but refuse to uphold their obligation to seek a job – it is not fair on hardworking Kiwis who pay their taxes that go towards those benefit payments,” she said.
Upston said the use of sanctions had risen, with the June quarter seeing 3700 sanctions of either reduced or suspended benefits compared to the same period in 2023. These were due to people missing appointments or failing to prepare for work.
The changes are aimed at reaching the government’s goals of having 50,000 fewer people on the Jobseeker Support by 2030, which it forecasts will save the country $2.3 billion.
‘Lazy reheated idea’
Greens social development and employment spokesperson Ricardo Menéndez March has called the new sanction of mandatory community work “a lazy reheated idea from the 1990s that failed to support people into permanent employment”.
“This policy has failed to support people into employment in Australia, and yet this government is wanting to replicate this instead of working to end poverty.
“[It] left sponsors dependent on free labour and burdened families with the costs of unpaid work. These are tried, tested and failed policies. We can do so much better than this,” March said in a statement.
He said people in poverty deserved more than what the current government has given them.
“People deserve to live in dignity, they deserve to be supported in times of need. Everything we need to turn this ambition into a reality exists. All that is missing is the political will.
“The government has shown little ambition or interest in really addressing poverty and has instead made life harder for many of our communities. Cuts to benefit increases, job losses and an increase in sanctions have left people without the resources to put food on the table and pay their bills.
“Compulsory money management only serves to take further agency away from people who simply do not have enough to properly make ends meet and regularly have to get into debt to cover the essentials.”
He pointed out the Greens’ “vow to overturn” the policies and introduce an income guarantee, which is a policy designed to ensure that individuals receive a minimum level of income, regardless of their employment status or other income sources.