Welfare dependency amongst working age New Zealanders is reaching unsustainable levels, and the rising rate of unemployment is set to make it even worse, ACT New Zealand Finance Spokesman Sir Roger Douglas said today.

“At present there are 353,000 working age people on some form of welfare benefit. Combine this figure with those receiving Working for Families and superannuation, and that number jumps to 1.3 million – that's 1.3 million New Zealanders receiving support from the 2.2 million New Zealanders working to pay for it,” Sir Roger said.

“Far from reducing the number of people on welfare National has taken the opposite path: increasing the minimum wage and not reinstating youth rates – pushing people out of work and on to welfare – and entrenching middle class welfare by refusing to alter Working for Families.

“The people who suffer most from excessive welfare are beneficiaries – rather than working, and being self-sufficient, they are robbed of their dignity by being forced to live at a subsistence level.

“Having so many people on a benefit also hits taxpayers with two costs. Not only must the country pay the actual cost of the benefit, but it foregoes tax revenue from those who are not working – revenue that can only be made up by taxing workers at even higher levels than they already face.

“The spiralling number of working age people on a benefit is one of the reasons that New Zealand is falling further into debt and remains so poor in relation to the rest of the developed world. Only ACT is committed to welfare reform; we will give people the opportunity to purchase their own unemployment and accident insurance and ensure that welfare functions only as a safety net, not a safety blanket,” Sir Roger said.

ENDS

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