www.wairaka.net/ubinz/IR/pov99/1999B18aCityVoice.html

by Hannah Anderson, City Voice, 18 Nov 1999
 

I'm nine years old, from Thorndon School, and I became interested in poverty last year when I went overseas. In quite wealthy countries like England and Italy I saw people asking and begging for money, some with children and some without. That's when I realised how big an issue poverty is, and I wanted to find out more.

I noticed people on the streets in Wellington who also looked as if they were struggling and needed money to survive. I wanted to find out if there was a problem in Wellington and who helped the poor. I visited the City Mission in Newtown.

The City Mission is one of those great places for people with difficulties. Anybody from kids to the elderly are welcome. The mission gets its money from sponsors. They provide food, blankets and a meeting place for people. When you go in it looks like a big cafeteria. The people pay very little for what they get, 50 cents for a meal and 20 cents for tea and coffee. Many people come every day.

Everyone can help. Karori Normal School came along recently and gave them bags of food. The City Mission also helps people find places to live.

Karen, who works there, says the hardest time for them was after 1991, because benefits were cut and people found it hard to make ends meet. She says she gets to know some of the people who go there quite well and often sees them in the street. But she says she has to keep an emotional distance because she can't take the sadness home with her.

I visited Kevin Hackwell at Wellington's Downtown Community Ministry where he runs a foodbank. It's estimated that 9% of the city's population have received a food parcel. Many of the people who go there are sent by Work and Income NZ (WINZ). Kevin Hackwell says many of them are not being given the benefits they're entitled to. He says he's sick of having to send people back to WINZ to get what they should have got in the first place.

It's not only unemployed people who go there, but also people who have work but get paid too little. He says that although some believe that poor people are careless with their money, this is not true. He says most poor people are very good at budgeting the little they have. He feels very strongly that poor people are getting blamed for things that are not their fault. In fact he gets quite angry when he talks about this.

The foodbank gets its food from churches and supermarket bins. Sometimes they have food days when they go to the supermarket all day and ask people to donate some of the food they have bought.

Kevin Hackwell says there shouldn't have to be foodbanks or soup kitchens and he wishes he could shut his foodbank down.

Sister Declan at the Tory St soup kitchen opens the doors at four o'clock. People are waiting on the steps and there is often a full house of mostly men.

The kitchen seats 48 people and has a homely atmosphere. The men go up to the counter and get a metal tray with food on it. The day I went they were to have macaroni cheese with bacon and lettuce. Sister Declan says a prayer before they eat.

The soup kitchen also provides clothes to those whose own are ragged or dirty. People pay whatever they can, which is often nothing.

At Christmas there is a special dinner and small presents for those who come. New World Supermarket donates the food.

Nearly everyone who works at the soup kitchen works for free.

After visiting these three organisations it appears to me that Wellington City depends a lot on volunteers to help the poor.

According to the Hidden Hunger Report released in October, nearly one in ten households are forced to use a foodbank at least once a year because their incomes are inadequate to deal with unexpected emergencies.

The number of foodbanks and the number of people using them grew after the 1991 benefit cuts.

In 1997 the National Nutrition Survey found that 14% of New Zealanders reported running out of food due to lack of money.

The survey also reported that in 1997, 7% of the NZ population sometimes or often relied on others to provide food or money for food.

The Cure?

The polls say the election in Wellington Central will be a two-horse race between the leader of the Act Party, current MP Richard Prebble, and Labour candidate Marian Hobbs, so I sent both of them some questions about poverty in Wellington.

RICHARD PREBBLE told me the main reason for poverty is lack of jobs. He says employers can't afford to hire more people because of costs. He says taxes need to be high enough to pay for the benefit, but not so high that they stop jobs being created. Prebble wants a 20% tax rate which he says would mean many more jobs and much less need for foodbanks.

MARIAN HOBBS says poverty is affecting three main groups of people: the elderly, people supporting the ill or disabled, and people with mental illnesses. She says we need increased superannuation, more support for caregivers, lower cost housing, and, above all, new fulltime jobs.

The basic difference between Prebble and Hobbs is that Prebble believes better off people should pay less tax so more of the money they earn can go straight into the economy, while Hobbs believes wealthier people should pay more tax so that help can be available to poor people through the state, and their basic needs taken care of.

Kevin Hackwell, who also represents the NZ Network Against Poverty, says people have been lowering taxes for years now and poverty has been rising. Hackwell feels strongly about poverty.

When I asked him why we have to rely on volunteers to give people food and fund them, he replied very sternly, "We have to because the government refuses to."