According to an official information response from the Ministry of Social Development, 5,997 were dependent on welfare by the end of the year. That's 35.2 percent.
Most would have been born onto a benefit.
Of the 17,397 born in 2023, 7,737 were on a benefit by age two. That's 44.5 percent.
The equivalent percentages for non-Maori babies are respectively 11.4 and 14.8 percent
These extraordinarily high Maori numbers aren't due to unemployment - just one in ten of the Maori babies born last year became dependent on a Job Seeker benefit. Eighty percent have sole parents.
The future expected time on a benefit for sole parents is 17 years.
Growing up in homes where nobody works is bad for children. They are more exposed to transience, abuse and neglect, violence, poor educational outcomes, poor health outcomes and substance abuse.
This is an entrenched pattern of behaviour for too many Maori.
It lies at the heart of all of the downstream negative statistics which we are then told to believe are caused by colonisation and racism.
Come on. Non-Maori might feel aggrieved by this finger-pointing but they are not the ones who are hurt and damaged by it.
Maori children are.
They are the real victims in this decades-long mess. Yes, too many went on to suffer in state care but why were they there? Who failed them initially?
Probably my opinion will be labelled racist and beneficiary-bashing but name-calling won't solve anything. Not for the children.
Children need stability, routine, security, and a mother and a father they can rely on.
Welfare has robbed too many of these vital necessities.
It isn't the rest of New Zealand, the government, the public service, the Waitangi Tribunal, charities or academics who can fix this problem.
It is Maori themselves. And to not say so is a cop-out.
Sources
https://infoshare.stats.govt.nz/ViewTable.aspx?pxID=f038b7c1-b055-45f7-8056-ae4b3c56abe1
https://www.msd.govt.nz/about-msd-and-our-work/newsroom/media-releases/2024/future-years-on-benefit.html
Lindsay Mitchell is a welfare commentator who blogs HERE - where this article was sourced.
The equivalent percentages for non-Maori babies are respectively 11.4 and 14.8 percent
These extraordinarily high Maori numbers aren't due to unemployment - just one in ten of the Maori babies born last year became dependent on a Job Seeker benefit. Eighty percent have sole parents.
The future expected time on a benefit for sole parents is 17 years.
Growing up in homes where nobody works is bad for children. They are more exposed to transience, abuse and neglect, violence, poor educational outcomes, poor health outcomes and substance abuse.
This is an entrenched pattern of behaviour for too many Maori.
It lies at the heart of all of the downstream negative statistics which we are then told to believe are caused by colonisation and racism.
Come on. Non-Maori might feel aggrieved by this finger-pointing but they are not the ones who are hurt and damaged by it.
Maori children are.
They are the real victims in this decades-long mess. Yes, too many went on to suffer in state care but why were they there? Who failed them initially?
Probably my opinion will be labelled racist and beneficiary-bashing but name-calling won't solve anything. Not for the children.
Children need stability, routine, security, and a mother and a father they can rely on.
Welfare has robbed too many of these vital necessities.
It isn't the rest of New Zealand, the government, the public service, the Waitangi Tribunal, charities or academics who can fix this problem.
It is Maori themselves. And to not say so is a cop-out.
Sources
https://infoshare.stats.govt.nz/ViewTable.aspx?pxID=f038b7c1-b055-45f7-8056-ae4b3c56abe1
https://www.msd.govt.nz/about-msd-and-our-work/newsroom/media-releases/2024/future-years-on-benefit.html
Lindsay Mitchell is a welfare commentator who blogs HERE - where this article was sourced.
16 comments:
And you could say the same about most children who fail, however for Māori to claim colonisation is responsible is a cop out!
Truthful article Lindsay, thank you for having the courage to say it outloud.
But the idea of a monogamous, steady relationship is just a colonialist construct. Maori culture is far superior and it should not be for us to judge them.
Just as it shouldn't be up to the dirty colonialist to pay for their cultural choices.
The lack of a positive male role model explains a lot of things about the behaviour and attitudes of Maori boys - including their attitudes towards girls and women. Much as it surely gets up feminists' noses, boys need a caring, responsible father for them to grow up with healthy, respectful attitudes towards women.
AH yes of course a stone-age tribal culture based to a large degree on violence (Maori Wars is a good example) is "far superior" to what? Any other culture? "Far superior" just how? This is the usual Maori wonderfulness B.S. and European cultural bashing that ignorant people with NO idea of history are pushing these days to justify the failures of Maori culture including the appalling rate of killing their own babies.
I do think there would be something to gain, if young maori women were educated to choose the father of their children far more carefully, teaching them the relationship is for "life" not one evening or a few evenings
These statistics are shocking and are a very sad and worrying portent of misery for future generations.
Wouldn't it be refreshing to see a considered and objective comment on the statistics quoted in the article from Debbie and Rawiri and their proposals to remedy what is an untenable situation for maori and the country as a whole.
Western cultures decline into licentiousness caused by libertarians attack on the nuclear family is also to blame. School readers and other school material have for decades featured solo parent homes as perfectly normal instead of a drain and destruction of a good society.
Certainly welfare payments have become too lax in requirements .as well and the avoidance of mothers in having to name the father of the child is foolishness.
We also now have a culture of Christian bashing as well as traditional values that have always emphasized fathers who fail to support their own offspring are badly negligent and those who didn't work shouldn't eat. These aren't fuddy duddy ideas but what gives stability to society. Peter Fraser and his welfare ideas have done us and Maori great damage because they failed to recognize the opportunistic attitude of Maori that the leaders like Sir Aparana Ngata warned about at the time welfare was introduced.
Wise Australian aborigine leaders are stating these same things about their own people and Western society ; it is not just me .
Speaking the truth is frequently not appreciated , Lyndsay but not speaking out is dishonest as well. As Thomas Sowell says 'if you want to help someone speak the truth if you want to just [please them tell them what they want to hear'.
Early explorers and settlers describe the communal nature of pa life, with a disdain for private ownership. (Except muskets, the mana of which is replaced by Harley Davidsons). Sustained work was not a tradition, even slaves were not held to unrelenting plod but shared in canoe outings etc. As a labourer relative who arrived in NZ in 1840 commented in a letter later "maori do not understand work." As a communal society great store is placed on idling away time with associates., hence the sucess of marae., hikoi etc The tikanga is deeply ingrained. Without the incentive of materialism the maori choice of a subsidised life in a state provided house with children as ransom for a benefit, and with hours of free time is very attractive. Especially for plain/gross unskilled women with prospect of little more than cleaning jobs.
Those who allowed for the normalisation of single parenthood, casual sex before marriage and no-fault divorce are equally to blame. Maori statistics were nowhere near this bad prior to this. It has nothing to do with colonisation and everything to do with liberalism.
As Elvis said :
"A poor little baby child is born
In the ghetto
And his mama cries
'Cause if there's one thing that she don't need
It is another hungry mouth to feed
In the ghetto
People, don't you understand
The child needs a helping hand
Or he'll grow to be an angry young man some day
Take a look at you and me
Are we too blind to see? "
Oh so true in NZ with our Maori population, self inflicting damage, and no vision to their own future.
Recall they recent publication from Papers Past, describing the infanticide by Maori women ( pre European arrival ) to limit the size of their families and mouths they could feed ?
Does anyone else see a correlation between these Maori birth statistics and the criminal and prison statistics ?
Of course, its the white colonists fault.
Maybe a good inter-tribal war would keep the the numbers down ?
Oops, we already have that with the gang warfare........
CXH... I think the Moris are doing very well at killing their babies..... and draining the public purse, and keeping Corrections in jobs.... I mean, makes sense, dunnit?.
Maori poverty and child neglect is related largely to the cavalier attitude to family planning. Plus the realisation that if a partnership reinterpretation of the Treaty and/or direct confrontation does not lead to total maori control, determined breeding will achieve by democratic means remarkably soon anyway. With health and social services for maori by maori and very many indoctrinated by the TPM and others approach of "maori uber alles", advice on contraception and family planning is seen a sedition to the cause, and hence dispensed very sparingly.
NZ has spent 50 years repositioning various Ambulances at the bottom of this cliff, with the problem only ever getting worse. Until this problem is addressed at conception, NZ will be having the same debate in 50, 100 and 150 years from now.
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