‘Liquidate your business’ - WINZ

Liquidate your business and be ‘‘work ready’’ for a supermarket job, is what a Palmerston North woman says she was told by Winz, after seeking help when her partner became seriously injured.

David Andrew and his partner Astarte said it was also intimated by Work and Income NZ that they might have been granted support had they separated.

Winz ‘‘strongly refutes’’ both claims.

The pair, both in their 60s, coown and operate a massage therapy business. But when David slipped three discs in his back while working in July, it rendered him motionless and in agony for about seven weeks.

Astarte was left to keep the business running and care for David full time, but with him unable to see clients and her unable to increase her workload, the pair said they came ‘‘this close’’ to bankruptcy.

David applied for ACC but was declined, he said, due to his age and a major injury in 1986 when he suffered a broken back in a car accident.

‘‘I told them about that, but they actually had no record of it,’’ he said.

The cost of paying for an advocate to counterclaim the ACC decision prevented them from doing so. So the pair tried to seek temporary help from Work and Income.

‘‘The lady there did her best to be nice, she wasn’t trying to be cruel but she obviously didn’t see a way she could help - she just said what she said, because I presume she’d been trained to say that,’’ said Astarte.

They could only be helped if Astarte quit her side of the business, the pair liquidated and Astarte became ‘‘work ready for a job as a supermarket checkout lady, those were her words’’, she said.

Winz was unable to provide help to David while he was off work, because Astarte was still working.

‘‘So I asked what if I wasn’t living there, and she said that would be a different situation - that’s outrageous.’’

The pair have received no support so far, although following inquiries made by Stuff, ACC has confirmed it was looking into David’s 1986 injury as it had no record of that.

David has since been forced back to work early.

‘‘I’m back on my feet now. Ideally not; I shouldn’t really be doing what I’m doing, but we have no choice.’’

Astarte said their encounter with Work and Income ‘‘made us feel like we didn’t matter’’.

‘‘We contributed between us, 80plus years of taxes and ACC and there’s no help for us.’’

David said the ‘‘system was broken’’.

Ministry of Social Development Regional Commissioner Gagau Annandale-stone said procedure was followed.

‘‘We strongly refute the claim that we suggested the couple separate, or that they liquidate their business in order to be workready.

‘‘In our explaining that a couple’s income is considered jointly, separation was a point first raised by Astarte herself.

‘‘Work-readiness was discussed in general terms, as generally to qualify for job-seeker support an individual must be ready to accept any suitable offer of work,’’ she said.

‘‘In this case, Astarte advised us that she would continue to work full time, and in our discussion we explained this would have a significant impact on any amount of benefit they would be entitled to.’’

She encouraged them to get back in touch if their circumstances changed.

A spokeswoman for ACC said they had received no advice on David’s prior back injury. ‘‘The most recent injury claim, and accompanying hospital notes, did not make reference to the 1986 back injury.

‘‘Because we do not have an electronic copy of the records from that time we’ll source the paper based medical information to see if in fact the recent injury is ‘consequential’ to the original injury so may qualify for cover.’’