Blogging against the bureaucracy
WINZ rules are over the top, says a beneficiary advocate. WINZ disagrees, Rob Stock reports.
The anonymous blogger behind the Diary of a WINZ Advocate wants to give the public a window into the benefits system.
She took to blogging her experiences late last year, seeing herself as a witness –a palpably middle-class one – to a world most Kiwis are lucky enough not to encounter until they experience the gentler side of the system, New Zealand Super at age 65.
The blogger started volunteering when she no longer needed to work herself, and says she has adopted the non-judgmental style of the witness, telling the reader what she sees, inviting readers to ‘‘judge for themselves’’.
Her choice to blog was driven by a judgement on her part – that the WINZ system is dehumanising, gruelling, and unpredictable for those trapped into relying on it.
She does not want to be named, or to see any details published that may lead her to be identified.
There are two reasons. The first is that she fears WINZ would ‘‘trespass’’ her, ending her voluntary advocacy work.
The second is to protect the identity of her daughter, whose story she shared in the blog, and who she helped ‘‘unwittingly’’ to commit benefit fraud.
‘‘My daughter became a beneficiary when she was 23. She was a university student, supported by her partner. They had an 11-month-old child when her partner died.
‘‘She was determined to finish her degree so she applied for a widow’s benefit – the same as the DPB back in 2012.
‘‘She was also determined to play absolutely by the WINZ rules.’’
But, the blogger says: ‘‘She’d been on the benefit a week when I visited her and her eyes just filled with tears. How was she going to do this? She could afford to buy food – but not the healthy fresh fruit and vegetables, wholemeal bread and lean meat she wanted to give her child.
‘‘So, unknowingly, unwittingly, her parents helped her commit benefit fraud – we gave her healthy food so she could give her child the good start in life that every child should have. We helped her buy clothes for her child, and sometimes herself.’’
That benefit ‘‘fraud’’ is easy to commit, based on rules to see that benefits are targeted, and are not being used to supplement private income, including gifts from family.
There’s even a case going through the courts questioning whether a beneficiary who took out loans to make ends meet breached WINZ rules because the loans should be classed as ‘‘income’’.
The blogger’s daughter is now getting on well in her career, but the blogger continues to wonder at how a ‘‘strong, stroppy daughter’’ was brought so low by the WINZ system.
One example of her advocacy experiences was that of an elderly man in August last year.
She tells it like this: ‘‘I sit with a man who looks quite elderly and who is pretty deaf. I discover he is six years younger than I am.
‘‘He needs emergency food, money for petrol and electricity, and money to pay a bill for a long list of medicines. The medicines include two drugs which are not subsidised. One costs nearly $150, the other $70.
‘‘The caseworker says they are too expensive and can’t be paid for. I suggest it is not a good idea to play around with medicines. She repeats that it is too expensive.
‘‘She consults the office manager, and returns to make a phone call. I suggest she should call his doctor, but she laughs and says you’d never be able to get hold of a doctor.
‘‘She will ring the MSD health team. She tells me they are welltrained (but they have never met this man and do not know what this medication is for.)
‘‘The health team is clearly wary of removing the expensive medicine. The caseworker calls the pharmacy and learns the man requires the medication. She is not to remove it from his list. Payment is agreed.
‘‘The man turns to me and says ‘Why are they like this when you are here? When you are not here, they shout at me and argue with me.’ All I can do is shrug.’’
Kay Read is WINZ’s group general manager for client service delivery, responsible for 126 service centres, seven contact centres, as well as Work and Income’s digital channel.
It’s a massive bureaucracy serving 1.3 million ‘‘clients,’’ carrying out the complex benefits rules handed down by Parliament, designed to ensure taxpayer money is distributed within the rules.
She’s read the Diary of a WINZ Advocate, and says it does not represent daily life in a WINZ office.
The queuing, and sense of crowding the blog depicts, are features of ‘‘impact’’ days when advocates organise for people to come en masse seeking emergency grants to a particular office.
It’s a strategy used by Auckland Action Against Poverty (AAAP), set up by former Green MP Sue Bradford.
‘‘They round up clients who aren’t necessarily associated with that office,’’ Read says.
Extra staff are deployed to cope, brought in from other offices.
Read reacts strongly against the idea the system dehumanises people, does not treat them with respect, and that there is little consistency in WINZ officers’ use of discretion on things like food grants.
But, she admits: ‘‘We have got work to do. We have pockets of brilliance, and we have pockets where we know it’s not happening in the right way.’’
A‘‘culture change’’ programme is underway, including redesigning WINZ offices to make them more friendly, less intimidating places to be.
Recently, a group of the highest performing WINZ officers, ones with good track records of helping people back to work and off benefits, was gathered.
Core to their success was being able to build relationships of trust with clients, Read says.
Does she feel there is something cynical about the blog? ‘‘Yes, being honest, I do.’’
The Ministry of Social Development, which WINZ is part of, believes the blogger advocates for AAAP, for which benefits advocacy is a political act, a fight against ‘‘the war on the poor’’.
But Read promises that WINZ does not trespass people for blogging.
In recent times there has been a rise in citizen-blogging and information-gathering that has had a big political impact, emboldened by Labour’s political rise in fortunes.
A report by Renters United, a group of disgruntled renters, played a part in influencing Labour rental law reform, and former beneficiary Sam Orchard collated the stories of beneficiaries who feel they were treated poorly in their interactions with WINZ.
The Government has begun a review of the benefits system.