Cold f lats, noodles students’ lot
Thousands of university students are living in poverty, with twothirds regularly unable to buy food, clothing, pay bills, get basic healthcare or pay for transport, a new survey has found.
The People’s Inquiry into Student Wellbeing, released yesterday, was delivered on the same day annual inflation hit its highest level since June 1990 and as the country buckled under a cost-ofliving crisis.
Those behind the inquiry – the NZ Union of Students’ Associations (NZUSA), Te Mana A¯ konga, Tauira Pasifika, the National Disabled Students’ Association (NDSA) and the Green Party – believed the findings were ‘‘irrefutable evidence’’ of student hardship and demanded Government action.
The group renewed calls for a universal student allowance, which NZUSA estimated would cost an additional $2.5 billion a year. Payment rates should also be raised to match the cost of living and meet the needs of different equity groups, it argued. While some claimed living hand-tomouth was a part of the student experience, NZUSA national vicepresident Sam Blackmore argued poverty shouldn’t be a rite of passage to suffer through.
‘‘Students remain some of the most vulnerable people in our communities, living in an environment that makes them sick through mould and cold, all while eating two-minute noodles,’’ Blackmore said.
The impact high housing costs were having on students were also highlighted in the findings, with those living in shared flats spending an average 56% of their weekly income on rent.
Despite the Government announcing on Sunday it was extending the cut to the fuel excise, which included half-price public transport and a 25c cut per litre of fuel, until January 2023, two-thirds of students said they weren’t able to pay for transport or vehicle costs.
NDSA founder Alice Mander said the results of the inquiry were ‘‘upsetting, but sadly not surprising’’, with disabled, Ma¯ori and Pasifika students among those ‘‘continuously disadvantaged’’.