Look at the Labour Government’s relief package, a straight 25 cent cut to petrol and halving public transport fares. No mucking around with WINZ or MSD! Any benefit raise there is clawed back by the bureaucracy. Labour should instead set the change where people would feel it immediately, in their pocket!
Labour needs to bypass the neoliberal state more often.
- Make Public Transport free!
- Free school lunches and breakfasts!
- GST off fresh fruit and vegetables!
- A 30% Government-owned Supermarket chain that would permanently reduce food costs.
We look to the State to provide market regulation and a pooling of resources for the best outcome.
Universal provision of well funded public services scares the bejesus out of the Right and the neoliberal public service who prefer to manage contracts than actually do the mahi.
Universal provision of well funded social services is the harvest we all share in a democracy!
If we provide real ways to reduce people's living costs, we can get everyone to buy into the system because for the first time in their lives, they will see a State focused on reducing their costs, not increasing them in an economic system rigged for the rich.
-- ACW edited.
