Alice would be right at home in the Wonderland John Key is busy creating. A land where widows will have to queue alongside solo mums with a 1-year-old infant strapped to their backs, to apply for jobs that don’t exist. A land where the state provider of housing for the most needy is to close its office doors to tenants up and down the country and tell them to phone an 0800 number instead.
“These changes are about delivering a more consistent level of service, but also allow us to save money, to provide a greater return to the taxpayer,” says general manager tenancy services Kay Read.
Cutting out the over-the-counter service will result in 70 staff members losing their jobs.
Critics from the housing charity sector are concerned, for example, about the consequences this will create for tenants who speak English as a second language and facing an urgent crisis. That’s if they have access to a telephone. In this age of wi-fi and text messaging, it comes as a surprise to discover that there are areas where many households have no immediate telephone connection – either wired or cellular.
The last household Census in 2006 highlights that the worst affected areas coincide with significant clusters of state housing.
The Pt England Census block topped the poll in Auckland with 105 households having no access to telecommunications systems of any sort. Close behind came Pukekohe North (99), Clendon South (93), Otahuhu West (87), Harania East (87), Papakura East (81), Otara East (78), and on goes the list through the lower socio-economic areas.
Among these people will be Housing New Zealand’s 200,000 tenants, now expected to dial 0800 and ask for help in an emergency. Without a phone of their own, where are they supposed to do that? The public phone box is a rare sight these days, and the chances are, if one is working, it will need a money card to work. If you don’t have a phone, what are the chances of having a bank card? Read more
Sources
- Brian Rudman in The New Zealand Herald
- Image: TVNZ