Yes, resist the Welfare reforms by all means but putting more and more ambulances at the bottom of he cliff will not solve the deteriorating social conditions in New Zealand. The structural injustice also needs to be addressed – not instead of, but as well as. Many of those who are resisting the Welfare changes are also working hard advocating social change.  I applaud such people.

But there is more, I can’t help wondering if it is just too easy to expect the Government of the day and its many agencies to do all our dirty work for us. In the past, when people tried to convince me that the Welfare State was not perfect, I found it hard to see what they were on about. It was often argued that the Welfare State makes people “welfare dependent”, whatever that means. That may or may not be true, but I have come to suspect that the Welfare State makes ordinary people welfare independent – an attitude, perhaps only subconscious, that thinks it is the government’s job to look after the needy,  “I am happy to pay my taxes, and I might even be happy to pay more taxes, so that ‘they’ can look after the needy. Meanwhile I will carry on with my reasonably comfortable life content that I have done my bit.

In the days before the Welfare State, people of good will banded together and went out and did the work. They raised the money, they build the buildings, they set up the programmes. I know there are still organisations around that do this, but they are not thick on the ground.  In my own church there were, in the past, massive efforts made to educate the poor, care for the sick, and house the homeless. Such activities now seem to exist only on the periphery, while we put all or energies onto making sure we are using the correct formulas when we pray….  history records that this phenomenon also happened in the time of Jesus.

Oh God give me a generous heart and also stop me from becoming a curmudgeon in my old age.

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1 Comment

spiritedcrone
Aug 30, 2010 8:59