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Ryan Bridge: Confused advice from the Ministry for Social Development · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

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  Speaker 1: A couple of stories in their news today which you
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  Speaker 1: will you will notice one of them, and I'll just
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  Speaker 1: read you the first line from this story. Ministry of
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  Speaker 1: Social Development officials warned their minister that using payment cards
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  Speaker 1: as a sanction for beneficiaries can be stigmatizing and open
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  Speaker 1: to exploitation. What so, either the poor things will stigmatize them,
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  Speaker 1: will tarnish their good reputations, or those bludges that will
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  Speaker 1: just exploit the hell out of the cards. You know,
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  Speaker 1: which is it? Are they bad? Are they good? It
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  Speaker 1: just seems a very confused piece of advice from the
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  Speaker 1: Ministry for Social Development in my eyes. At least you
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  Speaker 1: know they're going to flog them off these cards on.
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  Speaker 2: Facebook, sell them or are we tarnishing their good reputations
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  Speaker 2: by giving them to them in the first place. When
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  Speaker 2: you design a system, a safety net like this, it
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  Speaker 2: should be done for the dignity and the simplicity of
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  Speaker 2: those who desperately need it. I think we can all
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  Speaker 2: agree with that.
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  Speaker 1: However, you need to have enough hoops and barriers and
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  Speaker 1: checks and balances for those who would exploit the system.
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  Speaker 1: We're good people, we're fair minded people, as kiwis, But
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  Speaker 1: there are dicks among us, who rip systems off, who
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  Speaker 1: don't look after their kids, who don't use the money
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  Speaker 1: for the purpose of feeding their families, etc. Those people
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  Speaker 1: do exist, and treating them with free cash and no
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  Speaker 1: consequences is not going to change that situation, surely not.
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  Speaker 1: Why would you change when everything is just handed to
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  Speaker 1: you on a silver platter, and whether that's cash or
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  Speaker 1: whether it's a card, you're not going to solve that problem.
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  Speaker 1: So you have to It is a balancing act, but
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  Speaker 1: you have to design a system that is there for
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  Speaker 1: people who need it, but also can't be exploited by
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  Speaker 1: those who would seek to do so.
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