Weekly report on benefit numbers dropped

The opposition is shocked by a move to stop publishing weekly updates on benefit numbers.

From November, income support figures via the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) will be reduced to monthly reports.

Speaking during Parliament’s Question Time, Minister for social development Louise Upston said the weekly data was “volatile" and monthly reports with detailed analysis were more meaningful.

“Monthly reporting and quarterly reporting provides us the level of analysis that we need to make decisions that actually support us to ensure that we are able to do more to support job seekers into work.”

But Labour deputy leader and social development spokesperson Carmel Sepuloni said keeping a close eye on the figures was necessary for transparency and accountability.

“We need to see if there are any spikes any particular week so that we can see if something's going on.

“There's no reason not to produce that information, except probably that they don't want the general public or politicians like myself to get that weekly update of what is going on, keeping in mind that there are 22,000 more people on benefits since they took office.”

MSD figures for October showed a record 392,211 people on a main benefit, including 204,360 receiving jobseeker support.

The benefit reports were increased to weekly in April 2020 during the pandemic, which Upston said is no longer necessary.

"That period of course has now passed. Like many things, we are simply returning to the pre-Covid reporting.

"We want our department's resources to be focused on the analysis that we need to get more people into work, not on unnecessary reporting."

Speaking to William Terite on Pacific Mornings, Sepuloni said the capability for generating the information and publishing it is already there and should continue.

“Saying COVID is done and we no longer need this is a bit of a red herring, particularly given we've got more people on benefit now than what we had at the peak of COVID, so we should still be monitoring it closely.”

This comes with a raft of moves by the coalition government to toughen criteria for beneficiaries, along with sanctions for noncompliance.

Upston said the goal to have 50,000 fewer people on the jobseeker benefit by 2030 is ongoing, and monthly and quarterly data would provide a “better decision-making tool” to achieve this.

“What I'm really proud to say is the last quarterly report showed us that despite this very challenging economic time, we had 16,100 people in this quarter exit jobseeker benefit into work—2,400 more than the same quarter a year ago.

“What we're doing is working.”