John Darkin: Time to take account of those with a poor lookout

COMMENT

As I queued between a taller man and a shorter man to buy my copy of the latest NBR Rich List, two distant memories flashed through my mind.

The first was that my penniless parents always insisted that it was vulgar to talk about money. The second was of a television comedy sketch, in which three actors stood side by side in descending order of height, discussing who looked up, or down, upon whom. It was a satirical comment on other unmentionable topics - envy, mistrust and class distinction.

John Cleese, tall and immaculate in pin-stripes and bowler hat stood at one end, portraying accomplishment, superiority and wealth, while the diminutive Ronnie Corbett, pale and glum in grubby cloth cap, the image of unemployment and hopelessness, languished at the other.

In the middle stood Ronnie Barker. Neither short, nor tall, rich nor poor, dressed in everyday working attire, he represented the middle class majority, and seemed to be acutely aware of the precariousness of his position.

At least two of the characters, had they been in my queue, would have been reflecting on the merits of the Rich List, but for different reasons. The rich man because he was glad to be on it, the middle man because he wasn't but wanted to be. The humblest character in the line would have been too preoccupied with the struggle of everyday survival to worry about a Rich List at all.

Like me, on Rich List publication day, the ordinary middle-class masses and the odd limousine liberal flock into bookshops to grab their copy. But why do we have this fascination with other people's wealth? Are we envious of the rich, or do we suffer from a soap opera-style curiosity about other people's lives?

Clearly the general public love the list and it thrives. Our insatiable appetite for news about the good, the great and their money is, for one day at least, the subject of much attention. Without our interest, the list would serve no purpose other than as a handy check-list for vigilant tax inspectors.

The annual Rich List is part of the Idol industry craze; an item of harmless fun that arouses and satisfies our curiosity. We even laugh and joke that our name, yet again, failed to appear. Hadn't they heard about my pay rise?

As the Rich List gets longer and richer, does it mean New Zealand is on the right track and all's right with the world? Or is wealth flowing in one direction only?

Consider for a moment a reverse scenario. A different kind of list, on which none of us would welcome a mention: a Poor List.

Often brushed under a threadbare carpet, and certainly not idolised, are New Zealand's genuine poor. They are far more populous than the feted ultra-wealthy, or even the so-called uncomfortable rich. But unlike the wealthy, they have no power and no access to glamorous publicity.

Richly designed, an annual Poor List would be more than a who's who of the needy. Backed with pertinent statistics, such a list would be a sobering device for measuring the gaps between the rich and poor, and a dramatic expose in the fight against poverty.

Published as a glossy, the Poor List would profile the 200 poorest people in the land. Potted biographies of the chosen subjects, including how little money they possess, their atrociously overcrowded housing conditions, poor health prospects and the social stigma they suffer as pariah members of a first world nation, would be intimately detailed, along with their reflections on their fiscal misfortunes and prospects for the coming year.

Photographs of despairing and grim-faced families outside their houses will remind us not to aspire to be like them.

By celebrating an annual Poor Day, highlighted by a Poor List published simultaneously with the Rich List, we might embarrass ourselves and the Government into focusing the nation's collective attention on finding solutions that could truly close the yawning gaps between the super rich and deserving poor.

Experts world-wide acknowledge that tackling poverty is the first step towards resolving knock-on social problems such as educational underachievement, drug abuse, crime and family violence. Celebrating the wealth-creating skills of the deserving super-rich should and must be tempered with an increased responsibility towards uplifting the deserving poor.

At his inaugural address in 1961, John F. Kennedy said if a society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. Attracting advertising may be difficult, but who will sponsor the first annual Poor List?

* John Darkin is a writer from Gisborne.