Merepeka Raukawa-Tait: Budget needs to address pressing issues

Finance Minister Grant Robertson with his 2018 Budget hot off the press at PrintLink in Petone. Photo / file

It's Budget day today. Earlier this week I wished the Minister of Finance, Grant Robertson, well in presenting the Government's, and his, first Budget.

He said he was looking forward to it. I know many people couldn't care less about the Budget "it is what it is" they say. And that's right. But the Budget impacts our lives and it's taxpayers' money the Government spends so I am interested.

It's a pity the Government didn't have the results of international research company Ipsos' first survey of New Zealanders to help them prepare for today's Budget. It's just been released but maybe the Government did get advance notice.

Ipsos' Issues Monitor discovered the 10 biggest issues facing the nation are housing, poverty/inequality, healthcare, crime, cost of living, drug and alcohol abuse, climate change, education, immigration and environmental pollution. These are our biggest worries. It stands to reason we would like to see a Budget that takes these concerns to heart. Increases funding and support in these areas particularly.

I am pleased New Zealanders are worried about poverty and inequality. This shows we do care about what happens to others and we don't just think of ourselves.

It is the effects of poverty on children that must no longer be overlooked. We continue to say our children are our future but poverty is making that future very precarious for thousands of children.

Only some children will be our future. Will have a future. Some, because of their family structure, stability and nurturing home environment will make it through childhood and adolescence and go on to become productive and valued members of society.

Other children, and there are thousands of them, will have short stunted lives. Their growing years spent living in households barely existing above the poverty line. In these homes there are caring families too but the daily grind of having to try to make ends meet and survive from one pay day or benefit payment to the next has taken its toll.

These families are not thriving, merely surviving. Poverty has gained a foothold and its imprint is growing daily. A caring government understands there is no place in New Zealand for families to be defined as some belonging to the A Team while others are destined for the B Team.

I would like to see a Budget that adequately funds services to support young mothers, focus on the housing needs of struggling families, make family violence and addiction services more widely available, prioritise child and adolescent mental health, provide young school leavers with meaningful job training opportunities, and increase disability support.

There are competing demands in so many areas. Welfare, health, education, justice, business and primary industries and transport. The list goes on. Each wanting to see something in the Budget that will allow them to increase or better the services they provide.

A Budget that takes a planned, long term approach to growing the economy and puts equal weight on lifting and growing the wellbeing of all families in New Zealand is long overdue.

• Merepeka Raukawa-Tait is a Rotorua district councillor, Lakes District Health Board member and chairs the North Island Whanau Ora Commissioning Agency. She writes, speaks and broadcasts to thwart political correctness.