Without being a debbie-downer, I’m going to bring up not having money as a kid, again, and I apologise in advance. But mostly I’m going to use this editorial space as a means of having a bit of a bitch about how the finance system is set up to see those below the poverty line fail, ruthlessly ripping almost anything positive from the hands of those who deserve it most. This isn’t going to be some sad piece about me begging for money and for you to understand the plight for Māori & Polynesian everywhere, it’s just going to be a light being shone on the systems there to allegedly help.
Your parents are either the most successful storytellers or completely incapable of spinning some lies into place – mine were the former. We were always painfully aware that there wasn’t any money, or that perhaps Christmas wasn’t going to have presents like all my friends, but that was okay because my mum and dad never let us see them sweat. They would keep it together for the benefit of our own mental health but to the detriment of theirs. This is an important distinction to make, because now I’m constantly spending my adult life trying to pay them back for the hard yards they undertook to avoid us drowning in an abyss of endless bills and ticks needing to be paid. But why am I paying them back, when it wasn’t my problem to start with.
The ika rots from the head, and that’s where you start when you begin dismantling the patriarchal system that allows those to slip through. We, as poverty stricken Māori, are constantly battling on phones for money and for grants from WINZ to satisfy the cravings that are hunger or a desire for equal living. The bitter taste of unemployment benefits taste sour going down, forming a hearty lump in our throats as we struggle against the taste. Being referred to as bennie kids or pōhara as we wear last years fucked shoes in the heavy rain and suffer from constant colds. The system is designed to fail us, and that’s just the harsh truth.
While the government doesn’t officially recognise a national poverty line, here’s some facts for you to digest as you begin to understand the wealth disparities within Aotearoa. In the 2021 StatsNZ survey on poverty levels, 16.3% of tamariki lived in households earning 60% less than the average median household income. The easiest, yet unofficial, measure of poverty throughout our country. Of that 16.3%, 68% were Māori or Polynesian – indicating that 1 in 6 Māori/Polynesian children were living with less than 60% of the required income to meet the living wage means within Aotearoa.
These numbers have greatly decreased since I was a kid, with government funds in place to avoid the turmoil we faced throughout the 90’s & early 00’s, but the struggle hasn’t stopped there. Why now are they only realising the disparities in wealth distribution? Why now are we trying to fix the problems caused by the Treaty and lack of honour through the miscommunicated articles of interest? It’s idealistic of me to think that all problems should’ve been solved earlier, but is it idealistic to think that we should’ve been treating all inhabitants of this land with the same respect we all deserve?
