Posts by jessica scott
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I always liked the nuclear-free Wellington sign - now in the Wellington Museum of City and Sea, it was rescued from a skip before being displayed, hence why it is snapped in half. It was located next to the main road beside the runway so you were in no doubt that it was directed at tourists and was on airport-owned land
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Muse: Hooray for Wellywood (Really!), in reply to James Butler,
I think another reason the sign has caused so much outrage is the process of it being announced in advance, yet the public being told that it's a done deal. If it had suddenly popped up over night, people still would have been upset, but I think would have come around to it, or grumbled but not made too much fuss.
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Lindsay Perigo is hilarious. My favourite bit was when he called teachers 'child molesters of the mind'. Christmas dinner with him must be lots of fun.
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Now that I'm thinking about Bookshops I like: The Island Bay Stationers in Wellington is one of my favourite bookshops and a recent surprise discovery. You wouldn't expect it from looking at the front window- it looks like a regular dairy/magazine shop. It has an amazing range of children's books- we found a first edition 'The Bad Baby and the Elephant', and were sold it at the cost on the original price sticker, dating back to the 70's!
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This seems to have quite a parallel to the fall of the retail-music-selling giants (Tower etc) of the last few years, while the independent sellers are doing better than ever. (That's my impression, at least. Unity always seems to be very busy whenever I go there in Wellington) It seems in both cases there's no middle-market demand- people will either buy online/download/buy from the warehouse etc or enjoy the experience of an independent/specialty store.
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Speaker: Medical Journal, Chapter V, in reply to BenWilson,
The procedure is, in theory, reversible isn't it?
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Speaker: What PACE actually does, in reply to George Darroch,
Yes, the same from what I remember. It's still the dole, still the same amount of money etc The difference is/was when people on the scheme developed their 'job seekers agreement' could specify that they were looking for work within the creative industries, and therefore couldn't be reprimanded for refusing to go to job interviews for labouring jobs, for example
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Getting back to the PACE scheme..... It's been my impression that the scheme was being undermined well before National came into government. After I graduated with a Fine Arts degree in 2004 I was shortly on the dole. I made the mistake of saying to my case worker that I was pretty confident I would find work and didn't need to go on a course (like the first one Robyn described). I was told that if I thought I could find work, then I shouldn't be allowed on the dole. The benefit was there only for people who had absolutely no other options, and was not a stop-gap. I was also told very angrily that I wasn't allowed on the PACE scheme as I didn't have a proven record of working as an artist- I had graduated a few months before hand.
Luckily I moved flats and therefore moved to a different WINZ zone and was given a much nicer case worker. I think I was on the dole for a few months and eventually got work in a gallery under the taskforce green scheme, which was brilliant.
One of the other issues I have the employment in NZ is the voluntary-isation of jobs. Not just in the arts, although there are many, but in other fields as well. I'm not sure if this is still the case, but I remember from a few years ago all the Auckland Art Gallery tour guides were volunteers- why is that?
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I think the most surreal WINZ story comes from my husband, who is a musician. He was on and off the UB for years but now makes a living from it. At one stage he was being lectured by his case worker about 'whether there was a future for him in music' only to be interrupted by another case worker who recognised my husband and wanted him to write down the chords of one of his songs for him
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I completely agree with Lucy's comment. I honestly don't care if my taxes support a minority of people who for whatever reason don't want to work.
As an aside- In the last year I've become self-employed and have been a frequent user of both the IRD website and helplines. They are so much easier to use and more helpful than I remember them being from a few years ago. It seems that they've made a shift to thinking that the majority of people just want to do what's right in as quick and easy manner as possible and it's most efficient to generally leave them alone.
I don't understand why WINZ couldn't make a similar shift. I spent about 1 or 2 months on the dole after I left university and was made to feel like a criminal. Every process was made as inefficient and stressful as possible, I was constantly being sent multiple copies of letters with contradictory messages, making it all seem very difficult as to what the 'right thing' to do was.