The 2016 Budget is nothing but a Band-Aid on the growing wound that is New Zealand's child poverty problem, a Dunedin group says.
The Dunedin Child Poverty Action Group discussed how the Budget would alleviate child poverty in New Zealand at a post Budget brunch at the University of Otago College of Education yesterday.
Dunedin Child Poverty Action Group co-ordinator Emily Keddell said that tax credits and benefit rates were major issues the Budget had failed to address.
"Tax credits and benefits both control the lives of the poor.
"The term Band-Aid has been bandied around and I think that it's a very apt description.''
It was easy to get caught up with increasing costs, but it was people's stagnant or dropping incomes that needed to be attended to, she said.
The group believed the Government was "keeping a lock'' on spending to set money aside for tax bribes in election year.
Invercargill Mayor Tim Shadbolt said it was important to encourage vulnerable people to vote.
However, he said, when people were on the electoral roll they could be hounded by debt collectors.
University of Otago Choose Kids poverty action group member Kimberley Bain said the Government was doing the "bare minimum''.
"We would like to see time and money spent focusing on the Healthy Homes Bill.''
The university group would continue to work with other poverty action groups to make grass-roots changes, she said.
