But let's leave aside a focus on Turei's actions and consider why so many people out of the spotlight are forced into lying to Winz, just to get by.
That means backtracking to 1991 when benefit levels were cut 25 per cent and a host of measures aimed at making it hard on beneficiaries were introduced by the National government of the day.
This was a darkly calculated move to make being unemployed miserable and impossible.
That way, the thinking went, people desperate for work would be more likely to accept low wages. Thus putting downward pressure on the wages of significant sections of the workforce.
Combined with the attacks on unions this was great news for employers.
For someone who was doing low paid jobs in the 1990s I personally know the feeling of powerlessness and exploitation as business owners revelled in paying rubbish wages.
The legacy of low wages continues today. People working in cafes, restaurants, South Auckland factories, rest homes and call centres, will know this reality only too well.
Farm labourers, fruit pickers, cleaners, fast-food workers, shop assistants, these are all people either earning minimum wage (currently $15.75 an hour) or not much more.
To preserve the low wage economy, Helen Clark's Labour government even went as far as introducing the Working For Families tax credit.
The more equitable thing to do would have been to substantially raise the minimum wage for all workers and lift benefit levels back up from those 1991 cuts. This the Clark government didn't do.
Many people affected by these policies have simply stopped voting. This is the missing one million that Metiria Turei and the Greens are trying to connect with.
Will it be enough to change the government? I don't think so at this stage. But I'd like to suggest an idea that might help the Greens and Labour get across the line.
There's currently a grassroots campaign supported by unions, churches and community organisations that's advocating a minimum wage of $20.20 an hour.
Based on current research into the cost of living this is what should be a "liveable wage" in New Zealand (see their website www.livingwage.org.nz).
If both these parties campaigned relentlessly and with passion to lift the minimum wage to $20.20 as their very first act of government then, maybe, we'd witness a poll surge.
Plaster this promise in bold letters on all those billboards that are currently saying absolutely nothing to people.
Surely Labour, under the new leadership of Jacinda Ardern, has nothing to lose.
There will be howls of rage from some quarters, of course. They'll be same people who've been laying into Metiria.
Those howls, indignant dismissals and arrogant put-downs, will be a sign that you're actually on the right track.
Go on, Greens and Labour, inspire us to vote for you.
■ Vaughan Gunson is a writer and poet interested in social justice and big issues facing the planet.
