Tapu Misa: Bennett breaking promises on solo mums

You're not going to have me bagging solo mums, Paula Bennett said last year, as she was about to become the new Minister of Social Development.

So what exactly was that last week? What happened to the woman who, "having been on the receiving end of the DPB and knowing what it was like to live from day to day and struggle", wanted to bring her kind of "ambition and goals" to other DPB women?

And how does a former DPB mum not know how little encouragement people need to dump on solo mums, for being, in the first place, sexually promiscuous breeders who throw away perfectly good marriages and high-flying careers at McDonald's for the superior lifestyle of the DPB mum, and in the second place, shameless bludgers (a little like some MPs, but less socially acceptable)?

Solo mums, already weighed down by the exhaustion and stigma of the job, might have expected better from the heroic battler who overcame the odds to haul herself up the ladder - all through sheer grit, hard work and discipline.

She'd been determined to reject that "victim stuff", to not be that "poor, uneducated Maori solo mum". As if that was likely. Bennett didn't connect with her Maori side till university. She was the rebellious but indulged only daughter of a comfortable "middle New Zealand" family (dad had owned his own business, mum was a librarian). She didn't lack self-belief; her family wasn't without resources. So being a single mum at 17 was never likely to derail her for long.

But if she had help from her parents, she doesn't mention it. Yes, there were lucky breaks, supportive friends and flexible employers, and quite a bit of public money (how much is no one's business, apparently), including a handy little thing called the Training Incentive Allowance (TIA) which allowed her to back herself into a university degree. But basically, it was all down to individual pluckiness. Or so the story goes.

So you can imagine how annoying it must have been to have a couple of DPB mothers complaining that their dreams of being just like Paula had been squashed by the cuts to the TIA. Bennett's response was to bring the full weight of her office to bear on the women by publicly releasing the total amount of government assistance each was getting ($715 for one and $554 for the other). She said she wanted to introduce some balance into the debate; the figures showed the women had been given "a fair go".

"They're already getting a huge amount of support from the Government. We're asking them to back themselves a little bit and invest a bit of their own money."

In other words, they were being, at the very least, whiney, and at the worst, unreasonable and greedy. So why the surprise when things turned nasty? What did Bennett expect but the "absolutely horrific debate which has been very personalised and ugly"?

It wasn't a fair fight. Bennett's so-called balancing information didn't give the full story, either. It was clear, for example, that she didn't know if the women's partners were paying child support for the care of their children - which substantially offsets the Government's contribution.

Yes, anyone could have found out that the DPB payment for a parent with two or more children is $272.70, but the amount each parent gets on top of that varies according to her circumstances - and those circumstances can be hugely complicated as well as intensely private.

Take "Rosie", a 35-year-old Pakeha mother of three, whose dream of studying towards a Bachelor of Science degree has been derailed by the TIA cut. She doesn't qualify for a student loan because she wants to fit her studies around her children.

She's a proud survivor of domestic violence, and the amount she gets on top of the DPB benefit reflects the complexity of her particular situation - her children's health issues, the continuing threat from her husband and his associates, the fines he left her with. It isn't possible to judge whether she's getting too much without a detailed knowledge of her life.

And, actually, that's exactly what her Winz caseworker is there for; every allowance she gets is targeted to a specific need, every dollar she spends has to be accounted for. Rosie points out, too, that DPB mums don't get the accommodation and childcare subsidies in their hand, that the subsidies don't cover anywhere near the full cost of rent or childcare, and that, like many other allowances counted by Bennett (such as the Family Tax Credit) they're available to other New Zealanders, not just beneficiary families.

Bennett asked last week why beneficiaries should be treated differently from other students. Maybe she should read her own ministry's reports, which have consistently identified the children of sole-parent beneficiaries as among our most vulnerable; and consistently stated that well-paid, sustainable employment for sole parents is their way out of poverty.

Contrary to Bennett's suggestion that DPB parents are more generously provided for than in her day, ministry figures show a deterioration in the economic position of sole parents. Benefits haven't kept pace with petrol, food and housing costs.

In its briefing to Bennett as new minister, the ministry singled out sole parents as needing extra support. "With the economy softening, there is a risk that sole parents will fall back on to benefits, and we should give special attention to helping to reconnect these sole parents to the labour market where possible. If there are no jobs, a period of education and retraining will need to be the short-term focus."