Rugby World Cup jobs help ease food parcel demand

Levi Pupualii, 7, on the steps of his house with some of the food his family have received from the Salvation Army. Photo / Steven McNicholl

The number of Aucklanders getting food grants from the Salvation Army has dropped for the first time in four years, partly because of temporary work for the Rugby World Cup.

The number of Auckland and Northland families and individuals getting food grants fell 16 per cent from 4861 in the three months to September last year to 4103 in the same period this year.

Full figures for last month are not yet available, but the 548 food parcels given out by the Salvation Army's South Auckland community ministry last month was down 22 per cent from the same month last year.

Regional director Pam Hughes said her team knew several people who had found temporary work in catering or security during the World Cup, boosting household incomes enough to avoid the need for food parcels.

"Let's hope they can find something for Christmas too," she said.

But numbers getting food parcels are still about two-thirds higher than before the recession in the same period in 2006 and 2007, when only about 2500 people in the region received them.

Manurewa sole-parent beneficiary Pua Pupualii, who had her fifth baby three weeks ago, had to get help from the Salvation Army's Manukau foodbank to feed her children yesterday after her car was clamped on Saturday night, the day after she moved into a new rented home. She had to pay $180 to get the clamp removed.

"I had to turn back all my shopping and get my money back," she said.

She has had other food parcels in the past few months after using up her annual entitlement to food grants from Work and Income, partly because of the costs of creams for her son Levi, 7, and a daughter who had eczema.

But Salvation Army budgeter Yvonne Challis has helped to transform her budget from hopelessly in deficit to a $70 weekly surplus after she cut $60 off her rent by moving house, realised that her landlord should have been paying her water bill, and renegotiated her debts.

Salvation Army figures show little let-up in poverty south of Auckland. The charity fed 1590 people in the latest quarter in the Midland division from the Waikato to Hawkes Bay, down just 2 per cent from a year ago.

Numbers were 14 per cent higher than a year ago in the central division and 45 per cent higher in the South Island, even after excluding direct earthquake relief.

Work and Income special needs grants for food and other emergencies dropped by more than 20,000 a month, or 32 per cent, from an average of 63,330 a month in the four months to October last year to 42,500 a month in the same period this year.

This is believed to be largely because of a limit introduced a year ago of three hardship grants a year unless applicants "complete budgeting activities".

Statistics NZ said this month that employment jumped by 9.1 per cent in the year to September in Auckland but fell by 8 per cent in Canterbury.

Unemployment in Auckland fell slightly from 7.4 per cent a year ago to 6.8 per cent.

The numbers

Sallies' foodbank clients
Auckland/Northland, Sept quarters

2006 - 2576
2007 - 2545
2008 - 3104
2009 - 4464
2010 - 4861
2011 - 4103.