Bad news first: TOP would abolish Paid Parental Leave. Now the good news: we would give ALL families with children under three $200 per week; no questions asked. Labour is targeting the middle class, telling low-income families to go to hell.

As election bribe season kicks into full swing, both Labour and National are taking turns to give money to people that don’t really need it. Yesterday Labour announced their free tertiary package, which we have already critiqued here. Then National followed that up with an announcement about extending paid parental leave to 22 weeks, despite cynically vetoing Labour’s attempts to do the same. 

We all think New Zealand is a great place to raise a family. However, a new global report card from UNICEF shows that for many New Zealanders this isn’t the case. We are failing our children, and one of the key reasons is because we give so much of our money to the elderly.  

At The Opportunities Party (TOP) we’re so glad the Greens are joining us in choosing to address child poverty with policy that is supported by high-quality scientific evidence. 

We need more and better social housing. How would TOP’s policy achieve this? We’ve had a lot of questions on this. 

A number of people have asked me what the ultimate objective of “The Opportunities Party” is. We have a tonne of policies, so which are the most important? What are we trying to achieve? 

Press Release

Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) says the "Thriving Families" policy of The Opportunities Party (TOP) announced on Tuesday recognises New Zealand desperately needs a fundamental re-envisioning of the welfare and income redistribution systems.

Here is the video from the launch of the UBI and Thriving families policy. The video outlines The Opportunities Policy and gives a background to the concept of a UBI.