Poverty in Aotearoa NZ: is our Social Security system part of the solution or part of the problem

If our Social Security system was designed to avoid poverty, it could not be considered very successful. In fact, alleviating hardship is only one of the current system’s competing purposes. As a result, the system has features that actually serve to perpetuate poverty. It also continues to reinforce the socio-economic impact of colonialism. In this lecture we explore some of these features.

Māmari Stephens

Ko Pukenamu te maunga, ko Wainui te awa, Ko Tinana te waka, ko Tumoana te tangata. He uri tēnei nō Te Rarawa; ko Ngāti Moetonga, ko Te Rokekā ngā hapū; ko Wainui te marae. Tēnā tātou.

Māmari's research interests are law and language, tikanga Māori and the New Zealand legal system, and social security law. In 2019 she completed the first comprehensive text on social security law, published by Thomson Reuters. She was co-leader of the Legal Māori Project from 2008-2015, and her current research project is Te Rauhī i te Tikanga: a Tikanga Companion, a project piloting the creation of a digital resource for learning about tikanga Māori and the New Zealand legal system. Māmari is married to Maynard Gilgen and they have two sons, Te Rangihuia, Havelund and a daughter, Jessica-Lee Ngātaiotehauauru.

Hanna Wilberg

Hanna is an Associate Professor at the University of Auckland Law School. Her longstanding teaching and research interests are in administrative law, the tort liability of public authorities, and public law generally. Building on those foundations, her newer special interest is in social security law. Her work in this field includes advocacy for individual social security claimants and for law reform, and her new course on the topic gives students the opportunity to try their hand at this too. Hanna is also the law school’s Associate Dean for Equity, and the adviser to students from less affluent backgrounds.