Respected senior journalist-turned-Society of St Vincent de Paul Otahuhu financial mentor Simon Collins encouraged the Auckland diocese Justice and Peace Commission to use both the mainstream and social media to further their fight in the public square.
“It always seems like a drop in the ocean, but . . . I believe every contribution, every opinion contributed, especially in the mainstream media, but also on social media, is worth it because it all contributes to the fight. If we don’t speak, we don’t have any impact,” Mr Collins said.
Simon Collins
Mr Collins and another SVdP Otahuhu financial mentor, Alana Baker, presented the commission with six social justice issues that their clients in South Auckland are facing. This presentation was given on February 26, 2022, through Zoom.
Broadly, these issues are housing, debt, welfare traps, Work and Income, life insurance and Covid-19 emergencies.
Mr Collins said that, of all these issues, housing is the one that frustrates him the most.
“With most financial issues, we can do something. We can negotiate with creditors to deal with debt. We can get entitlements with Work and Income that people are not getting. But with housing, we’ve just struck a big wall because there just aren’t enough houses,” he said.
“We have whānau stuck in motels or transitional housing, and they stay there for years because there is no social housing to move into, or they are paying unaffordable private rents, and they can’t get into the social housing queue because there aren’t enough social housing [properties] available.”
Mr Collins said that, because the building industry is already at capacity and can’t deliver houses fast enough, they support the Government’s buying private homes.
He said this move is not popular with the real estate industry, because it could push up house prices further. However, he said that increasing house prices can be addressed through other means.
Ms Baker presented the issue of “parasitic credit providers”.
“Often our clients would pay their debt to them before they pay their rent,” she said. “These credit providers know about what the cultural pressures are on the families, and they take advantage of that. They (lenders) totally rip them (creditors) off.”
She said the strengthened Responsible Lending Code has largely seen “home-trucks” and “payday” lenders put out of business, but they have been replaced by pawnbrokers.
“Most of our clients have huge debts and are struggling with it. It affects their quality of life,” she said.
Mr Collins, who finished work at the New Zealand Herald in March last year, told the Justice and Peace Commission that issues such as these can be pitched to mainstream media.
“Public opinion is formed by media coverage: mainstream and social media. The goal in using media is to raise public awareness of issues, and public support for action,” he said. “In a democracy, elected politicians, public servants, businesses and individuals all respond to public opinion.”
He suggested coming out with news stories that are unexpected, unusual, or of human interest.
“The media want public engagement, and we should use all these opportunities,” he said.
Mr Collins, who was described by former New Zealand Herald editor Gavin Ellis as “the paper’s social conscience, ever striving for greater public good”, added in his JPC talk that human stories are needed to illustrate issues; for example, a homeless family, or a whānau exploited by unscrupulous lenders.
He suggested that the Justice and Peace Commission and agencies like SVdP may be able to collaborate to bring the issues and the human stories together.
In response to a question, Mr Collins suggested that the Justice and Peace Commission could well advance the cause of those in greatest need by re-framing some of their oral presentations to select committees as media opinion pieces.
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