Work and Income have deleted information from its website saying sole parents could be regarded as being in a relationship if they spend a few nights a week at each others’ homes.

The head researcher of a report on the plight of single parents has accused the Ministry of Social Development of attempting to whitewash practices that have traumatised beneficiaries.

However, the ministry said it deleted the line because it was inconsistent with other guidance on its policies and practices.

Tania Domett of Project Gender - who authored the Mako Mama-Mangopare report - said it was strange for the ministry to quietly delete the information after denying it was the case.

“It’s quite bizarre, I think, as a government agency, their response [should be] to take our feedback on the chin and to respond to it with integrity,” Domett said.

The report, which canvassed more than 3500 single parents, found more than half of single mothers said they avoided dating or entering a relationship because of their benefit.

“Single parents are terrified of even having somebody over because it may be construed as them beginning a relationship. Because if Winz hear about this [they] will immediately cut their benefit,” Domett said on Morning Report on Tuesday.

The list before, with the ‘staying overnight’ criteria in place:

Before: The list of Winz relationship criteria that might mean people could not receive single parent support, job seeker support or sickness and disability support - as it was before it was altered. Photo / RNZ

The list after, with the ‘staying overnight’ criteria removed:

After: The list of Winz relationship criteria that might mean people could not receive single parent support, job seeker support or sickness and disability support - as it is now. Photo / RNZ

Ministry of Social Development general manager of client service delivery Graham Allpress said Domett was incorrect to say that someone’s benefit would be cut if they had someone to stay the night.

In an email to RNZ, Allpress cited nine factors taken from the Work and Income website under the banner “Are you in a relationship?”.

Prior to Allpress’s comments, another page on the site also included a 10th point “you live separately but stay overnight at each other’s place a few nights a week”, which was subsequently removed.

When the ministry was approached for comment about the change, Allpress said the amendment was made after Project Gender alerted it to a webpage that was inconsistent with other guidance on “policies and practices”.

“This particular online services webpage is not an authoritative guide to our policies and practices and is not used by our staff,” Allpress said.

Domett said the ministry’s attempt to backtrack on their own statements was indicative of the struggles single parents had navigating the system.

“One of the key findings of our report was that information was constantly kept from single parents, they’re not given the full picture of what they’re entitled to. Even now they’re trying to cover their backs when there has been some comments made about how this is discriminatory,” Domett said.

Nearly two-thirds of low-income mothers in the report said they had been treated unfairly or discriminated against because they were raising their children on their own.

Work and Income were singled out by a third of those people as where this was most likely to happen.

Almost a third of respondents also felt they were not receiving benefits they were entitled to and many said advice was unclear and often contradictory.

Domett said the report’s authors made 82 recommendations for change.

It called for training and ongoing support for policymakers, front-line staff and government officials to reframe the state’s responsibilities to single parents towards protection, not an investigation.

“Regardless of what MSD’s official policy actually is, our research with 3500+ single parents provides evidence that the way the relationship status policy is being interpreted and applied by WINZ staff ‘in the field’ means that many single parents are indeed having their benefits stopped if staff learn that someone is staying overnight a few nights a week,” Domett said.

- RNZ