By Patrick Gower
In Richard London's house they bring in $85,000 a year. With three children, that means $85 dollars a week from Working for Families.
They'll lose about $2.55 a week under today's changes, life's hard enough as it is.
“It's difficult so any cuts to Working for Families, it affects us quite immensely,” he says.
The tax credit costs $2.8 billion dollars a year, today's cuts aim to get that back to $2.6 billion, a saving of $200 million. So not major cuts - Bill English calls it "Trimming".
“We needed to trim it enough that we could get back to surplus,” he says.
That trimming has just missed Sonya Booth's house where they live on about $60,000 a year.
That means $120 dollars a week from Working for Families.
It will get bumped up but only by 27 cents a week.
“We just have to live with what we have got really and be thankful it didn't get any worse,” she says.
The Doocey Household in Christchurch earn $90,000 dollars a year. They've got five young girls and get a $200 dollar tax credit.
That many children means they'll actually get $2.60 more when the changes kick in from April next year.
So what difference will that make?
“Not very much, maybe a bottle of milk if we're lucky. Not much at all,” they say.
But tens of thousands of families will get less money through the scheme - and 7000 families will lose the tax credit altogether. Bill English says they won't even notice.
“We'll be counting families that don't even know they are eligible,” he says.
The cost of living is top of the agenda for many families. So National has shied away from making savage cuts to this popular but expensive policy. And that's because it's election year.
3 News