A late night safe zone has found success in Wellington, and is being brought to Auckland.

For the past eight years, Take 10, an initiative run by Vulnerable Support Charitable Trust (VSCT), has been offering a late-night safe zone on Wellington’s Courtenay Place.

Now, with the support of Auckland Council, the volunteer-run initiative is launching a 10 week pilot in Auckland’s city centre.

Operations Manager Leigh Keown told Kerre Woodham that they get a lot of students and young people on their night out, but it’s for anyone who wants to have a break, get a glass of water, or charge their phone.

She says everyone is welcome, and rather than walk around the streets, not knowing what to do, people can come to them for shelter.

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There’s no doubt the news that the number of people on a benefit in New Zealand is up to the 400,000 mark will have some people tut-tutting.

But before we start ripping into the so-called “benefit bludgers”, we need to be very careful.

Because at the same time that we’re finding out that benefit numbers are up —and the number of people on the dole in particular— 10% compared to last year, we’re also hearing about people over-50 being knocked back time-and-time again when all they’re doing is just trying to find work.

So the number of people on the Jobseeker benefit is up right around the country.

The biggest increase has been in Northland but overall, there are 216,000 people on the dole. Which is just over half the overall number of beneficiaries.

That’s with 81,000 people off a benefit and into work thanks to moves made by the Government, which had former WINZ boss Christine Rankin all excited when she was on Newstalk ZB this morning.

Social Development Minister Louise Upston also said this morning that thousands of jobs are on the way with the big infrastructure projects in the pipeline.

Which is all very well, but not everyone works in construction. And the prospect of these big projects coming online won’t provide any reassurance to the over-50s who are over the hill in the eyes of many employers.

Which is why we shouldn't make assumptions that everyone on the Jobseeker benefit is not in the least bit interested in working.

Because there are plenty of people —thousands of people we’re being told today— who desperately want to work but can’t because of their age.

Or, more to the point, they desperately want to work but can’t because some employers are only interested in hiring younger people.

The founder of a website for people over-50 seeking work has been saying this week that thousands of people have contacted them with stories of being sidelined just because of their age.

Ian Fraser is the founder of the Seniors at Work website, and he says employers need to change their thinking about these so-called older workers.

For example, he says not everyone over-50 struggles with technology. He says that excuse comes up all the time. Not that that’s what comes through in the rejection letter – if you do get a rejection letter.

Then there’s the old line about being over-qualified. But we’re not talking here about people all that long in the tooth, we’re talking about people my age.

I’m in quite a privileged position of having a job for the next two years. All going well, that is. Providing I don’t completely blow it.

I’ve got a contract that says, “we want you for the next two years”.

But I’m as aware as the next person that, when contracts expire, that can be it.

Which means in two years time I could very well be joining these thousands of people in their 50’s who are finding it impossible to get work because employers aren’t interested in them because of their age.

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Around about 30 years from now the AI bot, who will be presenting the 9am to midday show, will announce breathlessly that single-cell classes are to be done away with and open plan classrooms are planned for future school builds to allow greater collaboration between students and teachers. A more relaxed style of learning, yadda yadda yadda – what do you think? 0800 80 10 80, the AI bot will say, because as sure as God made little apples, this is going to come around again.

Anybody who's been around since the 70s, perhaps earlier, will know that the great open plan versus single-cell classes debate has been going on, and on, and on for decades. Honestly, for people who preach collaboration and open minds, academics within education are awfully territorial and guard their own patch. Whole word learning versus phonics is another cracker, but we'll save that for the AI bot of the future.

While open plan designs were originally designed to foster collaboration, they have often created challenges for schools. So it was stop the presses yesterday when the Minister of Education announced that open plan classrooms aren't meeting the needs of students and teachers. Colour me pink and call me shocked! Whoever would have thunk it? We did. We all knew it.

They were originally intended to foster collaboration, and you can imagine a bunch of pointy heads sitting around a table saying: it'll be amazing – teachers will be able to draw support from one another, and those that perhaps aren't getting results from one student can look to another. Teachers will be able to foster the kind of energy and creativity that we need to see, and the children will be able to mingle. But no, it's been an abject disaster. It was an abject disaster in the 70s. It was an abject disaster in the 80s and it's been an epic disaster since John Key and Hekia Parata introduced them in 2011.

Erica Stanford says in many cases, open plan classrooms reduce flexibility rather than enhance it. She says we've listened to the sector; new classrooms will no longer be open plan. But this is the good thing: they're not going back to the future again. They’re going to create classes that prioritise flexibility over open plan layouts, so the use of glass sliding doors means spaces can be open when you want to have a wider collaboration, but then they can be closed for focused learning.

This idea doesn't mean we're going back to the prefab – the cold, uninsulated prefabs for every class that possibly you went to school in. If teachers want to open up space, they can, when they want to shut themselves off, they can. There is no one-size-fits-all for every class and that is the way it should be. The thing I really liked about Erica Stanford's announcement was the flexibility. This is a good thing. This is a very good thing. And I want to hear positive, joyous, fabulous response to this announcement from the Minister of Education, as one Minister who really understands her portfolio.

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