If you are living and working overseas with a student loan, your interest is difficult to keep up with even when meeting regular obligatory repayments due to your total loan amount. Often borrowers are paying the obligatory repayments, but are still pushed back by their accruing interest working against their efforts to get out of debt sooner. Borrowers must make additional repayments on top of the obligatory just to get ahead, this amount is often unmanageable for larger loans.

The reason most people leave New Zealand to work is to save for their futures due to a lack of jobs and opportunities in their home cities. Young people put in considerable debt at an early age simply do not understand the debt they are getting into and how this can affect their lives ongoing. 

Student loans were introduced in 1992 by the then Labor Government to assist young people in furthering their education who would otherwise not be able to afford to study. After a change in governments in 2008, the fifth National Government (successively over 3 years) introduced a series of punitive measures to get loan borrowers to pay their loans back sooner. The reality of these changes, however, is a ballooned student debt with many people still living with crippling debt which now stops them from bettering their quality of life in terms of financial and personal future stability. The negative effects on the mental health and well-being of those of us with increasing debt because of compounding interest are real.

Under the current Labor government with its leader one advocating for and actively practicing kindness within politics, let's work to shift policy to reflect this and make life easier not more difficult for borrowers seeking to further their education. The initial bonuses and sense of achievement at paying back loans were at least an incentive for young people to take control of their debt.

The penalties for not paying your total debt off as soon as possible (as there are other important financial milestones for young people to reach to attain stability in their lives, such as housing stability or general savings for precarious economic events, alongside getting out of debt) punishes those that leave Aoteroa as though they are unsupportive of the New Zealand economy by not staying and working at home. If there are no jobs or few opportunities, there is a reason to leave and find better scenarios. This mindset is simply no longer realistic and must change.

National Government policies lingering under a Labour government is hypocritical and do not seem to be on the Labour parties agenda at this time, therefore, this petition aims to begin an ongoing conversation between borrowers and decision-makers, with the desired outcomes of the following...

- Stop interest accrument for Overseas Borrowers
- Alternatively, significantly lower interest (lower to 1% from currently 3.5%)
- If neither or partially the above ... Re-introduce the voluntary repayment bonuses (removed by the fifth National Government).
- Annually reassess the repayment schedule as borrowers' overall loan balances decrease.

Let's make positive, supportive steps to get everyone out of debt.
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More reading here :

Student loan debt 'balloons' by 37%, with average student owing $21,000
Zero Interest for Overseas Based Borrowers (studentloan.org.nz)
Paying Student Debt from Abroad isn't easy (Stuff.co.nz)
Student Debt a ticking time-bomb (Radio New Zealand)
Kiwis abroad fear retuning to New Zealand (Radio New Zealand)