Debate on Crown Entities, Public Organisations, and State Enterprises — Families Commission

I want to make my comments around children and families, so I will speak about both the Families Commission and children. The Families Commission has taken quite a battering under this Government and this Minister for Social Development and Employment—so much so that it now cannot operate effectively to advocate for our families. It cannot really effectively meet the roles for which it was designed: to advocate for families through community consultation, research, and policy development, and to provide families with information.

This Minister has done something called a value-for-money review, which really means cuts. Now its work at the forefront of addressing the needs of families and advocating against family violence is stalling.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I notice the member is actually addressing the Families Commission as well, and that is a separate debate. But I am quite happy to ask the Committee whether there is any objection to the report on the Families Commission being taken together with the report on the Children’s Commissioner. There is no objection to that course of action? The member may proceed.

The Minister says the commission would be much more effective if its work were based on evidence and focused less on advocacy. The major raison d’être for the Families Commission is really being frustrated by the focus of this Minister. It was interesting that when this Government and this Minister moved to close down the major programme in New Zealand that was evidence-based and provided services to children, Te Hurihanga, the commission was being asked to come up with evidence-based advice and programmes. The Minister has been playing a game with this commission.

When the Government closed down Te Hurihanga, it also focused on the boot camp programmes. I know that National does not like us to refer to them as boot camps, but that is what they are. Now we have some evidence available to us. Last week we saw the Minister really struggling to defend that programme. The research last week was that there was 60 percent recidivism. She says now that the children are very, very difficult. On the one hand the Minister is saying she wants evidence-based work from this commission, but on the other hand the Government itself is not utilising evidence-based programmes.

Then there was the review of the governance of this commission. That review and the model that is now being directed by this Minister is to really separate out classical-fashion operations and governance, so much so that the commissioners simply become part-time board members. That is it. The very focus of this commission is being denuded. The Minister’s own hand-picked commissioners did not like this, and one left. But it is quite interesting: 2 days after he left, he got a $2.4 million contract to go around and do parenting programmes. There is no evidence base for that programme. It is fun, yes, and people support it, yes, and it is popular in the community, without a doubt. But there is no evidence base.

The very reason for having this commission is being frustrated by this Minister and this Government. Now we have to ask why have this commission at all. Why not do what we now need to do, which is to really put children at the centre of our policies? We should give our children the best start possible, have a real focus on the interests of children, and put them at the centre of all policy development. In order to do that, would it not be more reasonable, more honest, and more realistic to morph this commission into a Ministry for Children? That is exactly what our policy will be in the next Government. The very, very competent people working in that commission would do an excellent job advocating for our children and our families in a Ministry for Children. They would not play games by pretending to be independent, yet being directed by a Minister who has really confounded the work of this commission. So that will be the future of this commission. Thank you.

I stand to speak about the Office of the Children’s Commissioner. I stand at this point and say thank you for the work of Dr John Angus, who has been an outstanding Children’s Commissioner for 2 years. His focus has been on social work, which is his background, and on best practice, which was a key focus for him. I also thank him particularly for some of the work he did in some of the youth justice facilities. I am not sure that people always recognise the extent of responsibility that the Children’s Commissioner has. The office has a statutory responsibility. It is a place where parents can go for independent advice and advocacy. It is also a place that holds Child, Youth and Family to account if parents need another avenue to go to. Its commissioners also visit all youth justice and care and protection facilities, look at the practices there, and take any complaints.

I particularly thank John Angus for the work he has done with some of our practices within youth justice. I personally asked him to do an inquiry at one stage when I was concerned about some of the gender mixing in some of those facilities. He went in there, and I felt the advice he gave was incredibly sound. We have picked up the recommendations he made, and I think the practice we have in our youth justice facilities is a lot in part to the work he has done in the last 2 to 2½ years. This is my opportunity to put my thanks on record.

This is also my opportunity to welcome a new Children’s Commissioner, who will be coming in in a few weeks’ time. He is Dr Russell Wills, who is a working paediatrician at Hawke’s Bay Hospital. He will bring another dimension to the Office of the Children’s Commissioner that I think is really, really important. I think we need to mix it up a little bit and have different commissioners who bring a different focus. I think the office itself should run in an incredibly steady manner under a general manager. The practice is pretty good on a day-to-day basis, but I think a different commissioner can bring a different view, and I think that is a strength and it is something I really wanted to bring to the commission.

We have just heard what felt like, I do not know, an absolute buck-pass on the Families Commission. It was the baby of a previous commissioner, who now sits in this House as a member of Parliament. He stood up and gave the most abysmal—

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: The most sanctimonious member of Parliament.

—sanctimonious claptrap on why he thinks the Families Commission is not currently working, but with nothing behind it. I found it kind of shameful.

I think the Families Commission, in its respect, is doing the best it can with the legislation it currently has. It is very much focused on families, on making sure we have some of that research and evaluation that goes behind it, and on hearing the voices of families. I always remember one of the great pieces of work by a previous Families Commissioner—and this will be enlightening to the whole Committee, I am sure—that fathers in prison do not father as well as those who are out of prison. That took a number of months of research. It was one of the more enlightening pieces of research that I am sure the previous speaker is incredibly proud of and something I am sure he takes to real heart. It does not come as a great surprise to me that Labour has now decided it will bag the Families Commission. It is time that that member stood up and said sorry for being a previous Families Commissioner who did such an abysmal job and wasted so much taxpayers’ money that he should be ashamed of what he did for all of those years.

I would be quite open to him taking another call and apologising to New Zealanders for some of the shocking research that came out in his time. I can mention some. One piece of qualitative research it did for over a year was to speak to 28 people. From that research, it was able to devise something that had no substance to it and was not helpful at all to New Zealanders.

I stand here now to thank the Children’s Commissioner. Since I have been the Minister I have put another $500,000 into the Office of the Children’s Commissioner, because I think the Children’s Commissioner holds us to account. The focus of the Office of the Children’s Commissioner is directly on children, and it has a statutory responsibility as well. I certainly want to put on record my sincere thanks to the Office of the Children’s Commissioner for the work it does and the work I know it will continue to do on behalf of children.

Reports noted.

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