Families Commission Act Repeal Bill

I appreciate finishing the call, even though it’s 40 seconds. I know that my good friend and colleague across the aisle there, Greg O’Connor, is just waiting with bated breath just to hear every word that I may say, especially in regards to this bill. I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. Could I just have the counter—just so I do know where I’m at, please?

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): I’ll just let the member know when I count it down.

Thank you, Mr Chair.

💬 Kieran McAnulty: Stop stalling.

Of course, this is particularly for my other colleague across the aisle there, the honourable member Kieran “Filibuster” McAnulty, as well, just so that he is aware.

The line of inquiry is my question to the Minister in regard to social investment. So when we were talking about the whole aspect of the Families Commission Act Repeal Bill—and we were all supporting this bill, right across the House—my question to the Minister in regard to the aspect of the social policy evaluation and research unit (SuPERU) and the roles that are now being appropriated to the different ministries is will they still follow—[Bell rung] Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): I call the Hon Alfred Ngaro.

Thank you, Mr Chair. I’ll look forward to now continuing on. The question to the Minister in the chair, Carmel Sepuloni, is that she made some comments previously during the debate in the committee stage about the fact that the difference that this Government will take is that it’s going to be more about the people and not about the money, and that fiscal responsibility is secondary to responsibilities of the care and welfare and well-being of family and whānau. My challenge to the Minister is that it’s not an either/or; actually, it’s a both. As I had also indicated in my previous speech, the Minister has obviously become acutely aware of that when it comes to Budget time, because the fact is that when you need the resources to do the things that you think are important, then that’s where fiscal responsibility becomes critically important.

So my question to the Minister is in regard to the line of inquiry that she will take that has come out of the development work of social investment, and in this regard, with SuPERU, because the line of inquiry around social investment asks some very pertinent questions. The questions are this: for all that we invest into the system of government—and in this regard, social development—how do we know that we’re getting a return, and how do we know that the resources we’ve put in are surely making a difference to the family and the whānau that we are working with?

Now, if the Minister can actually give us some response to that—and I’ll get even more particular around social investment. And again, to the members across the aisle, they may need to know about this. Social investment includes things like, for instance, client segmentation. In other words, how do we know that the whānau and family we’re working with are the most vulnerable? It asks some pertinent questions.

I know the Minister has talked about data, but also too, in a sense, it’s not the requesting of the data that’s important. When we were going through, previously, as the Government of the day, the importance of data was ensuring that we were actually appropriating the resource to the right whānau and family. That’s the reason why social investment was important, and so I’d like to hear from the Minister that she and the ministry will still be following that line of inquiry.

The other aspect was around intervention innovation. In other words, why not question the innovations of the programmes that are being delivered? Are they being delivered appropriately? Are they delivered in a way that truly does make a difference? If I think, for instance, of some of our whānau and our family, there is the diversity of need and there’s the diversity of those families in their make-up, and it’s critically important for us to understand that.

Therefore, again, under the line of inquiry for social investment, are she and the ministry still going to follow that line that asks the question around the intervention innovation? In other words, are we going to be strong enough to challenge some of that process, both from the ministry itself and also from the contracted-out services and the procurement of services inside the NGO sector, inside our service providers, as well, that truly make a difference? In that case, and in some cases, is she open to them looking at the procurement of services around that line of inquiry that may mean services that are run, in a sense, more like businesses in their offering that they have? The bottom line—the question in the line of inquiry around social investment—is what works best for the whānau and who can deliver that best for them, and I think that’s critically important as well.

Again, I think about the appropriation role, so, again, just another question to the Minister is around the appropriations. I know that the member Greg O’Connor talked about the fact that this is “Let’s not get caught up in the detail. Let’s not get caught up in social investment, Better Public Services—next thing, we’ll be counting paper clips, staples, and pins.”, and yet in his speech, he talked about the increase around family violence of $76.157 million. So, I mean, he’s a man of detail and he’s particular, and what social investment is about is also that detail. So, to the Minister, in regard to the roles and responsibility that are being appropriated—the appropriations role—if she could confirm to us who will be taking up that role and which Minister will be doing that.

The third question to the Minister is in regard to the social science expert panel, and we think that’s critically important, because the role that they play is to question and query but also to ensure that the framework and the line of inquiry, as I’ve been talking about, is ensuring that we have the science and we have the data that’s appropriated, so therefore we have the right results, which focus our policy and our direction as well. I think those are important.

So those are just some questions that I’d like to pose to the Minister, and I’d like to hear some response. I think it’s important. Again, I want to just complete my speech by saying that I do hope that she continues on the work of social investment. I think it’s proven itself to be critically important to, again, the transition of SuPERU into its different roles in the Ministry of Social Development and also the Ministry of Justice, so I support this direction.

Thank you, Mr Chair, and I stand to take a call on the Families Commission Act Repeal Bill. In 2003, when the Families Commission came into being, it caused a lot of angst amongst a lot of the providers—because I worked in provider-land at the time. It caused a lot of angst, because in the role of the Families Commission it was to act as an advocate for the interests of families. Working within a Whānau Ora context back at that time, a lot of providers that I represented were quite concerned about that. How could a Crown entity actually serve to be an advocate for whānau when Whānau Ora workers were doing that work anyway? So there was quite a lot of angst, and I was quite interested to read some of the speeches that were done in the House back then. I must say that the Hon Judith Collins’ contribution back then was very pertinent. We all thought, “Yeah, she’s right. Why does it take a Crown entity to tell families how to love children, the needs of children, how to love children?” And $28 million being chucked into this great big entity was a waste of money, basically.

So when National came into Government in 2008 I was pleased to see that they started some work around changing the Families Commission and moving it in towards the social policy evaluation and research unit (SuPERU). I was really pleased to see that, because it then started to take that emphasis off what the Government of that day thought that they were doing for families and telling families what was going to best for them. So moving into SuPERU allowed the focus then to become more around policy evaluation and research and the work that came out of SuPERU to inform social investment, as my colleagues have already stated in the committee.

I think, with the advocacy side being taken out of this legislation, it is going to be quite difficult, really, for Government to actually take on that role. Last week, when we were speaking on this bill, a question was put to Minister Sepuloni about why advocacy was actually being taken out, and the Minister got up and responded that she considered that including advocacy in the legislation was—that the Government would be able to do that role better. I disagree with her, because I don’t think they can. I don’t think they can. I think that advocacy whānau for whānau, whānau voice for whānau that need advocates speaking for them, will actually provide a better outcome for whānau. So I was quite concerned about that. It almost said to me that “Government knows best, we’re going to be a nanny State,” and it’s arrogant. I felt that what that did was take the power away from whānau. It took their voice away, and I’m quite concerned about that when I hear about that.

I think that the work that has been done so far in the Social Investment Agency, Oranga Tangata has actually shown through data collection some of the work that actually can come through and show how far the outcomes can actually occur. I think you need some sort of evidence to actually prove that the policies and some of the investment strategies are working for people, and I’m going to say it’s for our people, because a lot of the work around this Families Commission and the repeal of it has been done with Māori families. Māori families show up very highly in all aspects of social services, so it’s really important that the way forward is done correctly, and even though National is supporting this, I think we should not be throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I think that the Government retaining the social investment agency—I’d like to see them just carry on with the work that we’ve already done, moving further down the road and starting to actually get some runs on the board for some of the most vulnerable people that this whole area around social investment caters for.

Just today I had a meeting with the CEO of Te Pou Matakana, and we talked a little bit about social investment. His comment to me was that that particular piece of policy, through the National-led Government, he was 100 percent behind. He said that it allowed them to do a lot more really positive future work with whānau, and allowed them, as a commissioning agency, rather than working from a deficit model, to actually start making some runs on the future well-being of whānau. I found it rather interesting that he should tell me that, and I said to him, you know, “Where to from here with a bill like this and social investment?” One of the things he said to me was he just hoped that the current Government would actually keep going with the direction that the social investment agency had started out with.

So I think that, as I said, the National Party is supporting this bill, but I think that there have been some questions that have been asked of the Minister that would be able to give us some comfort, and those people, those whānau, out there some comfort that they’re actually being heard, that the information that’s been gathered on them—and I know that our people have been researched right through, from day dot right through all of their lives, but I think that, you know, from that there should be some really key, core lessons learnt; that the Government should be listening to those in some of the areas that our whānau really do need some support in; and that the future for the repeal of this legislation will see that a lot more response from this Government should actually come out of a new piece of legislation.

Without any further ado, I think that a lot of the questions that my colleague the Hon Alfred Ngaro asked around procurement of services and how they are going to do that—where is the role of the Whānau Ora providers and the Whānau Ora commissioning agencies? I would like to see that they would take a key role in the delivery of services, and I would like to see the Minister put back advocacy within the bill and actually help to give the Whānau Ora providers that role as well, because they do a lot of advocacy work for their people, for the whānau that they help. A lot of people won’t talk to a Government agency. When it comes to things to speak on their behalf, to advocate for them, they won’t. I know I won’t, and I know that my family won’t. My mother certainly will not, but she will talk to someone from a Whānau Ora provider in the Wairarapa, because she has that trust with them. So I think that, you know, taking something out just because you can isn’t really a good excuse. I think we should take all the good bits and put it all together, and then start to move the programmes forward.

Anyway, without any further ado, I see that all of the SuPERU projects have already been devolved to the Ministry of Social Development, and that’s good, because some of those—Growing Up in New Zealand was a very good project, and I think we’ve learnt a lot from that. I am concerned that some of the key learnings that we’ve had from the projects that have been done could be lost in any reconfiguration of what’s coming through next. I think that we can’t lose sight of all the good things that came out of it, regardless of what side of the political fence we sit on. This is about family. It is about making sure that family get heard, have their voice, and are able to articulate that and the words and the feeling that they have as whānau.

So, anyway, I close my contribution today. I just want to say, you know, it’s great that we’re keeping on repealing the Families Commission Act and that we’re moving forward and that National is supporting the next steps. So thank you.

Parts 1 and 2, schedules 1 and 2, and clauses 1 and 2 agreed to.

Bill to be reported without amendment presently.