Presbyterian Support Northern 125 years

E nga mana, e nga reo, e te iwi o te motu, tena koutou, tena koutou, tena koutou katoa

There are many people present today who deserve to be acknowledged, among them Mr Steward Milne chair and Rod Watts CEO of Presbyterian Support Northern. I'd also like to mention the former Board members and Trustees, Mavis Campbell - chair of the Women's Auxiliary, Members of Woodlands Trust and local Christian Councils, donors and staff - I thank you for your invitation to be here.

I feel honoured you've invited me to share in your celebrations to mark your 125^th anniversary. New Zealand is lucky to have organisations like Presbyterian Support, which pour heart and soul into community work year in and year out. The work you do with families, parents and children in need is invaluable in helping New Zealand become a healthy society. Being here today is an opportunity to say thank you for all your hard work.

Obviously 125 years marks a fairly significant milestone. It's one to be extremely proud of. As a Government, we've marked a fairly significant milestone too. One year. It's significant for us - because, like you, we're extremely proud of what we've achieved in that time. In that year we've not only had to get on our feet quickly - we've had to learn how to run. Fast.

What I'd like to do is deliver our report card on how our first year's gone. Social Services: One Year On.

It's been a huge year for us. And a huge year for you. When we came into Government last November we were only just beginning to see how rough things would be for any number of New Zealanders and their families. You know, when I read the statement from your founder Duncan Macpherson all those years ago describing New Zealand's social conditions, I thought wow - that could be today. Unfortunately, we still live in a society that is afflicted by "...unemployment, alcoholism with its often related consequences of domestic distress, battered wives and ill-cared for children and sickening crime, all contributing to the utter despondency of so many."

I can imagine how easy it would've been in the 1880s to be despondent in the face of such need. But Duncan wasn't - he got out there and did what needed doing. Things have changed though. Over the years, the way services are provided has shifted. We no longer think of destitution as the result of original sin - nor do we categorise people as the "deserving poor". And today the Government helps support, fund and values the work that you do as an organisation for New Zealand.

At the end of last year, we saw the economic situation deteriorating. We saw increasing numbers of people losing their jobs. We knew we had to do something to help ease the shock of redundancy for those facing the worst. That's why setting up the ReStart package of assistance was one of the first announcements made by this Government.

It provides short term support to low and moderate income families with children, and to people with high housing costs who have been made redundant. So far we've supported over 5245 people through ReStart. About a fifth of them have cancelled their entitlement because they've got a job. ReStart did what it was supposed to do - it supported them through the rough times until they could get back on their feet. It will continue to do that.

Those people and organisations working at the coal face - like Presbyterian Support - have a greater understanding than most of what "recession" has really meant for many Kiwis, particularly the elderly, the very young, the unemployed, the disabled. We have made it our job as a Government to take the rough edges off the recession for those families and communities who need it most. While we're officially out of recession - just - it's well known that there's a lag between any recovery, and the real effects for those in our communities. I know your organisation has seen a large increase in demand for help - like the 433 new clients who came to you for budgeting assistance with a combined $8 million debt.

As Minister, I've met this year with so many members of organisations just like yours. I've enjoyed talking through ways of doing things better. I wanted to ensure the social services sector enjoyed a good relationship with Government. So we pulled together a working group to look at what we could do to help those groups - just like yours - which were facing increased demand for their services during the recession. We came up with the Community Response Fund.

The Fund is a direct response to what was - and continues to be - happening out there in our communities. More people asking for help, and more money needed to help them. In tight economic times, we freed up $104 million dollars to help address that very real need. This was one innovative way we could take stock of what was going on in New Zealand here and now. Your own organisation was granted $300,000 to help it continue the valuable work that it does in the Fund's first round. The Fund was a great example of how, when the social sector and government, put heads together we can come up with something that delivers.

I want to see that continue.

If there's one good thing I want to see come out of the recession - it's for Government and the sector to take a good hard look at what services we provide to New Zealanders. When there's less money to go round, every dollar and the way it's spent, becomes that much more valuable. You will have heard a lot this year about "value for money". It's a statement oft-repeated by this Government - but one we make no apologies for. We need the taxpayer to have confidence, that every cent we take out of their pocket is going somewhere it's needed and deserved.  It's never made sense to me to continue to pour money into a pot that has holes in it. I want to know that my money - your money - all of our money - goes directly to helping the Kiwis who need it most.

We are a new Government. We will make changes to how things will be done. Part of the reason I want to give you a report card on our first year, is to help you have confidence that we're doing what we're doing, for the right reasons.

You may have seen mention made in the media about changing the rules around benefits. It is important to this Government that we deliver on what we promised before the election. We pledged to require those on the Domestic Purposes Benefit to be in part time employment or training when their youngest child turns six. Now, we had to delay that for a year. What's the point in requiring someone to look for work when there's none available to them? It simply wasn't possible. But now the economy looks like it's getting back on its feet, we need to put that back on the agenda.

The reason we want to do this and the reason we intend to look at the way Sickness and Invalid's Benefits are assessed and administered, is because we believe people deserve more than being written off to a life on welfare. We believe they are capable of more than simply being handed a cheque week after week. When you lower your expectations of someone, when you put a label on them like "long term beneficiary" I believe the effects last for much longer - and reach further than most people imagine. How do you then inspire that person to aspire to do more for themselves? For their children? You condemn them to low expectations of themselves - sparking the viciousness of a self-fulfilling prophecy.

As Minister, I want to ensure people get the exact support they need to effect real change in their lives. We want to give people the power to control what they do - for the better. Give a person a kumara and you feed them for a day. Teach people to grow a garden full of kai - and you feed them for a lifetime!

I can see the changes Presbyterian Support has made in people's lives. An example of this is the support and help one of your Family Works Social Workers - Delcia - was able to provide Gerena and her family. In Gerena's own words, she's said "Before, I didn't know how to do anything by myself, but now I feel I can take care of my family and my own."

Not everyone can pull themselves up by their bootstraps. You won't find me arguing that everyone can - or that everyone should. We are not all blessed with happy circumstances right from birth. But I truly believe, with the right help - the help from organisations like yours - people can grow and change.

The way we help people has certainly changed over the last 125 years. Back then Presbyterian Support was ahead of the Government's social welfare schemes. You've continued to adapt to better ways of serving your communities. I'm sure that will continue. That's one of the reasons why I think it serves the whole country for the Ministry of Social Development to strengthen its ties with community agencies. You're at the coalface, you see the needs of the people - you know what works and you're able to adjust your response accordingly and deliver services that meet those needs.

That's what I was focused on when I instructed my Ministry to look at how it could work better with the organisations it contracts with. Way back in the 1880s, Duncan Macpherson certainly knew far more than the Government of the day about what was needed in his community. We don't want to be hands on and prescriptive with those groups we know are delivering excellent service. We want to let them get on with it.

That's why we are trialling a new approach to funding. It recognises communities need to - and in some cases are already - driving their own solutions. Hey - if it ain't broke, don't fix it! What's the point in making an organisation we trust, sign numerous contracts and go through a heap of audits each year? That just didn't make sense to me. The High Trust Model gets government out of the way of the providers so they can get on with the job. They can focus on the families they serve, and less on compliance and reporting.

What does it mean in effect? Well, the providers get greater flexibility in the way they deliver services to families, the families get the help they need, and the government gets better results for its investment. With lower transaction and compliance costs, it comes back to that "value for money" issue again. I can rest easy, knowing the taxpayer dollars going to that organisation are being well spent. At its heart, however, is the desire to make the most effective response possible to the needs of families, communities and the social services sector - and to keep the family at the centre of all we do.

So far, I'm very proud of the Government's social services report card. I think in one year, we've moved fast to implement practical measures to make life a bit easier for some of our most vulnerable New Zealanders.

In some ways, our hands were forced. With a recession in full swing - we had to make unemployment a focus - hands down. So we set up ReStart and the Job Support Scheme. The Job Support Scheme has helped businesses ride out the rough times while keeping their employers on the books. More than 555 jobs have been saved. We set up our Job Ops and Community Max programme, to try to help younger New Zealanders with limited job prospects get a foothold on the employment ladder. It's often said young people are our future. That's true, but they're also our now. We need to help them get the work experience they need now - so they can help support us in the future. Job Ops and Community Max are already providing more than 2500 opportunities for young people. It's boosting their CV and the likelihood of permanent employment in the future.

We've made moves to ensure those entering their Golden Years are as well supported as they can be, too. We've locked in higher superannuation payments for all superannuitants. Rather than letting the rate drop back to 65 percent of the average after-tax wage, we've ensured it remains at 66 percent for some half a million superannuitants. We've also changed the law, so - from next year - superannuitants will be able to spend their retirement where they like - and take their entitlement with them. Dubbed the "Golden Years OE", we want retirees to be able to take their Super with them if they travel, or chose to move to another country. It's recognition that growing older has changed. Grandparents aren't content to be regaled by the tales of their grandkids' hijinks overseas while they reach for the remote to put Coro St on - they want the adventure too. Hey - they've earned that right! This Government will support them to do it.

This is just a snapshot of what we've done in our first year.

But I have things I want to achieve. I know they're not going to be easy. If they were easy, they'd have been done by now. But I like a challenge. One of my favourite sayings is "you can give me a hundred reasons not to do something, but I'll take the one reason to do it - and do it".

I'd like to share something with you. The ultimate hope for me in this job - is to make a dent in our child abuse rates. If there's one thing in this portfolio that absolutely makes me despair - it's how many of our babies are dying needlessly.

So there was one final big thing for the report card - getting in place some practical things right now that could help make a difference to our most vulnerable children. Next month, you'll see a return of the Never Ever Shake a Baby campaign. 23 babies die each year, because someone has got to the end of their tether and shaken them to make them stop crying. It's so easy to do - and so permanent in its damage. Let's try to get that message - "never shake a baby" - through to that generation of parents who may never have seen it before. Maybe - just maybe - when things aren't going well and they're at breaking point, they will remember it at just the right moment. And maybe we will have saved a child.

We'll try to protect children, by getting an NGO to go check-in with a family where Police have attended a domestic abuse incident - and a child has been present. We will try to get better data on who hurts our children. This might sound simple - but it's actually NOT being done now. We simply don't have consistent information across the board to double check a child's abuse history between different agencies. We'll ensure all those who work with a hospitalised child finalise a plan to keep them safe before they return home.

These initiatives are not a panacea. They won't prevent every child from dying or being hurt. But they are a start. I want to take it further. I will take it further.

I need your help to do it.

Again, you've given so much over the past 125 years. I have no doubt your organisation will still be going in another 125. If only the government had your track record...but after just one year in government, we're working on it.

Congratulations again, and thank you for your time.