Tolley AnneHon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister for Social Development): I make no apology for wanting to make sure that the most vulnerable in our communities get the services from the Government which the taxpayer funds that will help them live better lives. I make no apology for that. I went to a meeting with a group of NGOs working in a small poor rural district a couple of months ago and the telling thing for me was that as they talked about an individual family they asked people in the room to stand up to represent each of the agencies that was working with that family. There was a room of something like 30-odd people and something like 18 people stood up as they called the roll call of the agencies working with that family.I do not know about anyone in this House but I sat there thinking this family had high complex needs. Some people might call the family dysfunctional but there were six children in that family and all of those people in that family deserve to get the services to help them live better lives. But how could they deal with all of those agencies parked up their driveways all with good intentions trying to give the services to them? This organisation that was talking to us had formed a group that got together shared information and designated one person to develop a relationship with that family and to organise all those other agencies.What I am describing is the way that children's teams work around this country. What I am describing is the way that many iwi social services are working around this country. I am describing the way Whānau Ora works around this country. In order to do that and to work in that way which we know is effective and we can prove is effective we need to be able to share that information. So this is not something to be afraid of. It is not to be used as a weapon. It is not to be used as a way to punish people. This is a way to share information so that families can get the help they need without having to have that sort of complex assistance adding to their dysfunction.This Government spends $330 million every year on social services out in our communities. Hand on heart I cannot say that that $330 million is effective because I have no way of judging that. In fact family violence is on the increase. The number of children in State care is increasing. The number of children being abused is still increasing. The number of families that are in dysfunction is still increasing. So that $330 million every year is clearly not effective and the Privacy Commissioner in his summary makes a point—[Interruption]Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The member has already had a very high-volume 15-minute contribution. I would appreciate it if she is going to have another one—she gets another right of reply; oh no she does not thankfully. But anyway later on in the night—[Interruption] I am on my feet. I am on my feet. You can at some stage seek whatever you like. The House will be in charge of its own business. However the member made a very strong impassioned statement. It is being responded to. She has had her go. The odd well-timed well-intentioned interjection is part of the play of the House. I suggest that she stick to that convention.Hon ANNE TOLLEY: The Privacy Commissioner states in his executive summary that it is not only legitimate but important that Government takes steps to ensure the efficacy of any programme it funds. It needs good information in order to do so." So the question then becomes: what information is required?I agree with the Privacy Commissioner's first recommendation which is that if we were looking only for the effectiveness of the programmes anonymised information may well be enough. Unfortunately that is not all we are interested in. We have heard a lot about the people who might not come forward. There are assumptions that people might not come forward if they know that their information is going to be shared—not their personal information but the details of who they are and the shape of their family—with the funder which is the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) or as it will be in the future the Ministry for Vulnerable Children Oranga Tamariki. But nobody has talked about the people who are getting no services and no coverage whatsoever and nobody is talking about the family that I have just been talking about where 18 different agencies were providing services to that family. That does not make sense. That is not a good use of taxpayers' money and actually it is not helping the most vulnerable people.So what we would like to do and what we are proposing to do is to gather information on who NGOs are working with so that we can see that we have good coverage. You cannot do that with anonymised data so unfortunately in my discussions with the Privacy Commissioner I have tried to explain to him that we do need to know whom we are working with. I have said to him that if Statistics New Zealand can provide a way to give us that information I would welcome that. Unfortunately to date it has not been able to do that.His second recommendation I have certainly accepted and I have asked MSD to find a way to create an exemption. His recommendation is that it must ensure that our "information collection practices do not deter vulnerable individuals from receiving necessary help." and nobody wants to deter people who need help.So yes we are designing into this system an exceptions regime so that NGOs—and I have to say most NGOs that I have talked with receive not only Government funding but also receive much philanthropic funding. So there are opportunities and I have talked with some NGOs that have said: "It is very simple. You only want information on the people whom the Government is funding. We have opportunities to work with people in a different way and we may well take advantage of that." But I have heeded the recommendation of the Privacy Commissioner and we are developing an exemptions regime for a certain percentage.His third recommendation is that we "must ensure that the purposes for collecting holding using and disclosing information are specific relevant to [the] functions and clearly conveyed and the information is necessary to achieve these purposes." That is incredibly important and I have asked MSD to make sure that people know exactly what we intend to use this data for.So it is not for matching and it is really mischievous of people to go around telling vulnerable people that their information is going to be shared with Work and Income and they might lose their benefit. That is outrageous. It is absolutely outrageous to say that to people because there is no intention—absolutely no intention—to share that information in that way. It is designed to make sure that we have the right people receiving the right services at the right time.Sue Moroney: And to deter them from getting them.Hon ANNE TOLLEY: Oh absolute nonsense. We want—Sue Moroney: That's what it is.Hon ANNE TOLLEY: You would not be talking about coverage and you would not be talking about identifying gaps and duplications if you wanted to deter people from getting services. We want to help our vulnerable families unlike those people sitting over there who do everything they can to stop people getting these essential services. Those members are full of talk and when it comes to what is actually happening on the ground they are absent. They love making a noise but they hate actually going out and doing the work themselves.Then the fourth recommendation of the Privacy Commissioner is to "ensure that its security procedures for holding using and disclosing ICLD are robust well-documented and transparent." and I agree with him 100 percent—100 percent. That is why I said to MSD "This is unacceptable. This is not acceptable. You're going to close down all of that portal and you are going to start again." because none of this can be achieved if we do not have security of the private information of these people.So I want to say that this Government is absolutely—the evidence is clear that by using good information intervening early and effectively in families' and in children's lives but more importantly working collectively not just with NGOs but also with Māori organisations and iwi I am confident that we can make a difference in New Zealanders' lives. I am confident we can do that. We are seeing that already with organisations like the children's teams making huge changes in families' lives but they do that only where they share the information. If I refer to the two family violence trials that are happening currently—one in Christchurch and one in Waikato—the essence of what those trials are showing is that the sharing of information shows us a much broader picture.One of the stories from the children's teams is pertinent I think in that they found 12 different agencies had been working with this family over a period of time—quite a lengthy period of time. Yet it was not until that child was referred to a children's team a lead professional was appointed all the other agencies were cleared out and a relationship was developed with the family that we actually found that at the heart of the dysfunction was family violence. So sharing of information leads to better decisions about what services are needed for those families. Social investment is a way of working that is proving to be effective with our families but it is only as effective as the information that it is based on because if you have got only half the story you can only ever give half the answer. In fact I would suggest that you cannot give even half the answer if you have not got all the information.Finally I would say we have some superb NGOs in New Zealand. They do a tremendous amount of work and there is no intention to cut back any of the $330 million that MSD spends every year on community-based services. But we do need to know that everyone who needs the services is getting the services that they deserve that will make a difference for them and in order to do that we need to share data and in order to share data we need to have the trust and confidence that that data will be respected and will be protected. Thank you."