Dyson Ruth: Estimates Debate — In Committee Procedure 
Dyson Ruth: Estimates Debate — In Committee Procedure 
[Volume:618;Page:14434] 
Hon RUTH DYSON (Associate Minister for Social Development and Employment (CYF)) 
: 
 I thank the member who has just resumed her seat not just for that contribution but also for her support for a department that is often the subject of political criticism in a way that is sometimes unfair. I also thank her for the acknowledgment of the hard work that the Department of Child Youth and Family Services does around the country—work that is often unacknowledged from a political perspective. 
At the Social Services Committee we enjoyed quite a lot of debate about the way that the department has improved over the last little while primarily as a result of the baseline review. The focus of that review on the core functions of the department has enabled the department to start moving away from the “we are all things to all people” sort of attitude that was really part of the culture of the organisation before. The department is very focused now on meeting its statutory responsibilities but it has also showed an incredible ability to link in much better with our community organisations which provide services that link in very well with the department. One of the issues we discussed was how to ensure that the community organisations were able to pick up work at different levels. One of the considerations now being undertaken is the checking of our legislation to ensure that the statutory requirements that are clearly the work and the responsibility of Department of Child Youth and Family Services social workers are maintained but that we ensure we have a process whereby other work that could be done by non-statutory social workers is able to be picked up by the community. That is a really exciting challenge for us in the future and I look forward to being able to report back to the select committee on that in the next little while. 
Obviously the Department of Child Youth and Family Services has been considerably strengthened by the increase in resources. It has had Dr Russ Ballard as its acting chief executive for the last little while. Dr Ballard finishes that job on this coming Friday and I would like to place on record my admiration for the tremendous leadership he has undertaken in that position during what has been a very significant period of change. Next Monday we will welcome the new chief executive Paula Tyler who is from Alberta. I am sure she will be very warmly welcomed as part of the public service in New Zealand. 
Some of the key highlights we discussed at the select committee were the family group conferences. Although those conferences are often not recognised in New Zealand internationally they are regarded as a leadership model in dealing with family problems in terms of ensuring there are links in with the different social services agencies and in terms of ensuring the responsibility of both those agencies and more important the family are recognised and supported through to implementation. We have also recruited 17 permanent social workers. 
One of the issues Judy Turner raised in her speech in the debate was the fact that a number of children come back into the care of the Department of Child Youth and Family Services and that is clearly a problem. It has happened because in the past we have focused far too much on quantity rather than on quality. We have a much clearer focus now on the quality of the interventions we undertake and that will reduce the number of children who come back through the system. But in the last 6 months we have had record numbers of notifications to the department and that of course was discussed with the select committee as well. For me as the Minister it is a bit of a rock and a hard place frankly. Of course we would like to have no child abuse at all in our community; that would be the ideal in the view of all the members of this Committee I am sure. But where there is child abuse we want it to be notified. So by encouraging the debate on and zero tolerance for child abuse we actually increase the pressure on notifications. Our responsibility is to make sure that we are there when it counts—that when the phone rings we have a total system in place to deliver services that are able to ensure our children are safe that they are in strong families that are free from abuse neglect and offending and that those families can contribute positively to the wider community. 
Since we reported last year on the estimates I have seen a tremendous lift in the confidence and the competence of the department driven and supported by the baseline review and I am certainly very proud to be its Minister. 
Vote agreed to.