Rich Katherine: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Rich Katherine: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:618;Page:14379] 
3.  
KATHERINE RICH (National) 
 to the  
Minister for Social Development and Employment 
: Does he stand by his statement in relation to capacity-building grants that: “We’ve taken exactly the right approach to ensure that if we’re going to have taxpayers’ money in the hands of people who’re going to be delivering a variety of services they’ve got the capacity to do so.”; if not why not? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Minister for Social Development and Employment) 
: 
 Yes I do. I stand by the statement I made in July 2001 that if we are going to have taxpayers’ money in the hands of people who are going to be delivering a variety of services we need to ensure they have the capacity to do so. If as we all agree local solutions to local problems is one of the key ways forward then we first need to develop the capacity of local groups so that they can deliver the services efficiently and manage the money properly. 
Katherine Rich 
: When the Community Employment Group guidelines for capacity-building grants clearly state that salaries are not to be funded through the schemes what is his response to a Community Employment Group worker quoted in an official evaluation report who described the continued flouting of this rule by saying: “… you tell the group they can’t use the grant for a salary but then you tell them you can contract someone from your group to do the work—it makes it so unclean.”? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: My reaction is to freeze the grants process and to ensure a full review of the Community Employment Group’s operations. 
Moana Mackey 
: What results have been achieved from capacity-building grants? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: There are a large number of positive reports I could give from a wide range of departments but because the member from the National Party has raised the Community Employment Group it is worth pointing to for example Maori land development. The evaluation shows that with very few exceptions the reports are able to provide good positive outcomes with projects meeting their objectives and people now being able to move on to deliver social and economic goals. In the Pacific organisational development area we are able to look at groups that have been enabled through capacity building to now begin to apply for money. They understand how they can operate in social and economic areas and are now able to begin providing services directly. 
Dr Muriel Newman 
: What responsibility does the Minister take for the hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars that taxpayers consider to have been wasted on misguided and race-based programmes? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: All Ministers of course are warranted to take full responsibility for what occurs in their departments. One of the things I would point out as I pointed out before however is that—and I assume the member is referring to the Community Employment Group as it has been raised today—there would not be a member in the House who does not have a positive and useful example over the years that he or she could point to of the work of that particular group. In my own area for example and in Simon Power’s area as well over the last little while we can certainly point to work around the floods that took place in the Manawatu and Rangitikei that Community Employment Group workers did very well. 
Katherine Rich 
: As the Minister has mentioned the Maori land development grant scheme can he respond to comments made by the Community Employment Group’s staff that information provided on that scheme was “intermittent incomplete late inconsistent and unresponsive to field adviser input”? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: I certainly can. Wherever I see and I have now seen advice like that from members of staff it leads me to do what I have done which is to freeze the grants process and ensure a thorough review of that organisation. 
Katherine Rich 
: When guidelines are flouted fieldworkers say they do not understand what a scheme is supposed to achieve and so many projects of dubious quality have been funded does he accept that his Government’s flagship capacity-building initiatives have flopped; if not why not? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: No I do not. The member is probably referring to the report she received recently which was part 2 of a three-part review of capacity building within that particular organisation. But as I mentioned before capacity building is a broad policy running across Te PuniKokiri the Ministry of Pacific Island Affairs Housing New Zealand Corporation the Ministry of Social Development and the Community Employment Group. There is a wide range of those kinds of grants and as I say someone like Bill English has quite rightly pointed out that from the National Party’s point of view local solutions and local problems need people who can do those things locally. We back that view and will carry on ensuring that people do have that capacity.