Tolley Anne: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
Tolley Anne: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:632;Page:4338] 
ANNE TOLLEY (National—East Coast) 
: 
 First I say to the Minister the Hon David Benson-Pope that it is no good reflection upon him that his department has performed so poorly during this estimates process. The Social Services Committee was unable to get answers to questions in time for it to deliberate as part of the normal select committee process. That is a very poor performance from the ministry and in fact the members of the select committee had to come back during the adjournment in order to further progress this estimates process. I say to the Minister that I hope he will take that up with his department and make sure we do not have to endure that next year. 
Today I want to talk about the merger between Child Youth and Family Services and the Ministry of Social Development. The Minister said at one stage that the stars were in alignment so the merger took place. Actually the Minister knew that those stars were going to be in alignment back in December of last year. Once could almost say that the Minister moved heaven and earth to make sure it happened. There was no analysis of the impact of that merger and during the entire estimates process we saw no analysis completed by any department on the impact of merging Child Youth and Family Services with the Ministry of Social Development. There was no consultation with any of the staff in Child Youth and Family Services. That meant there was no consideration of any gain in or loss of quality of care for Child Youth and Family Services and the vulnerable children and babies under its care and protection. They certainly came a dismal last in the consideration given to this merger. So we have no idea and no indication that there will be any consideration of the impact of the merger. It is not just me—as a member of the Opposition—who is saying this. In fact the audit report said that given the amount of change within the ministry within recent years the merger may increase the degree of risk to existing ministry services. 
This fragile department—Child Youth and Family Services—has a budget of $464 million and is responsible for 5000 children in its care. This year it is budgeting for 79000 notifications of abuse of children and babies and is planning to carry out 58000 investigations into such abuse. It has been reviewed and restructured every year since this Government took office because of poor performance. It has had four chief executive officers in the last 2½ years. In fact the State Services Commission’s paper to Cabinet stated: “… stakeholder reviews have consistently found there is a culture of ‘resistance’ amongst some front-line CYF staff. In the SSC’s view this reflects ‘professional disregard’ for management.” 
That same review went on to identify five major problems with Child Youth and Family Services none of which will be addressed by the Ministry of Social Development in any shape or form that we could find that we asked questions about through the coming year. The first problem is that there is no management of referrals or notifications. There is very poor understanding. In fact an internal review questioning why there has been such an increase in notifications came to the conclusion that it was a victim of its own success when in fact its own figures show the graphs the Minister himself presented to the select committee show that the majority of the increases come from police reports. In other words the increases are coming from the discovery by police of actual cases of abuse or neglect. The department does not have any understanding of why it is getting those referrals and how to manage them. 
The second query from the State Services Commission concerned the department’s need to improve the management of children in care. Because the department cannot manage the huge increase in notifications it drops the ball in looking after those most vulnerable children and babies in New Zealand.