Davis targets agencies failing vulnerable children
Children’s Minister Kelvin Davis has put all agencies on notice, with a top-down instruction to every department that they need to take responsibility for caring for vulnerable children.
Oranga Tamariki social workers have too often been left to find housing, hire teacher aides and organise healthcare for children – effectively doing the work other agencies should already be doing, Davis said.
Davis is now pushing for agencies to take greater responsibility for the care of vulnerable children in their patches. He has gone to Cabinet for a formal mandate, telling chief executives across Government to ‘‘work with each other’’.
Cabinet agreed with the crossdepartment mandate and planned to release it this week. With Cabinet’s approval, Oranga Tamariki would start reporting to ministers about how effectively departments work together.
Davis said he expected an official update every six months, with the first arriving in December. But he also encouraged officials and frontline staff to report any roadblocks sooner, saying he expected the public service’s top brass to act with haste – or he is willing to get involved.
The focus on holes in the state’s care of vulnerable children, and issues with different areas speaking to each other, has been highlighted by the murder of Malachi Subecz, a five-year-old who was known to Oranga Tamariki as being vulnerable.
His appointed caregiver murdered him, while his mother was in prison. And his daycare had noted signs of abuse, but asked his caregiver about the bruising – rather than following policy and reporting it to police or Oranga Tamariki before his death. The Ministry of Education is now inspecting the daycare centre,
after noting its failure to follow policies on suspected child abuse.
Davis said he could not comment on this specific example, where it appeared the Government’s systems for protecting children have not worked – but he said it was clear ‘‘all government agencies need to work better together’’. ‘‘To be honest, it is commonsense. But it surprises me that this is not happening consistently across the country.’’
The focus on departments working together came via the official Oranga Tamariki Action Plan. Since 2018, the Children’s Act has required chief executives and the minister to articulate how their systems will work better for vulnerable children.
But Davis said he continued to hear from social workers, saying they are having to fill the gaps left by other government sectors.
‘‘When there are children needing a teacher aide, often it’s been put on Oranga Tamariki social workers to find a teacher aide. In reality, Oranga Tamariki is not an education agency,’’ he said. Davis said the other agencies with responsibilities to support children would be expected to quickly action the requests from Oranga Tamariki’s social workers, to help ease the burden on those social workers.
He said he wanted to free up the social workers to focus on their areas of expertise, rather than trying to fill gaps left by other agencies. ‘‘Talking to Oranga Tamariki social workers, they’ve told me that when they’re standing in a courtroom supporting a child and the judge would say this child needs a teacher aide, a counsellor, healthcare, somewhere to live.
‘‘The burden is put on the social worker, and they felt the weight to deliver all of these things – but the reality is a number of other agencies have a role to support the needs of children,’’ he said.
The top bosses of police, Corrections, and the ministries of education, social development, health and justice have agreed to the latest update.
‘‘All government agencies need to work better together. To be honest it’s commonsense.’’ Kelvin Davis Children’s Minister