An iwi programme to tackle young offenders is so effective it’s been asked to support the next government bootcamp.
Rangitāne o Manawatū’s initiative Te Oranga Pai is based just a few kilometres away from where the boot camps were run in Palmerston North.
But their approach and their results couldn’t be more different.
Seven out of ten youths in the recent $5million military-style academy pilot reoffended. But only about 20 percent of rangitahi on the Te Oranga Pai initiative have been back in trouble.
Rangitāne’s chief executive, Wayne Blissett, describes the differences as the bootcamps taking a ‘containment approach’, as opposed to Te Oranga Pai’s ‘ therapeutic approach’.
Social worker Kristina Suafo’a heads Te Oranga Pai’s team known as the Aunties.
“We tell our kids and our families we’re always there for them. We’re only there for a short time, and our job is really to bring the whanau back together,” she says.
Te Oranga Pai engages with the whānau as a whole, for example referring whānau to health services or helping them find housing.
The scheme is run in conjunction with Oranga Tamariki, Police and the Ministry of Justice to keep young offenders in Te Papaioea/Palmerston North out of the justice system.
Suafo’a explains “We’re just treating them like they’re our own kids, like they are part of our family. We really just try to expose them to positive stuff, engage them in lots of cool stuff and just be there for them.”
Oranga Tamariki have recognised Rangitāne’s efforts, requesting to work with the iwi on the next bootcamp intake.
Blisset says “We think a success recipe might look like working with whānau alongside the young person while they’re in residence to be able to create that pathway of healing.”
He recognised that rangatahi on the bootcamps had complex trauma but he felt the Te Oranga Pai methods could still help.
“I think we have to do something better and different. We have to try something that will respond to those aspirations of those young people to be good citizens,” says Blissett.
Wayne Blissett also advised on Aroturuki Tamariki, the Independent Children’s Monitor report into outcomes for tamariki and rangatahi Māori in Oranga Tamariki care.
It found that young Māori are over-represented in care, and that the system was letting them down.
“The report is very sobering reading. What we need is the resource and the trust to be able to get in with whānau sooner, better, faster.”
Almost 50 percent of reports of concern made to Oranga Tamariki are about Māori children and young people; they also make up two-thirds of those in care.
“Māori children get seen and dealt with differently to other children. That’s a fact,” Suafo’a says.
Made with the support of Te Māngai Pāho and New Zealand On Air
