Naida Glavish was in the limelight in 1984 when, as a young tolls operator for the Post Office, she risked suspension by greeting callers with “Kia ora”. That wasn’t acceptable until she tested that language boundary. Since then, she has routinely pushed other boundaries – as a strong advocate of te reo Maori, as a long-time advocate for incorporating tikanga Maori into health practices, as a leader in the development of Whanau Ora, as a political leader in her role as president of the Maori Party, and as a critic of clumsy, government social welfare organisations.
The report from the Children’s Commissioner, Russell Wills, last week, should prompt some urgent action. Not just from CYFS [Child, Youth and Family], who he was criticising, but from Maori as well.
He was pointing to a number of problems – the high percentage of Maori among CYFS “clients”, the failure to help them identify with their culture, and also the failure to monitor what happens later on to those CYFS kids.
So we have some serious concerns. But my main concern, of course, comes back to Maori needing to examine why and how our children got into the hands of CYFS in the first place. How did our children get there?
We Maori are the ones who keep saying: “There is nothing more important than our mokopuna because our mokopuna are the reflections of our tupuna.”
But, if that be the case, then we need to look at what’s happened in our society and our whanau that explains how these children came into the “care” of CYFS.
As it is, we have CYFS assuming the “in loco parentis” responsibility over our children rather than having our whanau being given enough support to look after these children when their parents aren’t able to. Generally, there’d be someone in the wider whanau who, if they had support, could take on that parenting role.
But, rather than looking there, the whanau has been taken right out of the equation by CYFS – and then CYFS has failed our kids miserably. Miserably. And it hasn’t been honest enough until now to admit it. Then, to make matters worse, their failure has been as bad as what they saw as the original problem.
Two years ago, I was one of several iwi chairs at a hui in Hopuhopu with the then Minister of Social Development, Paula Bennett. She challenged the iwi over the number of our children being in CYFS care – and she wanted to know what we were going to do about it.
But she made it clear that, if our kids were returned to our care, there would be no government resources coming our way. That was the stand taken by a Minister of the Crown.
I know that Ngapuhi and Ngati Whatua, in particular, arranged for a meeting with that minister to explain that they were interested in building a kainga of some sort, where we could bring our children and our mokopuna back to us – and where we could rehabilitate and then reintegrate them into their iwi. That, however, is as far as that discussion has gone until now.
But at least this report is timely, seeing that there are all these discussions at the moment about the way Whanau Ora should be operating. Also, there has been some disturbing but helpful observations from Andrew Becroft, the Principal Youth Court judge, who has focused on the link, or the busy pathway really, between CYFS clients, and the youth courts and then prison.
The pattern is for CYFS kids, if there’s no effective intervention, to move on to youths courts, and then, in due course, to prison. So they’re all connected, which means we can’t focus on just one area. And we have a huge clean-up job to do.
Instead of those government departments providing culturally appropriate care, they’ve become cultural invaders and have capitalised on the misery of Maori – and they haven’t looked for solutions within the iwi.
This is one time when we should pay attention to what Arapeta Einstein once said: “No problem will ever be solved in the same consciousness that created it.”
© e-tangata, 2015
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Or kids are our future, best
Or kids are our future, best thing to Spend on them is Time,
I went to a hui with SYPS to Support my whanau Regarding custody of Some of our kids and Ended up putting up my Hand to Take One of them, who had asked to come to us,within 3days she was living with us, a bit of a shock as we were only there to Support our whanau,
It took a few Month’s before she come out of her shell and glow with the fact she was Loved and for the first Time in her 12years of life she was grounded, was beautiful to see her blossom into the person she was, they offered us a Benefit for her but that was like they were paying us To Take her, we Declined as it wasn’t for the Money,
After about 4months We sent her to her nana for the school holidays, we never saw her after that because SYPS took her From our custody because of my convictions, all petty Crimes From my Youth, it broke our Hearts how they done what they done and shattered our girl who was Back in Limbo, they (SYPS) didn’t once Think of her well being when that’s what they are paid for isn’t it?
We need to be there for our listen teach and guide them to be Confident leaders, to be the best them they can be, i Support Looking after our kids, anything we do is Better than doing Nothing at all, more jails are not the solution,
All of the above comments
All of the above comments have good points,this is my opinion Maori have a strong connection to the land and to each other,the system of governments and corporations is tearing that connection apart. How do we fix it -have faith,teach our children to love God and one another, be strong in all we say and do Chur
It could all be just some
It could all be just some views on how children are raised do not meet the standards of the doctor, teacher, social worker or nurse who happens to be on for the day. When it comes to raising children, Maori use to be in near to each other homes and clusters, in which the words a village raises a child could be aligned too. But if you take away provisions like; jobs, shops, petrol stations and recently banks as like in Ruatoria, then you take away income that allows these families to retain these homes, then of course there is going to be those that move closer to these provisions because of low income, medical purposes, convenience and then the hometown becomes less of a village and more of a household. Granted it is the households decision to have a child, but it is not the household that dictate how that child should be raised, but in fact how that child is raised. The difference being, it is the ones on the outside that are creating the trouble on the inside, yet we punish the child and the parents who cannot keep up with the ever changing world and laws, where even their best is now not good enough.
I love the idea of a maori
I love the idea of a maori base whare where the people who run it, teaching and rehabilitate our children have a history where they to have been there themselves are now successful, manage to raise their own tamariki in a better light and are fine rangatahi, contributing and mentoring. Never mind the government funding let’s do this ourselves therefore empowering the Treaty of Waitangi fairness, it is our maori children that is misbehaving not the Pakeha, we don’t need them come on man, take responsibilities for our own. Got these huge Iwi $$$ trust out there? what do they offer? Homes are what these children’s families need and not government housing, education into forestry, build our own homes on our free hold lands, agriculture, marine to feed our pukus 1st before we feed Manuhiri aka tauiwi we turn to the $$$ we all know is an essential necessity built into the minds of the maori people today this is and once was our tupuna way of life before they passed. tangata te whenua, make it feel like something and not just te reo maori, WORDS who is a true maori enough to do it?. High and educated maori talk the talk but never walk the walk. Our maori politician are all talk, get their $$$ their comfortable for life. the welfare of our CYFs children is not only abused, but neglect, from our entire maori people of this land AOTEAROA, 98% of maori live the Pakeha way can we as maori truly believe we can go back and live 2%.in the Bush butt naked fending for ourselves again??? so when you talk maori you live maori, but maximise the potential feed our children the knowledge, engage with them if you have the skills. There are no more chiefs in AOTEAROA just the people.
It actually does make a
It actually does make a difference when Iwi’s are given the reigns to build better foundations for their tamariki, But in saying that Iwi still need to have the proper supports put in place so that these children are catered for left right and center without any break downs within there time of growing. The children should not be impacted at all if the system is failing them, Why do they have to suffer after all its not there faults. But systems will always make the child pay and suffer. Having a Iwi based social services would help us as Maori so much more as there would be counselors that can work with whanau on how to provide a better environment for them and there kiddies this would most certainly encourage whanau to set realistic goals that they can work towards getting there kids back and building a more solid foundation for them and there tamariki.
They are onto something here.
They are onto something here…Iwi need to reclaim their tamariki back WITH the financial support of the govt. There are positives all round and i believe could make a really big impact on our tamariki and all for the good of all. Limitless potential. I love the idea of a purpose built whare for those displaced tamariki. Of course there would need to be a high standard of care so that any kind of abuse is non existent in this whare. I don’t know what’s sicker…cyfs removing children from whanau abuse to putting them into foster care only to be abused by strangers. Our poor babies…no wonder they end up broken as adults. Bring them back to their roots…let them live like their tupuna did. Train them to all things te ao maori so that they can become enriched and keep our mana strong. The leaders of our tomorrow….x