May 10, 2024
Social investment what we do says Tamihere
The North Island Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency is keen to joint venture with the new Social Investment Agency.
Chief executive John Tamihere says social investment is a threat to existing government agencies and many mainstream service providers because it can give a clear measure of what’s working.
Announcing the rejigged Social Wellbeing Agency yesterday, Finance Minister Nicola Willis said the Government is not seeing the outcomes it wants from the annual $70 billion spend on social services.
She said the agency can look for new approaches to rising welfare dependency, declining school attendance and achievement, poorer health outcomes, rising youth crime and gang membership.
Mr Tamihere says Whanau Ora has practised social investment for a decade through its 101 Maori partners and it has the international accreditation to prove it.
“We will no longer be put down when we are ahead of the pack or destabilised. We should be acknowledges and what we should be doing is a joint venture with the state social return on investment because they are way behind the eight ball,” he says.