Police boss 'sick' of agencies being criticised

SUCCESS: Superintendent Russell Le Prou says agencies are tackling social issues together.

Northland's social issues must be solved alongside economic growth and job creation, says a Northland top cop.

Superintendent Russell Le Prou has been the Northland Police District Commander for three and a half years and has spent 32 years on the thin blue line.

He was well aware of the problems raised in the Salvation Army's Mixed Fortunes report but said agencies were working together to tackle the social issues.

"It is clear that you cannot fix social harm in isolation and it must be done alongside economic growth and job creation. A person with a job earns money and feels valued and more in control of their lives."

Mr Le Prou said he was a "little sick and tired" of hearing people say government agencies were not working together and that was not the case.

Mr Le Prou said he brought government social agencies together creating the Social Wellbeing Governance Group, which sits under the Northland Intersectoral Forum and includes police, Northland District Health Board, Ministry of Education, Child Youth and Family, Work and Income, Te Puni Kokiri and Haami Piripi, chairman of Te Rarawa and chairman of the Iwi Leaders Forum.

"As we were putting this together it became apparent that we had a spike of suicides, particularly youth suicide," he said

The group pushed for funding for Matatini, a play about suicide, which toured Northland schools and provided a catalyst for conversations about suicide and where to go for help.

Mr Le Prou said there had been some "stunning" results.

In 2012, when the group started focusing on youth suicide, there were 12 suicides in Northland .In 2014 there were four and so far this year there has been one.

Mr Le Prou said there had been a number of similar clusters of agencies working together to solve different issues including focusing on children, family violence and more.

He said there was more work to be done but Northland needed to keep the collaboration going.

"Youth suicide is down, crime is down slightly this year and while domestic disputes are up the serious family violence assaults are down and repeat family violence victimisation is trending down.

"We need to keep going the way we are and expand with more collaboration across the board."