Contracting out responsibility for the care and protection of children to overseas organisations that make their money from this vulnerability doesn't sit right in Aotearoa today, and it shouldn't. We need to resource and develop our own publicly provided services to do this critical work. It's only through structuring these services ourselves that we can ensure any financial surplus is reinvested exactly where it should be - in our communities and in our children.
We need to stop copying what other countries have already proven doesn't work and take responsibility for doing what needs to be done to help parents, whānau, families and communities to support our own kids. We have a wealth of relevant cultural and social expertise right here in front of us, our voices and the voices of practicing social workers need to be at the very core of any review of these services.
It is well evidenced that CYF is significantly under resourced to the point where care can suffer and certainly innovation cannot flourish. Compounding this, successive governments have starved local community and iwi providers of the resources needed to ensure they can sustain comprehensive community and whanau services to keep our children and their families safe, well and together.
It's time the government worked together with all of us here in Aotearoa. We need to take responsibility for solving our own problems instead of bringing in ideas and organisations based on overseas conditions and needs. The CYF review is our chance to stop handing our vulnerable children a life sentence. We can do better for our kids - let's make the right choices for them.
Richard Wagstaff is PSA (Public Service Association) national secretary.