WHANAKE RANGATAHI: PROGRAMMES AND SERVICES TO ADDRESS MAORI YOUTH OFFENDING.

• Author: Owen, Victoria

Abstract

Young Maori continue to be significantly over-represented in the criminal justice system. Government, Maori and the community all share the goal of preventing or reducing Maori youth offending and re-offending. Government has put in place a range of programmes and services to this end. This paper reports on a study, Whanake Rangatahi -- Programmes and Services to Address Maori Youth Offending, assessing Maori participation in programmes and services directed at youth offending and the outcomes. The paper highlights implications for government policy, programme specification and purchasing, research and evaluation. It concludes that government needs to work with Maori to build on successful models and develop a range of programmes and services that address the causes of offending for young people. Government also needs to improve its information collection so that we know whether interventions are working for Maori.

INTRODUCTION

"Probably the reasons why I keep re-offending was because of my parents, I never actually had them there with me. I hung out with the wrong people, I guess and ended up drinking and drugs ... and then doing crime. My family also ... watching older ones doing it ... I thought it was life -- I thought it was natural." (young female) "Sticking us in jail ain't gonna do nothing ... you take us away from the community and then when we get out we don't know what else to do ... and we go back to doing what we did before ... and when we come back [to prison], that's okay, we know how it goes, we've been here before. They're doing it all wrong -- thinking why their jails are filling up. They send us to jail ... jail just makes us worse. Why stick us in jail if there's nothing to help us [in jail]." (young female) These quotes (Te Puni Kokiri 2000a) paint a common, and disturbing, picture for many of the young Maori that end up in our criminal justice system. Lack of family support, problems with schooling, truancy, drug and alcohol abuse, and lack of skills and employment prospects combine to lead many youth down a slippery slope to offending and, ultimately for some, prison. Many young people and their whanau never get the type of help that they need to address the factors that lead to offending, or to address the offending once it occurs.

The Maori population is young relative to non-Maori (Te Puni Kokiri 2000b). Maori youth (aged 10-19 years)(2) make up a significant proportion of the total Maori population (21%)(3). High levels of Maori youth offending in this generation will have major implications for the future of Maori society and the nation as a whole. The aspirations of iwi, hapu, whanau and Maori rest on the positive development and contribution of their rangatahi (young people). (See glossary, appended, for additional Maori words used in this paper.) Government, Maori and the wider community recognise youth offending as a significant problem. Some measures indicate that there have been increases in levels of offending -- particularly violent offending -- by young people since 1989. Maori youth continue to be significantly over-represented at all stages in the criminal justice system: from apprehensions through to convictions and imprisonment (Te Puni Kokiri 2000a:24-6).

Over recent years, reducing youth crime has been a priority for governments, and they have put a range of programmes and services in place to prevent and address it. Given the continued, and disproportionately high, involvement of Maori in the justice system, there is a need to consider the effectiveness of our current approaches in reducing this offending. To this end, Te Puni Kokiri undertook an assessment of programmes and services to address youth offending, in terms of Maori participation and their outcomes(4). The findings of the study were released as Whanake Rangatahi -- Programmes and Services to Address Maori Youth Offending.

The study drew on the views of rangatahi, their whanau (extended family) members, and those who work with them across the lower North Island. These participants identified a number of gaps in programmes and services available to address Maori youth offending. The research also suggests that Maori youth and their whanau may not be accessing the range of available programmes and services.

It is difficult to assess the overall effectiveness of current programmes and services for Maori youth due to a lack of adequate information. Most of the evaluation information focuses on short-term results, and provides little information on outcomes for Maori. Government agencies need to improve the information gathered so that effectiveness can be properly assessed and resources targeted to the most effective approaches. However, there are initiatives that have been demonstrated to be effective for Maori youth, in the short term at least. A key aspect of the success of such initiatives is their basis in tikanga and whanaungatanga. The research also indicates that programmes and services should be delivered in a coordinated way in order to address the major issues of social and economic disadvantage that contribute to offending, and support the development and maintenance of strong, positive cultural identities for the young people.

This paper identifies a number of implications of the research reported in Whanake Rangatahi for government policy, programme specification and purchasing, research and evaluation. The report provides important -- and rarely sought -- views of the end users of government programmes and services, that is, Maori youth and their whanau. If we are to stem the tide of Maori youth offending, their messages about the need for interventions must be heard and acted upon.

RESEARCH APPROACH AND FINDINGS

Government has put in place a range of programmes and services to prevent and reduce offending by young people. In order to assess whether these services are working Whanake Rangatahi drew on a range of information sources including:

* national-level information on government programmes and services;

* previous research on youth offending and re-offending, youth and criminal justice, and programmes and services; and

* local-level research undertaken by Te Puni Kokiri with a range of Maori youth offenders, whanau of young offenders, service providers and community members who work with Maori youth offenders(5).

Together these sources provide a complementary understanding of the issues at a broad national level, as well as from a local perspective.

Youth Offending in New Zealand

Offending by children aged 10-13 years and young people aged 14-16 years is addressed under the Children, Young Persons and Their Families Act 1989. The purpose of the Act is to ensure that all children and young people who commit offences are held accountable for their offending, while recognising their needs in an effort to prevent re-offending. People aged 17 or over who commit offences are dealt with under separate legislation, including the Summary Proceedings Act 1957, the Crimes Act 1961 and the Criminal Justice Act 1985 (Te Puni Kokiri 2000a).

Rates of apprehensions, prosecutions and convictions for Maori youth have all increased since 1991. Maori youth are, on average, three times more likely to be apprehended, prosecuted and convicted than non-Maori youth.

Factors Associated with Maori Youth Offending

We asked young people, their whanau, and those who work with them about the factors that lead young Maori to offend. They identified a range of factors including:

*...