Tommy Wilson: New thinking to old budgets

A woman watches the sunrise over Mount Maunganui. Photo/file

There's something special that happens when walking around Mauao, especially on a Sunday morning when many religiously make the walk for many different reasons. For me and my mate it gives clarity to life's challenges and the silent voice of Mauao gives us answers like no other Sunday sermon can.

Perhaps it's the remnants of the morning light shining across Matakana or perhaps it's the howling sou'wester that blows away the week's cobwebs and nudges one's concerns back to the safe anchorage of life, like a tug boat corralling a container ship alongside the Sulphur Point wharf.

Whatever it was yesterday's walk was more than worthwhile as was the korero and the cup of tea we collected from Sidetrack cafe as we passed go.

My week in review as we walked and talked was all about ministers riding into town toting a kete of stats and asking for solutions to take back with them to Bill the Bean counter, who has made it quite clear there is no extra money in the kitty, but there are opportunities to apply new thinking to the old budgets.

First up was Social Development Minister Anne Tolley who was very open and honest about the $33 million currently spent on Social Services in this area and how the budget and the problems will stay the same - if we don't look at them in a different light.

Minister Tolley's sad stats were 48 per cent of all children born into a benefit family will not sit NCEA and 45 per cent will become beneficiaries themselves.

I stood up and added my own two bobs' worth with the stat that if you are a 9-year-old Maori boy and you can't read and write you have an 82 per cent chance of ending up in jail.

Next up on the next day was the health sector that launched the Maori Health Plan Monitoring Tool, described by Bay of Plenty District Health Board acting chief executive Pete Chandler as the tool that will highlight the health disparities between Maori and non-Maori in a way that has never been done before.

Again the stats shine the torch on the problem with only a flicker of light on the solutions.

My question is what are the social determinants of health and when will MSD and MOH both start walking and talking together.

Perhaps they should hikoi around Mauao together?

Last but by no means the least cab on the right honourable rank, the Ministry of Education, who came to Trinity Wharf Hotel on Friday to complete the trifecta of focus on what many consider the three biggest challenges we face as a community and as a country - the inequality of wealth, health and education.

The big difference was the Education Ministry brought with them the voice of six students from Mount College and when they spoke the audience all sat up and listened. Not only did they know the problems inside and outside the school gate but clearly for many of us there they had the solutions covered as well.

The problem and the solution to all three sectors was the same and if applied could save the taxpayer money.

And if it involved contracting out services, kei te pai - bring it on, I say. Why should Te Puni Kokiri keep all the cash for administration?

Start talking together across all sectors.

The key for all in the room, especially the kids who stole the hearts of the blackboard brigade at Trinity, was not John Key but Wiremu 'the wallet-holder' English.

The key for the inequality of wealth, health and education is education itself.

If we get to the kids today and they get it in a language they can understand, then they have a huge influence on teaching their parents almost as much as their teachers have when teaching them.

That's how we turn around the 48 per cent not sitting NCEA and not getting good jobs later in life. That's how we teach them about what not to eat so they don't have a diet of sugar-coated fast food that ends up crippling the health system later in life.

We put them into warm, dry homes under a korowai of care by those who know their needs most, where six new homes can be built on the same land where one run-down whare stands.

If we can re-work what we have and take away the crippling administration costs such as the $42 million of Whanau ora funds we start packing up the deck chairs of despair - not reshuffling them.

Maybe next time the ministers ride into town looking for solutions they should all walk around Mauao with a group of students from Mount College.

-Broblack@xtra.co.nz

Tommy Wilson is a best -selling author and local writer.