Tackling abuse by 'adopting' whanau

A young woman listens during an emotive speech. Picture / Glenn Jeffrey

Maori groups in Manukau are calling for volunteers for an "adopt-a-whanau" scheme to stop child abuse.

The groups, led by family violence counsellors and the police, plan to launch a telephone hotline for the service in November, 0800 TE KAINGA ("the home").

They told more than 200 people at a hui in Mangere yesterday that the service would initially serve just Maori families in Counties-Manukau, where the community has been galvanised by last month's murders of twins Chris and Cru Kahui.

After a year's trial run, it could become nationwide if funding is available.

The tangata whenua co-ordinator of the South Auckland Family Violence Prevention Network, Suzanne Pene, said the scheme would link services so that Maori families could call in help from Maori social service agencies, hospital visiting groups and marae before a crisis occurred.

Kuia (older women) were available at various marae to act as mentors for troubled families for a year.

"It might be just a phone call now and then to ask, 'How are you? How are the kids?' " she said.

"We have already spoken to a lot of kuia at different marae. We need as many as we can get."

Tamaki Makaurau MP Pita Sharples told the hui that the scheme might need $2 million a year and urged Maori Affairs Minister Parekura Horomia to provide the money. Mr Horomia, who spoke later, promised only a co-ordinator.

But Ms Pene said the agencies involved had been planning the scheme since February, well before the Kahui murders, and were committed to launching it, initially from their own resources.

Counties-Manukau police iwi liaison officer Maryanne Rapata said the 0800 number would be circulated to all frontline police and agencies such as Victim Support.

"The idea is that our whanau can use it at any time before they call 111.

"The idea is that we look after our own. We have the skills. We have the places like Nga Whare Waatea [marae].

"The idea is that we will look after the victims, and we will look after the offenders because they are our whanau, too. We don't want to isolate them out there. They are our whanau."

The head of the social service agency Tamaki Ki Raro Trust, Sharon Wilson, told the hui the welfare system needed to be reformed so that families got practical help as well as money.

"The main thing whanau need to have is not appointments, not only benefits. They need positivity.

"They need someone to go in there and say, 'You are not a loser, this is a speed-bump, this is an obstacle that you can get over'," she said.

"They need someone to believe in them - not someone to take over their money for them so their kids grow up thinking rent and power don't need to be paid, but someone to walk along with them and give them hope."

Manurewa training provider Frank Solomon also criticised the benefit system. It encouraged young couples to split so that one could get the domestic purposes benefit.

"We are told by our students that they get more money if they live separately, so we then face the fact that our tane [men] are not with our tamariki [children] to provide that leadership and mentoring and modelling as a father," he said.

* Contact South Auckland Family Violence Prevention Network, Suzanne Pene, (09) 263 6841.