Gaps policy lives on in health proposals

By AUDREY YOUNG political reporter

The Prime Minister's decision to drop the term "Closing the Gaps" and downplay policies targeting Maori and Pacific Islanders has not been adopted in health.

Health Minister Annette King yesterday released the first monitoring report for Closing the Gaps health programmes - comprised entirely of Maori and Pacific Island initiatives.

Some of the aims set out in the report are broad:

* Identifying diabetes early in Maori and Pacific people.

* A comprehensive measles immunisation programme, with an emphasis on Maori, Pacific Island and "hard to reach" children.

* Strengthening a Maori injury-prevention programme.

Other parts of the report set specific targets. In respite care, for example, the department wants "500 Maori consumers to be in receipt of new service" of a total 1522 consumers overall; in residential care, it aims for 32 new Maori consumers to receive the service out of 171 consumers overall; under home support and personal care, the target is 12 new Maori consumers out of 280 overall.

Prime Minister Helen Clark, who chairs the cabinet's Closing the Gaps committee, initially ordered quarterly reports to monitor departments' commitment to the programme.

But she has stopped using the term "Closing the Gaps," saying Opposition parties have tainted it.

She no longer wants emphasis put on ethnicity, but on reducing inequality.

She has suggested that the Closing the Gaps cabinet committee might be restructured out of existence.

This is seen as a way to drop the title while passing its work to another committee.

Race Relations Conciliator Dr Rajen Prasad also expressed reservations in October about ethnically targeted health programmes.

But Annette King said yesterday that changes to Closing the Gaps would not affect her ministry's work.

"In health, the inequalities are just so obvious that regardless of what language we use to describe the problem, it is one of having to improve the health status of large groups of New Zealanders."

She said Pakeha would not be turned away from any programme if they had the same health problem as Maori or Pacific Islanders.

Herald Online feature: Closing the Gaps