Funding for Family Violence Focuses on Frontline Services

Associate Minister for Social Development and Employment, Tariana Turia, has announced a reprioritisation of funding for current funding to family violence services and the creation of a new Family-Centred Services Fund.

The aim of the new Fund is to enable providers and provider collectives to work more flexibly and to prioritise funding to areas where the need is greatest.

Hon Tariana Turia, said $11.035 million of the $62.4 million Government currently invests each year in contracted family violence services will be re-channelled into the following five initiatives:

• $8.535 million for the Family-Centred Services Fund for direct services to families and whānau where family violence has occurred, to restore their safety and wellbeing and help to create longer-term changes to prevent family violence from reoccurring. It will also encourage providers to work together to reduce duplications and gaps in services to their community – and to enable more innovative and integrated frontline services that respond to local needs

• $0.5 million for ongoing funding of the "It’s not OK" campaign focusing on the message “It’s OK to ask for help”

• $0.5 million for the E Tu Whānau! campaign which encourages whānau to take ownership and action for the safety of their whānau, building on whānau strengths and capabilities within the context of te Ao Māori.

• $0.5 million to address violence within Pacific families though a Pasifika Campaign that builds on the strengths of Pacific cultures to prevent violence from occurring.

• $1.0 million to develop and implement a training programme for Pacific providers that builds their capability to provide culturally appropriate interventions to victims of family violence, perpetrators and their families.

• $2.8 million to funding innovative and joined up approaches to the coordination of responses to family violence, such as community networks and case collaboration, for a period of one year. During this time the Taskforce for Action on Violence within Families will complete its review on how best to achieve good coordination of family violence services and initiatives across New Zealand communities.

Applications for the Family Centred Services Fund are now open and will close on Friday 29 April 2011.

In a related document - Family violence funding decisions Q and A

What initiatives have lost funding due to the reprioritisation of this funding?

Funding for the following three initiatives will no longer be available. These are:

• Te Rito Collaborative Community Family Violence Prevention Fund - which provided funding for 32 community-based family violence networks. The networks aimed to improve inter-agency co-ordination, collaboration and communication between groups and encourage the development of whole of community strategies to prevent family violence. Most Te Rito contracts were due to expire on 30 June 2011.

• Advocates for Children and Young People Who Witness Family Violence programme funded 45 co-ordinators in locations throughout New Zealand to raise community awareness about the impact of family violence on children and young people, identify service gaps in the community, build strong collaborative networks within the community to ensure agencies and service groups are connected to one another and take action for the best interests of children and young people. The majority of contracts for this programme were due to expire on 30 June 2011.

• Family Violence Education Services funded a range of family violence information, education and support services across the country.

All providers delivering the above services can apply to the Family-Centred Services Fund if they fit the criteria.

Further information about the new Family Centred Services Fund is available at http://www.familyservices.govt.nz/working-with-us/funding-and-contractin...

The full media release is available at http://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/funding-family-violence-focuses-front...