Speaking at the Identity Conference in Wellington Minister of Finance Bill English said it was important to know “which people were where” across the country in order to tell what particular Government services were making a difference.
“Take a child under 5 who is known to CYFS, where at least one parent in the household is on the benefit and where either of the parents has had contact with Corrections…we can pretty much forecast now that that child under 5 with those characteristics…by the age of 35 they’re five times more likely to be a beneficiary and seven times more likely to be in prison by age 21.”
English calls these children the “billion dollar kids” and says the more the state knows about them, “we may be able to change the course of that life. If we can’t know that much about them it’s almost certain that we can’t change the course of their life.”
“The fact there are 20,000 children in New Zealand with parents in prison proves “we haven’t been making much impact with what we know,” he said.
