IN-CONFIDENCE
21 September 2023
Diamond8nz
[FYI request #23964 email] Tēnā koe
Thank you for your email of 26 August 2023 to Oranga Tamariki—Ministry for Children
(Oranga Tamariki), requesting information regarding children coming into the care of
Oranga Tamariki. Your request has been considered under the Official Information Act
1982 (the Act).
You have requested:
What’s the percentage of children uplifted yearly and how many of those children
are returned to their parents care that same year?
How many child are moved into the greater family’s care ( Aunty uncle
grandparents care) How many children go into foster care in a year and how many
of those children are back in care with their family by the end of the year?
How many children remain in the ministry system away from parents or family, in
the fostering system on average a year and how many of those children return
home if not the same year, how many years on average until they return home to
there parents or get moved in with family meme beds and how many child stay in
the ministry’s care never to be returned to there parents or family , but in the care
of the ministry?
To clarify, “uplift” is not a term that is used by Oranga Tamariki, although we understand
that it is commonly used to refer to the time when tamariki and rangatahi come into the
care of Oranga Tamariki.
The information you have requested is not held in the format you have asked for. While
Oranga Tamariki does hold information regarding entries and exits into care, whose care
tamariki enter into, ages of tamariki and rangatahi and the reasons why they exit care, we
would have to manually collate information from our structured data and, in doing so,
create new information in order to fulfil these requests.
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IN-CONFIDENCE
We have considered whether changing or extending the timeframe for responding to your
request would help, as required by section 18A of the Act. However, we do not believe
that this would enable us to be able to answer these particular parts of your request.
We have considered consulting with you, as requ ired by section 18B of the Act. However,
we do not believe that this would be helpful in assisting us with being able to provide the
information requested.
Therefore, due to the substantial amount of work that would be required to collate the
information you have requested, we are refusing your request under section 18(f) of the
Act.
However, in order to provide you with some relevant information, we have included in our
response a pdf document containing information regarding:
• the number of tamariki and rangatahi who have entered into the custody of the
Chief Executive per financial year,
• the number of tamariki and rangatahi who have exited from the custody of the Chief
Executive per financial year,
• the number of tamariki and rangatahi who have been in an Out of Home placement,
organised by type of placement and financial year, and
• the average duration in months of Out of Home placements, organised by type of
placement and financial year.
All of this data commences from the 2017/18 financial year.
Wherever possible, Oranga Tamariki endeavours to ensure tamariki are cared for within
their whānau. The high number of Family/Whānau care arrangements in the attached
dataset reflects this commitment. Foster Care is a more generic term and may also
include care arrangements with Family and Whānau due to language/category
descriptors changing over time.
In the attached dataset, you will find the care category “Child and Family Support Services
(Bednights)”. This refers to care arrangements which are undertaken on behalf of Oranga
Tamariki by partner agencies pursuant to s396 of the Oranga Tamariki Act. These include
Iwi partners as well as care arrangements provided by other partnered agencies. The
relatively high number of these reflects both the breadth of this category as well as a
commitment to working collaboratively with community and iwi partners to ensure the best
outcome possible for individual tamariki.
We also refer you to Pages 15 and 16 of ou
r 2021/2022 Annual Report, as well as Pages
10 and 11 of our
2022/23 Quarter 3 Performance Report, both of which contain data
pertinent to your request.
You may also find information from our practice centre of interest.
Care arrangements for
tamariki and rangatahi | Practice Centre | Oranga Tamariki
I trust the information provided is useful. I encourage you to raise any concerns about the
response with
[email address]. Alternatively, you are advised of your right to
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IN-CONFIDENCE
also raise any concerns with the Office of the Ombudsman by contacting them on 0800
802 602 or at
[email address].
Nāku noa, nā
Nicolette Dickson
Deputy Chief Executive Quality Practice and Experiences
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