Core Group Minutes - 7 December 2011
PRESENT
Mayors Dale Williams (Chair), Bryan Cadogan, Jenny Rowan, John Forbes, Malcolm Campbell, Roly Ellis, Alistair Sowman, Winston Gray, and Deputy Mayor Penny Hulse.
MTFJ – Jan Francis, Bry Kopu and Claire Richardson (Auckland Council)
LGNZ – Mariska Wouters
APOLOGIES
Mayors Brendan Duffy, Jono Naylor, Frana Cardno, Kevin Winters, Kelvin Coe, Les Probert, Wayne Guppy and Lawrence Yule
MTFJ – Annette Smithard
TASKFORCE MEETING
Minutes – 15 September 2011
Moved – Malcolm Campbell
Seconded – Bryan Cadogan
FINANCE
The financial report was accepted
Moved – Roly Ellis
Seconded – Jenny Rowan
Carried
Rangatahi Leadership Programme
A discussion was held about this programme following information on the first year. It was agreed that there needed to be some help with mentoring for Mayors and it was agreed that Mayors signing up for the next year would be requested to attend one training session. Bryan Cadogan suggested that in some instances it might be useful for Marcus to provide some feed-back to councils. Jan will follow this up with Marcus
National Forum
After discussion it was agreed that a national half day forum to be held before one Rural and Provincial Sector meeting was a good idea and should be progressed with the Chairs of the sector ( John Forbes and Jono Naylor). Jan to follow up
Kapiti Forum Meeting
Jenny Rowan reported that the meeting held in her district to progress a Youth Transition process was very well attended and successful. Facilitation by Celia Lashlie and Jan Francis had ensured that many ideas were canvassed and will be further fleshed out for a full forum early in the New Year.
Youth Guarantee Advisory Group
Jan reported on a meeting of this group which she had recently been appointed to. The group chaired by Stuart Middleton is to advise the Minister and Ministry on progress with implementation of the various initiatives under the Youth Guarantee process. The group had also just been asked to advise on the review of Careers Education. The meeting provided useful information and has a broad terms of reference and will meet as required but probably at least quarterly. As the review of careers education is vital to the work of the Taskforce, Jan will invite Officials involved to attend the next Core Group meeting. In addition Jan asked for a small group who were particularly interested in giving feedback on the review to respond to the discussion paper. Mayors Jenny Rowan and Dale Williams agreed to do this and Jan will follow up other Core Group members via email.
Strategy Meeting
It was agreed that a strategic planning meeting would be held in February to develop a new strategy to cover 2012 – 2014. Jan will send out a draft before the meeting.
General Business
There was discussion regarding informing Councils more about the work of the Taskforce and providing presentations when asked and where possible. Jan and Bry to follow up.
LGNZ Maori Committee
John Forbes reported on this committee which comprised Maori elected members based on the 7 electorates and was focused on getting more young Maori elected to Councils. They were keen to work with Marcus Akuhata – Brown on this.
MSD Tender Process
It was agreed that the Taskforce would send our recommendations on the youth package tender to MSD in January and that documents should state that:
- Must be a local provider
- A local panel, including the Mayor/or deputised elected member should look at the tenders and provide some recommendation
- Note required attributes – connectedness, collaborative, positive relationships
Bry suggested that expressions of interest could be called for as part of the process, to reduce compliance for groups before putting in a full tender, and/or to influence the tender document.
Bry and Jan to follow up.
The meeting concluded with a vote of thanks from Chair Mayor Dale Williams and wishing everyone a safe and happy festive season.
PARTNERS MEETING
EDANZ
Samantha Seath reported on the work of EDANZ over the past year. The focus had been on collaboration both in the regions and with Central Government. She noted that it is important for local areas to take economic leadership to show Central Government the importance of the Local Government sector and local EDA’s. EDANZ had been working with LGNZ on the Know How series with the Economic Leadership Course which had attracted 32 participants. Samantha said it was important for Councils, Mayors and EDA’s to work together especially when engaging at the Central Government level. She further noted that there was a need to grow the economy and find the niches in which NZ could excel. Asia was a growing market and it is important for EDA’s to understand this market, so she was engaging with NZT&E to support trips to the region and noting the importance of Mayors particularly in China.
There was some conflict with the Chambers of Commerce regarding the role of EDANZ but Samantha was clear that the roles were different and that EDA’s were unique in that they are not membership based and work wider than with individual businesses.
The Government’s emphasis on competition and innovation required collaborative action. She also felt it was important for local communities to have a strong relationship with their local MP’s.
During a general discussion on the world demographics and the falling numbers of young people Samantha agreed NZ needed to ensure all young people were able to participate in the economy, noting the only country not facing declining numbers of young people was India.
Council of Trade Unions
Peter Conway reported on the work of the NZCTU. He noted that there were two disputes which were causing concern at the moment – the Ports of Auckland and the Rangitikei Meat Company lock out.
He noted the Government policy on youth pay rates and said they needed to make them work and focus on the investment in young people with high quality training as part of the rates. The Youth Guarantee work was hopefully providing opportunities for many young people to become trained and qualified.
Noting that unemployment in NZ was higher relatively to other OECD countries he said the Council’s position on the tax cuts remained and said that the structure of the reform had seen a growing gap between lower and higher wage earners.
The welfare reform would see the job seekers increase as a group with 59,000 on sickness benefit alone. He believed there was room for organisations and employers to be active in this area to ensure the best possible investment for this group.
He believed the new government would weaken unions and therefore their ability to lift wages. Insecure work and inequality would be a focus for NZCTU in the coming year. Unions would need to modernise and needed to reinvigorate the conversation on sustainable development and values.
Student Job Search
A general discussion on work experience followed a question on the subject from Mayor Dale Williams. Paul Kennedy of Student Job Search noted that many students were working with charities on a voluntary basis to gain work experience to add to their CV’s. Student Job Search was registering voluntary jobs from charities on their site. He noted that there were opportunities with Local Government for student placement (4 year windows where students could provide valuable work to Councils).
Paul also commented that the Careers NZ website was underutilised and was a fantastic resource – also saying that a lot of recruitment was now done with on-line interview as the first screening process. He believed schools could assist greatly if they got students to register with Careers NZ and with Student Job Search. This could make a real difference for the prospects of young people.
However, he also noted that the biggest gap with engagement was with employers and that they needed to step up with information on jobs, skill requirement and future opportunities.
Human Rights Commission
Moana Eruera and Liam McAtee, who he is mentoring, gave an update on the work of the Commission around a resource from young people in the form of a local recording. The recording is primarily the voices of young people to encourage employers to take young people into their organisations and to know what to expect and also to give young people information on what employers would expect. The recordings are in magazine style and will be available on their website. The Taskforce will also put a link on our website.
Industry Training Federation
Mark Oldershaw the new Chief Executive introduced himself to the Taskforce noting that he was keen to continue and further the relationship with Mayors. He noted that the Industry Training Review needed to be industry led for solutions and that there was a discussion document and an employers’ survey on the ITF website. He was keen to work on linking the ITF with industry and EDA’s and focus on industry and communities. A BERL report on the value of Industry Training would be available mid December.
OFFICIALS MEETING
Ministry of Social Development
Karen Bishop from Ministry of Social Development spoke of the changes for young people in the transition area noting that they would be targeting 16-17 year olds. The Ministry of Education would refer data on all school leavers and those who had been absent from school for 20 days and MSD would rate them low to high risk before referring to providers who would be paid according to the level of risk assessed. Success would be based on gaining NZQA level 2 or off benefit. This policy was investment based where you invest to get the best outcome and MSD will decide on that investment. The Ministry has had some discussion with stakeholders regarding the changes. There would be a tender process in February and they wanted to get the information out to as wide a group as possible not just current providers. The decisions were expected to be finalised in April. She also noted opportunities within the Government’s wider youth package around sole parents, sickness and IYB beneficiaries with one tender process for all these services. Mayor Roly Ellis noted that the process would be flawed if the tender went outside the district and would in effect kill his (Tararua) current programme.
There was a general discussion on the issue of drug testing and benefit receipt. Mayors agreed with the focus on drug testing as drugs and alcohol were a major cultural issue. However, they felt that rather than suspending income support drug users needed help to address the issue and possibly needed to stay on a benefit until they had some work experience which would then help them get a job. Felicity Bolen (DoL) noted that it was a deep rooted, systemic labour market issue which caused a huge loss of productivity.
Department of Labour
Felicity Bolen reported on the role of the Department in monitoring the 90 day law for abuse. Also they were working on the P.S.A. issue in kiwifruit and doing some profiling for those communities. In forestry they were importing labour from the Pacific Islands but also working to get NZers into the work.
Careers New Zealand
David Bradbury provided Mayors with a written handout from Careers NZ detailing: new benchmarks for secondary schools, Know your Skills an interactive online self-help tool, working in Canterbury and work with the Nelson Regional EDA. The handout is available on the Taskforce website.
MINISTERS MEETING
There was no Ministers Meeting due to announcement of Cabinet not being made until mid December.
Next Core Group Meeting – March 2012