Nicola Willis: Social Investment Minister on the new Social Investment Fund and outcomes contracts

There’s going to be a major overhaul in the way the Government contracts social services. 

The Government's announcing what it calls outcomes contracts in a bid to deliver results, but also scrap initiatives that are not working. 

It's also working on a Social Investment Fund, soon to be spearheaded by social investment secretary and former Police Commissioner Andrew Coster. 

Social Investment Minister Nicola Willis told Mike Hosking there are often multiple contracts coming from different agencies. 

She says they're spending hours filling in forms and doing what she calls “administrative bureaucracy”. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
So the Finance Minister looking to overhaul the social services
space as we told you yesterday, more focus on outcomes
not outputs. Less cross contamination when it comes to multiple
agencies doing multiple things and know and seemingly knowing what's
going on, and the idea that performance pay in the
public sector could be back anyway. Social Investment Minister Nicola
Willis is in charge of all of this and is
with us. Very good morning to.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
You, Good morning mate.

Speaker 1 (00:20):
To my eye, it's got a slightly wooly sort of feel.
I mean, what is social investment and this is Costa's
job eventually, what specifically is it and what changes?

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Well you think about basic concept. Everyone in New Zealand
degrees Let's not have an ambulance at the bottom of
the cliffs. Let's build the fence. It's a bit tricky
when you have to work out, well, where should we
build the fence, who are the people who need defenses,
who's good at building fences, and how do we check
the fences are working. That's what social investment's about. It's

(00:50):
about proper prevention and proper early intervention so that people
don't go on to lead life of crime, welfare dependency,
under achievement, and we know that there are some things
in communities that do work off and they're delivered by
very grassroots organizations, by EWE, by non government organizations, by
social organizations. So what government tends to do is go

(01:13):
off and fund literally thousands of different contracts across the
country feel really good because it's funded them, and they
never check in to see which ones are working and
which ones should we be standing up to the Social
investment is about cleaning all of that up and being
much more purcepitseful about what we invest in and whether
it's working.

Speaker 1 (01:31):
The Cross department stuff. Do you have any idea how
bad that is, how big it is therefore, how much
you can save, and how much more efficient you can
be specifically.

Speaker 2 (01:41):
Yeah, well, look, as I said, more than eighteen thousand contracts, Mike,
And so there are multiple non government providers who are
working with vulnerable New Zealanders who will have more than
upwards of thirty different contracts. So piecemeal little contracts, a
little contract year for good off violent prevention, mineral contract

(02:01):
year to prevent children going into stake year, contract year
to help with children with mental distress, multiple contracts, and
then those will come from multiple departments, so there might
be six or seven different agencies involved. So they're spending
hours filling informs, reporting, doing all of this administrative bureaucracy stuff.

(02:22):
And my view is, look, as they're a proven provider,
tell them what they want to achieve, measure it. If
they're achieving it, we keep funding them. If they're not
achieving it, then we've got to make a change.

Speaker 1 (02:32):
Does something to do with the mindset of the public service.
Because I've followed Labor with interest. They've been asking care
and Shaw, particularly about Orangatamariki, and she was arguing, look,
there's a whole bunch of providers there that have money
in the bank and never provided any service. Labor never
seemed to get their head around the idea that if
you're not spending your money, you're not doing your job.
Just in simple terms, Why is that level of thinking

(02:52):
prevalent in Wellington? What's gone wrong there? Everyone else in
the real world talks about outcomes, not just handing out contract.
Was it so weird where you are?

Speaker 2 (03:02):
Well I call it the easy complacency of good intention,
and it's about that thing of well, look, we've five
different programs to prevent family violence. So it doesn't that
feel good and it feels great to say, look, we're
putting all this money in, but my view is trying
hard is not good enough. Actually you have to go
a step further and say, okay, well we had a

(03:24):
good intention, but is it working? And that question is
very challenging because if you're a government agency and it
turns out the thing you've been funding is a bit hopeless,
then maybe the next step is to say, let's stop it.
And so look at I wouldn't just blame public servants.
I've blame politicians too, because politician we love announcing things
and saying, look how lovely we are and how caring

(03:46):
we are. It's a bit hard a year or too
latest to say, well, we're going to have to stop that.
And that social investment is about introducing some rigor to
all of that, being much more purposeful and frankly taking
power away from government aid agencies and all of the
buacracy that comes with it and putting it down on
the grapped grassroots with the people and communities who actually

(04:06):
know what's going on.

Speaker 1 (04:07):
Appreciate your time as always. Nichola will as Finance Social
Services Minister.

Speaker 2 (04:11):
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