Karen Chhour: All children that go into care should be treated equally

September 26, 2021

Act MP Karen Chhour said the current rules can override what's best for Kiwi children in need.

ACT MP Karen Chhour has drafted a private member’s bill which would remove section 7AA from the legislation that governs Oranga Tamariki.

Section 7AA was introduced in 2019. It requires Oranga Tamariki to strive to place children and young people who are unable to go home in permanent care that meets their needs from within their family, whānau, hapū, iwi or family group.

The first term MP told Q+A that “family, iwi or hapū are a great place to start, but that’s not always possible, and I just don’t want it to get to the stage where we are overiding the best interests of our children”.

She argues that removing 7AA would encourage Oranga Tamariki to be “colour blind” and that “all children that go into care should be treated equally”.

Ms Chhour, who says she entered parliament in part to deliver better care for children, told Jack Tame that however the law was intended to work, non-Māori people tell her they are being told by Oranga Tamariki that 7AA doesn’t apply to them, and that they are not eligible to be considered under it.

“If I thought Section 7AA was for all children and not trying to separate and divide us into different categories then yes 100% I’d be behind the idea of family first, whānau first.”

Lady Tureiti Moxon, one of the claimants to the Waitangi Tribunal over the repeated failings of Oranga Tamariki, disagrees. She says while even the Tribunal has acknowledged that 7AA is reductionist and imperfectly applied it is “better than nothing”.

“Its the one thing in the act that actually protects our children, protects our whānau, hapū and iwi, and protects who we are as Māori.”

Lady Moxon challenges the idea that removing a child from their culture is in their best interests. She says there is trauma, pain and irreparable damage done to both children and their families when those bonds are broken.

It comes after Oranga Tamariki CEO Grainne Moss stood down on January 22.

The system prior to the introduction of 7AA produced “children who belong nowhere and don’t know who they are.”

“Who said the best interests of the child was not to be with their whānau? Where did that come from? Who’s been perpetuating this view that Māori are undeserving, Māori are bad parents. The State’s the bad parent”.

Chhour believes there needs to be a change in society’s attitude and a recognition that “all our children are vulnerable”.

She says that New Zealand “can’t deny there are homes where these children are not safe” and that “we have an obligation to protect”.

Lady Moxon says while she has concerns about how frequently children are removed, she’s also frustrated that that seems to be the only move the State has.

“It’s one thing to remove a child from a family for that child’s safety at that moment in time, but they never given them back. And that’s what we’ve been saying forever and a day is: give them back.

"Support the whānau to be the best whānau they can be so they can look after their own children.”

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