Our intentions: Looking at how effectively a joint venture has been set up to reduce family violence and sexual violence
Photo acknowledgement: mychillybin © Alistair Lang

Our intentions: Looking at how effectively a joint venture has been set up to reduce family violence and sexual violence

28 July 2020: Family violence and sexual violence affect hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders every year. The consequences for individuals and communities are widespread, and have enduring social, cultural, and economic costs. Despite sustained efforts over many years, New Zealand has yet to achieve improvement in outcomes.

The Government’s efforts to reduce family violence and sexual violence draws on people and resources in many organisations, including Oranga Tamariki, the New Zealand Police, the Department of Corrections, Te Puni Kōkiri, ACC and the ministries for Social Development, Health, Justice, and Education. Separately, those efforts are not proving as effective as they could be.

The Government has created the Family Violence and Sexual Violence Joint Venture to lead efforts to address family and sexual violence.

What we’re focusing on

Our audit will look at how effectively the joint venture has been set up to support reductions in family violence and sexual violence. We will be asking:

  • Are the role, mandate, objectives, and accountabilities of the joint venture understood and communicated to those working on reducing family violence and sexual violence?
  • How does the joint venture intend to support better outcomes and significantly reduce family violence and sexual violence?
  • Does the joint venture have what it needs to support the delivery of improved outcomes?

The difference we expect to make

Our work will provide independent assurance to parliament and New Zealanders that the joint venture has been set up in a way that ensures that it can support significant reductions in family violence and sexual violence. We will:

  • provide our views on the joint venture – a new approach by the Government in addressing family violence and sexual violence, which are long-standing and challenging issues, and
  • look to determine the conditions necessary for this and any future joint ventures to be successful in delivering improved outcomes for New Zealanders.

Please use the feedback form on the right if you’d like to speak to a staff member about this audit, make a suggestion, or ask a question.

We expect to complete this work in the first quarter of 2021.