Budget 2021 is investing in a range of initiatives to help communities prevent family violence and sexual violence from happening in the first place, and help those using violence to stop.

“The Government is committed to reducing, and ultimately eliminating, family violence and sexual violence. The impacts of family violence and sexual violence are complex, entangled, multifaceted, interconnected and intergenerational,” said Prevention of Family and Sexual Violence Minister Marama Davidson.

“Budget 2021’s investment will not only extend the capacity and capability of a number of successful prevention programmes running in our communities, it will also help develop integrated and coordinated systems to ensure we have a solid government framework for addressing family and sexual violence,” Marama Davidson said.

“The initiatives we are investing in today reflect what we have heard from families, whānau and communities experiencing violence. We need to enable our community-led, whānau-centred services to provide sustained and holistic support built around families and whānau.

“We are already seeing how these community prevention programmes can have a real, practical impact – improving the experiences of those needing the services and changing how people and communities think and act,” Marama Davidson said.

Funding of $131.9 million over four years will ensure an adaptive, strengths-based learning system. Specific initiatives to receive that funding include:

· Expanding whānau-centred facilitation by kaupapa Māori providers

· Working with communities and whānau to support parents and reduce risk

· Sustaining and developing existing safety responses with communities

· Building partnerships and collaboration to transform the system

· Strategic coordination of data and insights to build a learning system

· Extending early support to help people stop using violence.

“Together, these initiatives take important steps towards strong nationally enabled community-led responses to family violence and sexual violence in our country. It ensures that Māori leadership, Te Ao Māori thinking and an inclusive Te Tiriti framework play a pivotal part in transforming the family violence and sexual violence system to the benefit of everyone,” Marama Davidson said.

“This approach will enable and support iwi and community leadership to prioritise and design their own responses to family violence and sexual violence: ensuring families and whānau get the help they need, when they need it, how they need it, and from people they know and trust.

“We are truly committed to having a safer Aotearoa New Zealand for all, and especially for women and our tamariki,” Marama Davidson said.

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