Treasury publishes four new papers and updates Insights tool

The Treasury has published two Working Papers and two Analytical Papers today, covering the impact of student mobility on under-achievement, gender budgeting, parental leave in the public sector, and population change in New Zealand.

The following papers are available on the Treasury website:

• Student mobility across schools and its links to under-achievement (Working Paper 2018/01) by Sylvia Dixon. This paper provides new information on the extent of student mobility between schools in New Zealand, measuring mobility rates at both the student and school level. It examines the characteristics of mobile students, the extent to which they become disengaged from school, and their NCEA level 1 achievement rates. It also compares the student turnover rates of different types of schools. The research findings show that children who change schools frequently are less likely to complete NCEA. Decile 1 primary schools had student turnover rates in 2015 that were more than two times higher than those of decile 10 primary schools.

• Gender Budgeting: A useful approach for Aotearoa New Zealand? (Working Paper 2018/02) by Suzy Morrissey. This paper explores the nature of the growing field of gender budgeting and how it could contribute to the transparency of fiscal reporting and analysis in New Zealand. Elements of gender budgeting include identifying initiatives that would support gender equality, examining proposed expenditure (gender analysis) to determine the gender impact of the proposal, and analysing agreed expenditure (ex post). The paper includes a brief example of ex post gender analysis, by analysing the 2016 Tax Expenditure Statement, and includes some actions that could potentially be undertaken by both civil society and government in the future.

• The experiences of those who take parental leave within the Public Sector and the policies that support them (Analytical Paper 2018/01) by Suzy Morrissey and Maria Williamson. This Paper presents research undertaken jointly by staff at the Treasury and the Ministry for Women. The qualitative study involved interviews of public sector employees who had returned to work within the previous 12 months after taking parental leave, and a survey of human resources teams in public service departments. Experiences of parental leave were generally positive, with flexible work arrangements and understanding managers and colleagues identified as important factors in a successful return after parental leave. The survey of human resources teams indicated variation between Ministries in their policies and procedures. Subsequent to the research, the Ministry for Women prepared a guide for managers, which brings the lessons learned from the research into a practical tool. The guide will be released by the Ministry for Women soon.

• Where we come from, where we go – Describing population change in New Zealand (Analytical Paper 2018/02) by Keith McLeod. This paper presents new experimental data about population change in New Zealand between 2008 and 2016. The results come from Treasury analysis of administrative data collected by government agencies and matched anonymously at an individual level by Statistics NZ in the Integrated Data Infrastructure (IDI). The new data will facilitate research into the impacts of population change on local communities and economies. Through a better understanding of local area population change, decision-makers, businesses, and the general public, will also be better able to understand the changing needs of different communities.

The release of this paper coincides with an update of Insights, the Treasury’s online interactive data analysis website (https://insights.apps.treasury.govt.nz/). Insights was designed to make integrated administrative data accessible to a wide audience, providing evidence to better inform policy and practice. Two new tools added in the update allow population change in New Zealand local areas to be explored. Three existing tools focus on services and outcomes for children and youth.

The views, opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in these papers are strictly those of the authors. They do not necessarily reflect the views of the Treasury or the New Zealand Government.

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