Youthquest Kapiti Setting An Example – Kāpiti and Coast Independent

It’s become clear that there is a small group of around 150 very serious young offenders for whom our Youth Justice System in its current form just doesn’t work. Prime Minister Bill English

Kapiti Boot Camps

By John Granville and Roger Childs

Clearly the Kapiti Independent “Comment of the Week” is suggesting that Bill English’s boot camp idea is equivalent to Hitler Youth Camps.

I am all in favour of Bill English’s initiative IF it means the government will fund existing programmes for Youth at Risk.

Bill English’s initiative for Youth at Risk already exists in a different and appropriate form for Youth at Risk in Kapiti.

An inspirational programme

The modern, Kiwi-ised, Community-based successor of a ‘boot camp’ already exists with the successful Youthquest Kapiti operational programme for youths at risk.

This inspirational programme does NOT include weapon training, but includes a successful motivating and inspiring opportunity for youths to become community-minded citizens and has a 12 month mentoring period afterwards.

NOW it only needs Government funding!’

KCDC need to look at its youth funding priorities

KIN is of the view that the Kapiti Coast District Council (KCDC) should look seriously at the funding it provides for youth organisations.

Nationwide ZEAL at the end of June 2016 had more than 1.6 million in Accumulated Funds!

KCDC had provided ZEAL with donations totalling $187,867 during 2015/2016, while Youthquest Kapiti received a miserly $1,150!

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100 Years Ago — and the Maori Long March begins

Māori politics was dominated by the influential MPs (and sometime Cabinet ministers) Māui Pōmare ( Waitara statue photo above) and Apirana Ngata.

The 1920's also saw the rise of Tahupōtiki Wiremu Rātana’s religious movement, and the emergence of Te Puea Hērangi in Waikato.

Ngata worked hard to foster Māori scholarship and education and preserve traditional arts and culture.

He convinced the government to establish a Board of Maori Ethnological Research (1923), a Maori Purposes Fund Control Board (1924) and a School of Maori Arts and Crafts in Rotorua (1927).

The Reform government also took the first, tentative steps towards settling longstanding Māori grievances.

Agreements with Te Arawa in 1922 and Ngāti Tūwharetoa in 1926 recognised their respective rights over the Rotorua lakes and Lake Taupō, and led to the establishment of trust boards with some government funding.

Commissions of inquiry which examined Ngāi Tahu grievances (1920–21) and the Waikato and Taranaki confiscations (1926–27) recommended that modest compensation be paid.