Growing opposition says repealing Section 7AA will harm children

The coalition government is sticking to its guns on a promise to repeal Section 7AA of the Children's Act, despite expert testimony condemning the move. Will getting rid of Section 7AA prioritise children's safety, or ignore the role of culture in their wellbeing - and put them at risk? The government promises it is putting the welfare of children first in its moves to get rid of Section 7AA of the Children's Act, but the step is deeply unpopular, with warnings it will set back efforts to make tamariki safer.The Children's Minister, ACT's Karen Chhour, has been forced to repeatedly defend the move in media interviews and in Parliament, adamant it will go ahead despite the overwhelming submissions against the repeal at the select committee and outcry from iwi leaders. Section 7AA binds Oranga Tamariki to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi and means the chief executive of the agency is required to work in partnership with iwi and hapū, and to report on those relationships to Parliament once a year.Today The Detail looks at the history of 7AA with Tracey Martin, who was Children's Minister when it came into force in 2019 and is an outspoken critic of the repeal. Martin says the work on 7AA started with her predecessor in the National government, Vulnerable Children's Minister Anne Tolley, as part of a wide-ranging review of the child protection system because it was failing Māori children. That section of the act was the culmination of decades of work to devolve the care and protection of tamariki to iwi and hapū, says Martin.Just before Section 7AA was brought in, a Newsroom investigation revealed a shocking video of an attempt to uplift a newborn from its mother at Hawke's Bay Hospital. Journalist Melanie Reid said in the story that the taking of Māori babies was a crisis in hiding, and that three Māori babies a week were being uplifted.Martin says bringing in 7AA was not a kneejerk reaction to the story but coincidence, as the legislation was written before the uplift. However, she says the case involved her own iwi, Ngāti Kahungunu and the clause enabled a closer relationship between it and Oranga Tamariki."Because of 7AA we advanced a relationship on an unofficial basis where we placed a social worker inside the Ngāti Kahungunu Trust. They walked alongside them to be able to develop their capacity to support their families and children more before it reached an Oranga Tamariki stage," says Martin.But Chhour has said that even before she became an MP she was hearing about the "unintended consequences of that certain section of the act" and the poor practise going on within Oranga Tamariki "around placement of Māori children"…Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details