Horse Manure #2: Vision and Values, differing from reality?
The following is the CCDHB statement of vision and values with highlights by Adam:-
Capital & Coast DHB - Vision and Values
Now then what do we know to date, some major points:-
1. Hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars have been “siphoned off” by a Kapiti runanga, with some used to prop up failed business ventures, a police report alleges.
2. Police began investigating after runanga members – frustrated by complaints to the Government going largely unheeded – complained.In a scoping report, Detective Inspector Doug Brew, of Police National Headquarters, said he believed there were potential issues requiring criminal investigation. Health dollars were “siphoned off” into a failed cafe and a craft shop at Lindale run by Tihei Ltd, he said
3. Capital & Coast’s director of Maori health, Riki Nia Nia, said the runanga had failed to meet its contracted obligations. A 2009 audit found “a number of financial anomalies including transfers and advances from Hora Te Pai accounts”.Included in the $590,000 was $200,000 invested as a term deposit, a $140,000 advance to the runanga, an advance of $176,362 to the failed iwi business that tried to start a cafe and art gallery and a $74,000 advance to Te Ati Awa Ki Whakarongotai Charitable Trust.
4. Capital & Coast Maori Health Development accountability manager, Jim Wiki, said a complaint would not be made because he thought the failings were due to naivety and lack of ability.Mr Wiki said there was a “possibility” the money would be repaid so “the board would not be forthcoming with any complaint to police”.
5. Ministers and health officials took too long to act on complaints that hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars for Maori health had been diverted into a failed cafe, two iwi members allege.
6. Health Minister Tony Ryall has asked for an urgent report from the ministry to ensure the right processes were followed.
7. The allegations – which the women claim were first raised three years ago in a telephone call – were repeated to Attorney-General Christopher Finlayson nearly a year ago and later made to Capital & Coast District Health Board managers, as well as Mr Ryall, Associate Health Minister Tariana Turia, Maori Affairs Minister Pita Sharples and ACT MP Roger Douglas. It was only when a threat to go to the media was made seven weeks ago that a Health Ministry investigator called, iwi member Apihaka Mack said – to say they had “very little information” to assess whether he should investigate.
8.Capital & Coast District Health Board will not try to recover hundreds of thousands of dollars earmarked for health but spent instead on farming and other investments by a Kapiti runanga.
9. A report by PricewaterhouseCoopers issued by the board yesterday said $276,000 worth of surplus health money from Te Runanga o Ati Awa ki Whakarongotai’s health arm, Hora Te Pai, was invested in a bank and farming in Northland. If the board felt it should recover the surplus it gave Hora Te Pai, it should investigate how the money was spent and how to recover it, the report said.
10. Capital & Coast planning and funding director Sandra Williams said yesterday that the board took legal advice and would not try to retrieve the money because it believed Hora Te Pai performed the services it was contracted to deliver. She said an “audit” found Hora Te Pai had made a $416,000 surplus in six years and just over half had been returned to Hora Te Pai’s accounts. She wanted to reassure people the board spent considerable effort to ensure health dollars were used properly by all groups it funded.
11.Ms Williams described the report as an audit but PricewaterhouseCoopers said it had not “conducted any form of audit” and had “no opinion on the reliability, accuracy or completeness of the information” it relied on.
12. Ms Williams said the DHB’s primary concern was that patients had access to health services so it had now contracted Compass Primary Health Care Network to run Hora Te Pai’s services
13. Kamiria Mullen, …, said the health board’s decision was disgraceful.”They are sending a message to Maori that you can [use funds for other purposes] and get away with it. They [the health board] know the money was used wrongly,” Ms Mullen said yesterday.
14. Ms Mullen said it was ridiculous for the board to say its contracts with Hora Te Pai were concluded satisfactorily considering an earlier report from the board said the runanga repeatedly failed to meet its obligations and demanded all the money be returned.
“15. They [the health board] are covering their butts here. They simply didn’t bother to monitor what they gave that money for,” she said.
16. As a kaumatua I am angry with what my brother [and others] has done.”She said other iwi were facing similar issues and it was time to stop people using money meant to “uplift our people” for the wrong purposes. “Our iwi is standing up and saying: `This is wrong.’”But this message from the DHB is giving all government departments an out.”
So comparing key points from the various Dominion Post articles it seems to Adam that what has happened/is happening is somewhat at variance with the professed Vision and Values of Capital & Coast DHB.
It would be interesting to know what the 21 candidates standing for the CCDHB in the forthcoming local body elections had to say on this matter; especially the 6 incumbents who are standing again.
In particular:- Margaret Faulkner, Judith Aitken, Virginia Hope and Peter Roberts who all serve according to the CCDHB website on The Finance Risk and Audit Committee. Perhaps voters should post questions to each of these candidates and indeed to all the candidates on where they stand on issues such as this!
Furthermore, it would be very interesting to know what advice Tony Ryall as responsible minister had received as in one of the earlier articles his spokesperson indicated the minister had asked for a report.
As the DomPost noted this morning in yet another editorial:-
There appear to be two possible explanations for what has occurred. The first is that cash surpluses accumulated by HTP have been used in a manner “contrary to any authorised (or) lawful dealings”, as was suggested by Detective Inspector Doug Brew of Police National Headquarters in a scoping report last year. If that is the case, the board’s next course of action is straightforward. It should take every possible step to recover the money, not just for its own sake but to avoid signalling to other health providers that it is in their interests to create surpluses.
The second explanation is that the board’s contracts with HTP were so poorly drafted that the organisation was entitled to use the funding it received from Capital & Coast for whatever purpose it chose. In that case, heads should roll.
Capital & Coast has no chance of persuading Mr Ryall to take a fresh look at its funding constraints while it scatters scarce health dollars about like confetti.
Now what was it again that CCDHB proclaimed as part of the Vision and Values, ah yes something about
- Professionalism (leadership, integrity, honesty), and
- Excellence ( effectiveness and efficiency) -
not sure that immediately comes to mind at the moment when one considers the content of the various newspaper articles by experienced reporter Phil Kitchin.
Then the clincher, the money quote so to speak, ‘managing our money effectively‘.
Oh dear, excuse Adam whilst he marvels at the flight of pigs overhead.
More to come on this soon in relation to reflections on governance and other matters.
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