Part 6: Agency self-monitoring

This year, Oranga Tamariki again reports that it is partially compliant with the NCS RegulationsCloseNCS Regulations
(National Care Standards and Related Matters) Regulations 2018 View the full glossary.¹⁷⁰ It states that 37 percent of tamarikiClosetamariki
Children (plural) aged 0-13 yearsView the full glossary and rangatahiCloserangatahi
Young person aged 14 – 21 years of ageView the full glossary in its care were estimated to have had its own core lead indicators met. The core lead indicators are a subset of the 21 lead indicators. This level of compliance is the same as the previous year.

Oranga Tamariki introduced its lead indicator framework ahead of our 2022/23 Experiences of Care in AotearoaCloseAotearoa
New ZealandView the full glossary report. Oranga Tamariki uses the framework to monitor its own compliance with the NCS RegulationsCloseNCS Regulations
(National Care Standards and Related Matters) Regulations 2018 View the full glossary and publishes annual reports on this. ¹⁷¹

There has been no change to the lead indicator framework for the 2024/25 reporting period. However, Oranga Tamariki advised that lead indicator 16, which looks at whether tamarikiClosetamariki
Children (plural) aged 0-13 yearsView the full glossary and rangatahiCloserangatahi
Young person aged 14 – 21 years of ageView the full glossary are placed with an approved caregiver, is based on a smaller sample of files that makes it more susceptible to year-on-year variations and harder to track changes over time. It said this lead indicator should be interpreted with caution and acknowledges that there is an issue with the ongoing inclusion of this lead indicator in its selfmonitoring approach. Oranga Tamariki has said it will reconsider the lead indicators ahead of next year’s reporting.

Oranga Tamariki self-monitoring includes analysis of the case files of a sample of tamarikiClosetamariki
Children (plural) aged 0-13 yearsView the full glossary and rangatahiCloserangatahi
Young person aged 14 – 21 years of ageView the full glossary in care. For the 2024/25 reporting period, case file analysis questions covered some new areas or areas where Oranga Tamariki had previously relied on its Quality Practice Tool (QPT).¹⁷²

The new case file analysis questions cover:

• reasons for care entry
• reasons for transitions between placements
• mental health diagnoses and support
• transitions to adulthood (including life skills assessments and transition planning)
• data quality for recording social worker visits
• supervision for social workers
• Oranga Tamariki practice standards.

Oranga Tamariki has also stated its intention to discontinue case file analysis that assesses planning for tamariki and rangatahi to move out of care and into permanent arrangements. Issues around recording these plans and decisions in CYRAS, together with the dynamic nature of tamariki and rangatahi plans, meant the data was not truly representative and was potentially misleading.¹⁷³ Oranga Tamariki has since advised that case file analysis does still ask a question about whether permanency planning is on track. Oranga Tamariki told us this offers a more reliable picture of whether planning is on track.

Surveys are a valuable tool for gathering first-hand perspectives from people on a wide range of issues. In 2024/25, Oranga Tamariki conducted its annual caregiver survey, which is referred to throughout this report.¹⁷⁴

The 2024/25 Oranga Tamariki annual report states that Oranga Tamariki has also conducted fieldwork on its third Te Toho o te Ora child survey and has piloted a new whānauClosewhānau
Whānau refers to people who are biologically linked or share whakapapa. For the Monitor’s monitoring purposes, whānau includes parents, whānau members living with tamariki at the point they have come into care View the full glossary survey. It has also introduced a new survey of partners and providers. We have yet to see the survey results.

We understand that the next iteration of Te Pihinga, a kaimahi survey on cultural capability, is planned for 2025/26.

Oranga Tamariki introduced a new enterprise data analytics platform in 2024/25 to replace its legacy data warehouse. This also required the replacement of legacy computer code used for reporting. The implementation of this major change to data collection appears to have been affected by capacity constraints and the loss of expertise and institutional knowledge during recent restructures.

As part of the restructure, the Safety of Children in Care team was disestablished and some of its functions were transferred to a role within the Quality Practice Improvement team. Consequently, some data that was previously supplied is no longer available. One example is data on the proportion of the reports of concern for tamarikiClosetamariki
Children (plural) aged 0-13 yearsView the full glossary and rangatahiCloserangatahi
Young person aged 14 – 21 years of ageView the full glossary in care that were considered to be allegations of abuse or neglect. Oranga Tamariki has since advised that, in 2026, it will begin case file analysis on reports of concern for tamariki and rangatahi in care that ended with no further action in the initial assessment phase.

Together with the re-platforming of the data warehouse, this means there are several areas where data is not available or where there are discrepancies between data that was provided previously and data provided this year for the same periods.

This raises concerns about the quality of the data we are receiving from Oranga Tamariki to assess compliance. More importantly, Oranga Tamariki should be concerned about the impact of poorquality data on its ability to assure itself it is working well.

We have reported for several years, and agencies have told us, that poor information sharing is a barrier to compliance with the NCS RegulationsCloseNCS Regulations
(National Care Standards and Related Matters) Regulations 2018 View the full glossary. This is both in terms of agencies’ ability to meet tamarikiClosetamariki
Children (plural) aged 0-13 yearsView the full glossary and rangatahiCloserangatahi
Young person aged 14 – 21 years of ageView the full glossary needs and in terms of monitoring whether needs are met. This year, a measure from Ngā Wawata performance framework¹⁷⁵ found that just 4 percent of Oranga Tamariki partners and providers felt strongly that Oranga Tamariki provided the critical information they needed to perform their role.

As an example of the inability to accurately monitor compliance, in 2023, Oranga Tamariki conducted a data match with Health NZ to determine immunisation rates and PHO enrolment rates for tamariki and rangatahi in care. This revealed that Oranga Tamariki was substantially under-recording PHO enrolment – while the data match showed 93 percent of tamariki and rangatahi were enrolled, Oranga Tamariki data showed an enrolment rate of just 56 percent.

In its response to our data request for 2024/25, Oranga Tamariki told us it is continuing to work with the Ministry of Health to obtain health-related data (such as PHO enrolments and immunisation rates) for tamariki and rangatahi in care.

For education, we have previously reported that poor information sharing is a barrier to ensuring tamariki and rangatahi are enrolled at a registered school (or other formal education). We heard that Oranga Tamariki and the Ministry of Education were actioning an information-sharing agreement, with an initial focus on enrolments and attendance, beginning in February 2025. We now understand that this did not occur during the 2024/25 reporting period, and the first sharing of information took place in November 2025. This is discussed in detail in Part 2 of this report.