the department of internal affairs Statement Of Intent 2010–13
Safer communities
In this section:
Safer communities
What we seek to achieve
The safer communities outcome is about ensuring New Zealand communities are safer because threats and risks to their safety have been minimised and effectively managed. When communities are safe, people can participate fully in their communities and enjoy the benefits of living in New Zealand. The Department actively works to ensure communities are protected and resilient, and people are engaged and participating in their communities.
We also seek to reduce the cost to society of not managing risks to community safety – such as threats to lives and personal well-being, damage to economic and physical infrastructure, increased costs of law enforcement, increased use of social and health services, potential loss of employment productivity, and lack of participation in the community.
The three intermediate outcomes that support safer communities are:
- Communities are engaged
- Communities are protected
- Communities are resilient.
Specifically, we seek to:
- create an environment in which the risks associated with gambling are minimised, the benefits are maximised, and communities are more satisfied with the balance that is achieved
- protect people from objectionable material, and the dissemination of unsolicited electronic messages or ‘spam’, to create a safer and more secure electronic environment
- protect communities and reduce the risks from a broad range of natural and man-made hazards.
What we will do to achieve this
The Department’s key contributions to achieving this outcome are outlined below.
Provide leadership
We ensure compliance, build resilience and engage with communities by providing leadership in areas such as the development of policy and strategic advice to Ministers, operational initiatives, the promotion of good practice, and national coordination and close collaboration with other agencies. We will contribute to resilient, protected communities by reviewing the National Civil Defence Emergency Management Plan, and by establishing a new anti-money-laundering/counter-financing of terrorism function within the Department in the next two years, and a new enforcement function covering the private security and investigation industry in 2010/11.
Engage communities
We develop and provide information to communities and stakeholders in both the public and private sector to make them aware of the law as it relates to censorship, anti-spam, and gambling compliance and help them understand and comply with regulations. Our aim is to increase voluntary compliance and good practices across all the sectors we regulate. For example, we will continue to work with the Ministry of Education and NetSafe to enhance and develop new initiatives and education resources for children to promote safety when using the Internet. Using a range of media, we will continue to engage communities in civil defence and emergency management activities, helping them to understand the risks and how to be prepared for emergencies. Through the mass media campaign ‘Get Ready, Get Thru’ and the school programme ‘What’s the Plan, Stan?’ we will continue to raise public awareness of hazards and the importance of preparedness.
Ensure compliance
We undertake a range of activities to encourage and enforce compliance to ensure communities are protected. The activities range from engagement with those operating according to legislative frameworks (or those being regulated) to ensure requirements are clear, reasonable and able to be met – through to an intelligence-led and targeted enforcement process. We will continue to play a key role in ensuring that the sectors we regulate are supported to behave responsibly and that regulation the Department undertakes is fair and effective.
The key priority in this area over the next three years is to develop gambling compliance initiatives to maximise the percentage of gambling machine money returned to authorised purposes and improve integrity in funding practices. We will continue with a range of initiatives under this umbrella that include implementing a leniency policy and continuing to focus on casino-related crime prevention.
We will continue to manage an information technology change project to implement a new gambling licensing and compliance system in 2010/11. The new system will enhance operational efficiency and effectiveness, including information gathering to support measurement of the Department’s contribution to our outcomes. We will also begin reviewing the third party fees to ensure there is a continued sustainable basis for funding our gambling compliance activity in 2010/11.
We will continue to develop software applications to ensure investigation and enforcement in the censorship area remain effective against offenders’ ever-evolving methods of evading detection. This includes the implementation of website filtering to assist in preventing people from gaining access to websites that contain images of child sexual abuse.
We will also continue to invest in new security features for identity documentation. This is in response to the increasing criminal interest in the production of fraudulent identity documents to help facilitate other types of crime.
Build resilience
We generate greater degrees of resilience in communities by supporting individuals, families, businesses and communities to improve their readiness and preparedness for emergencies. We will continue to support the development of Civil Defence and Emergency Management (CDEM) sector capability through the provision of national guidance and leadership. A key enhancement of national capabilities will be the rollout of the Emergency Management Information System across CDEM Groups and territorial authorities by mid-2010. In October 2010, we will also lead the national CDEM exercise ‘Tangaroa’ to test the response to a tsunami.
We will seek to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the fire sector by considering options to address issues such as those relating to fire service governance, fragmentation of rural fire services, and fire service levy inequities.
Significant gains will be made by the Department in supporting the National Rural Fire Authority’s strategy to encourage the voluntary amalgamation of rural fire authorities into regional groups, allowing for improvements in resource allocation and capability.
Our outputs and activities
In addition to the above contributions, we will continue to deliver the following services:
- Advice to stakeholders
- Education, information and research
- Monitoring risks
- Licensing of gambling operators
- Investigations and enforcement of the law (gambling, censorship, unsolicited electronic messages)
- Auditing, monitoring and evaluating
- Ensuring New Zealand compliance with international agreements and arrangements
- Monitoring of Crown entities
- Participation in international crime prevention and enforcement initiatives
- Policy advice.
The services are funded through the following outputs:
| Vote | Outputs |
|---|---|
Internal Affairs |
|
Emergency Management |
|
Racing |
|
Further detail of the Department’s outputs can be found in the Information Supporting the Estimates for 2010/11.
How we will measure success
The main measures and standards to assess our progress towards achieving the impacts and outcomes are identified below. The impact measures seek to describe the intended effect of our specific activities. The outcome measures describe what we seek to achieve at a high level. The standards described for the outcomes are intended as a general guide and cannot be solely attributable to the Department’s work. The results are subject to a wide range of influences and will be carefully analysed to inform decision making on our future interventions.
| Outcome measure | Context and desired standard |
|---|---|
Percentage of people who experience negative impacts related to:
|
Gambling: 2006/07: 16% Spam: 2007/08: 76% Communities are safer when people experience fewer negative impacts of gambling, the Internet, and published material. This measure provides a proxy for overall progress towards our safer communities outcome. It considers the extent to which people have been unable to pay bills due to spending too much on gambling, received spam messages, or experienced a virus. Over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve on the latest results identified above. Source: Health Sponsorship Council Gaming and Betting Activities Survey; World Internet Project New Zealand |
Percentage of people indicating they know how to influence the development of relevant rules or policy:
|
Gambling: 2006/07: 19% This measure provides an indication that people are engaged and contributing towards making communities safe, measuring the percentage of people that write to their territorial authority to influence gambling policy. It particularly helps demonstrate progress towards our intermediate outcome, ‘Communities are engaged’. Over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve on the latest results identified above. Source: Health Sponsorship Council Gaming and Betting Activities Survey |
Percentage of the population that is aware of the hazards and risks in New Zealand in the Department’s areas of expertise:
|
Gambling: 2006/07: 61% Communities are safer when people are aware of and understand the range of harms and hazards associated with their environment, life and activities. This indicator measures the percentage of people who could think of consequences of gambling for the wider community. Over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve on the latest results identified above. Source: Health Sponsorship Council Gaming and Betting Activities Survey |
Percentage of people who are prepared at home, work or both for:
|
Gambling: 2006/07: 73% Spam: 2007/08: 75.6% Civil defence emergencies: 2008/09: 10% This measure provides an indication that communities are prepared and, consequently, protected in regard to our areas of expertise. Through various sources, we are able to identify the percentage of people who are aware of ways to avoid problem gambling, have appropriate security measures against spam and viruses in place, and have supplies to withstand a civil defence or emergency management disaster. Over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve on the latest results identified above. Source: Health Sponsorship Council Gaming and Betting Activities Survey; World Internet Project New Zealand; CDEM Annual Survey |
Average score for capability to achieve the National Civil Defence Emergency Management (CDEM) Strategy goals |
This is a new measure that will provide a proxy for assessing our progress towards our intermediate outcome of resilient communities. The Department has developed a Capability Assessment Tool to enable any agency or CDEM Group to evaluate their own capability, and will support a periodic national assessment to document and review New Zealand’s collective CDEM capability. This assessment tool follows international examples from the United Kingdom and the United States in aiming to create a standard assessment of emergency management capability for New Zealand. We will identify a baseline in 2010/11 and, over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve on these results identified. Source: CDEM Capability Assessment Tool |
| Impact measure | Context and desired standard |
|---|---|
Percentage of people taking part in decision making in their communities:
|
Gambling: 2006/07: 9% This measure provides an indication of the Department’s impact on promoting participation in decision making for its areas of regulation. It measures the percentage of people who write to their territorial authority to influence gambling policy. Over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve on the latest results identified above. Source: Health Sponsorship Council Gaming and Betting Activities Survey |
Number of detected breaches related to the Department’s areas of regulatory expertise:
|
Gambling: 2007/08: 397 2008/09: 269 Spam: 2008/09: 637 Restricted and objectionable material: 2007/08: 46 2008/09: 49 This measure provides an indication of our impact on whether regulated sectors are behaving responsibly. The number of detected breaches may vary based on the operating environment and the Department’s approach to investigation. However, over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve on the latest results identified above. Source: DIA data |
Percentage of stakeholders believing the Department is an effective regulator:
| Gambling: 2008/09: 71% This measure provides an indication that the Department is helping to increase cooperation and compliance with legislation and that regulation is fair and effective. Over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve on the latest results identified above. Source: DIA annual stakeholder survey |
Percentage of people believing gambling does more good than harm |
2007/08: 29% This measure provides a proxy for the Department’s impact to ensure that social harm and crime are minimised in the gambling area. Over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve on the latest results identified above. Source: Health Sponsorship Council Gaming and Betting Activities Survey |
Percentage of the public who consider it ‘very important’ to be prepared for civil defence emergencies |
This is a new measure that will commence from 2010/11. This measure demonstrates the effectiveness of the Department’s work on education and awareness for civil defence and emergency management activities, and provides a proxy for determining our impact towards helping communities be prepared and self-sufficient. Following the first survey, a desired standard will be developed and, over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve these results. Source: DIA annual survey |
Percentage of stakeholders in CDEM Groups who consider specific guidelines, codes and technical standards from MCDEM have supported the development of their capability |
This is a new measure that will commence from 2010/11. This measure will help us determine the impact of our work to develop sector capability. Following the first survey, a desired standard will be developed and, over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve these results. Source: DIA annual survey |
Percentage of stakeholders who consider that guidance from MCDEM (publications, advice, collaboration) has supported the enhancement of their organisation’s capability in the civil defence emergency management area |
This is a new measure that will commence from 2010/11. This measure will help us determine the impact of our work to develop sector capability. Following the first survey, a desired standard will be developed and, over the medium to long term, we will seek to maintain or improve these results. Source: DIA annual survey |