Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Mark Mitchell: Sport and Police Minister on the $8 million funding injection for youth intervention through sport

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Mark Mitchell: Sport and Police Minister on the $8 million funding injection for youth intervention through sport · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: The Sports Minister wants to use sport to stop you
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: th re offending. He's putting eight million towards a community
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: program which would see at risk youth put into sport
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: and physical activity. Mark Mitchell is a sports minister and
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: the police Minister, and he joins me now, thanks so
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: much for your time this morning.
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: Mark, Good morning, Good morning Francisca and May You're welcome.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: Is it because you are both sports minister and police
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: minister you can see this connection between young people and
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: the need for sport.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I've always been a huge believer. Even
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: when I had my own placing career, I was heavily
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: involved in Blue Light and I can just see what
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: a positive impact sport has on young people. And of
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: course a lot of the our youth offenders missing out.
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: They haven't got access to sport or recreation for whatever reason.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: And so I saw a big opportunity when I became sports,
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: a sport and rec Minister to put some money into
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: trying to reach those kids and get them into sport
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: newsatus a way of get them on the right path.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Mark, who is this for? Is it for less at
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  Speaker 1: risk kids than those that might go to boot camp?
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: Yes, it is, but it's the whole range. It's a
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  Speaker 2: whole range of kids. So this is even funding a
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: program inside our youth justice facilities to actually get our
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  Speaker 2: kids active, get them involved in sport, get good role
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  Speaker 2: models and mentors around them, get them learning how to
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  Speaker 2: work as a team. There's no downside, it's just all
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: positive upside if you get kids and engaged in sport
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  Speaker 2: and get them physically active.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: Does sound a little bit more fun than a boot camp?
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah? Well, the youth Military academies were designed around the LESV,
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  Speaker 2: which involves a lot of physical activity. And the funny
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: thing is the first youth military camp that we actually
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: delivered through oron a tamariki, the kids on that were
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: asking for more of it. They wanted to get out
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  Speaker 2: and do more team building, they wanted to get out
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  Speaker 2: and do more physical exercise. So it just goes to
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: show that we know what a positive impact it does
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  Speaker 2: have on them.
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: Are there already programs like this in action? Are they
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: seeing good results and that's why you want to back them?
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah? Totally. So that's exactly what we've done. As we're
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: identifying trusted community organizations that have got approving capability with
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  Speaker 2: strong local connections and we're using we're funding them and
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  Speaker 2: I've visited one of them yesterday in so I thought
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  Speaker 2: they're doing an outstanding job. We're getting great results. And
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  Speaker 2: those are the sort of organizations that we're funding around
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: the country. Champions Initiative, Billy Graham with Boxing, Blue Light,
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: the Rise Program, you know, Live for More and Tower
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: on It. So programs that are really that have been
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: around for while can deliver results. We're giving them additional
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: funding so they can get reach more kids.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: So what does success look like? Is it as simple
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: as we're keeping them out of the justice system.
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's I mean, that's the Obviously, we had a
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  Speaker 2: target when we came in the government to reduce youth
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  Speaker 2: foland offending by fifteen percent by twenty thirty. We're well
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: on track to achieve that. We don't want our kids
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: to go into the youth justice system because often that's
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: a fast track into the adult system. So I just
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  Speaker 2: want to get the best role models and mentors we
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  Speaker 2: can around them, get them engaged. Sports sport can be
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: can transform lives, and we want to show that we
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: believe in them and that we want to invest in them,
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: and that we want to as young people. We want
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  Speaker 2: them to embrace all the opportunities that our country has
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  Speaker 2: instead of making bad decisions and ending up in the
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: youth justice system.
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: So if this is successful, could you put more money
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: into it in the future.
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: Yes, I've got eight million dollars put towards it now.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: Two point two million has already gone out with these
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  Speaker 2: five programs, and yes, I'd like to put more money
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: towards it absolutely.
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: Now, look one I've got you can I just quickly
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: talk to you about Mina Pacifica. Would you support it
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: being brought by a private group if it meant that
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: moved to Hawaii?
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, at the end of the day, I'd
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: love to see more one in Pacifica continue as a
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: Pacific based franchise. But the reality of it is, we'd
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: already put five million dollars of tax PAS money into it.
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: There's two point seven of that we're probably going to
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  Speaker 2: have to write off and I'm waiting for advice back
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  Speaker 2: from Sport and REEF in terms of whether we can
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  Speaker 2: recover that. We're probably too far down the list in
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  Speaker 2: terms of creditors. But but I just I don't support
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: putting more TEXTPAS money into it. If there's a private
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  Speaker 2: option that can come forward to forward to support and
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  Speaker 2: own a professional franchise supporting franchise, that would be great.
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  Speaker 2: I just don't think it's the right use of TEXTPAS
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  Speaker 2: money at the moment.
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  Speaker 1: Make Mitchell, thank you very much for your time this morning.
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: Appreciate it.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live
• 4:25
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• 4:28
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