Acknowledgements
The Families Commission was established under the Families Commission Act 2003 and commenced operations on 1 July 2004. Under the Crown Entities Act 2004, the Commission is designated as an autonomous Crown entity.
The main role of the Families Commission is to act as an advocate for the interests of families generally (rather than individual families).
The Families Commission’s specific functions under the Families Commission Act 2003 are to:
- encourage informed debate about families
- increase public awareness and promote better understanding of matters affecting families
- encourage and facilitate the development and provision of government policies that promote and serve the interests of families
- consider any matter relating to the interests of families referred to us by any Minister of the Crown
- stimulate and promote research into families, for example by funding and undertaking research.
Jaimie and Anne would like to acknowledge the valuable comments from those who reviewed the report at various stages: Adolf Stroombergen, Infometrics; Roger Hurnard; Fiona Alpass, Massey University; Grant Scobie, The Treasury; Karen Wong, Helen Moore, Michelle Poland, Tracey Davies and Ruth Richards, and Commissioner David Smyth, Families Commission; David Feslier, Retirement Commission.
The Commissions are also extremely grateful for the SoFIE data tables provided by Katy Henderson, The Treasury.
Disclaimers
Access to the data used in this study was provided by Statistics New Zealand under conditions designed to give effect to the security and confidentiality provisions of the Statistics Act 1975.The results presented in this study are the work of the authors, not Statistics New Zealand or The Treasury.