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.

The Commission would like to thank Mary Richardson, JHI Consulting Ltd. for preparing this report.

Mary Richardson would like to thank Francis Luketina, Families Commission; Claire Freeman, Associate Professor, Department of Geology, Otago University; and Julie Macdonald, for comments on drafts of this report.

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.