Transcript
DR TAUTAI KAITU'U: We have to make sure that this bill comes through to help these families that are having difficulties with the children and the - bringing up the children. Those sorts of things. So it's not the majority of Solomon Islands society.
DON WISEMAN: You can't walk away from this foreign influence now, can you. It is going to become more and more significant. It's inevitable, don't you think?
TK: Yes, yes
DW: So the bill itself what is it you are going to do, in terms of the help you are going to provide for these families?
TK: I support the bill wholeheartedly and the government will pass this bill. One of the things that's in the bill is, the Social Welfare Division here, it's been working, helping families and children but there is no bill or legal framework that guides their work, so now this is what the bill counts in. We are going to give the powers to the Welfare Division officers to assist, to assist families who have difficulties or their children have difficulties at home.
DW: And these sorts of things exist in countries like Australia and New Zealand, and various other places as well, but how do you think traditional Solomon Islands families react to someone who is not family taking such a key role in the management of the family.
TK: When they did the provincial or the villages' consultations the majority of them supported the bill to assist these people to come and assist in difficult cases where children are supposedly abused or neglected - that sort of thing. So the majority of them support this because it takes into account that we must use the cultural custom, positive ways to always use that as well. So the majority of Solomon Islanders support the bill.
DW: So you will have what in New Zealand we would call social workers. How many of those do you imagine are going to be needed in Solomon Islands.
TK: That's the other thing we don't have the capacity, we don't have a big unit. But we are looking at when the bill is passed we will looking at increasing it [staff numbers]. That is one of things we are looking at - increasing the capacity of the Division to assist more families that need help.
