Le Va expands successful violence prevention programme

Published: February 27, 2024

Le Va’s senior manager – violence prevention, Paul Tupou-Vea, said the Atu-Mai team is motivated to provide violence prevention support not only for communities and families across Tāmaki Makaurau, but also for anchor partners around the country.

“We’re pleased to have the opportunity to lead this work in the primary prevention space. Sexual violence is an uncomfortable topic, but it has significant, ongoing impacts on our communities. We are looking forward to approaching this issue with rigour and respect,” he said.

Le Va recently met with ACC’s Prevention Partnerships Lead, Melanie Turner and Māori Community Mobilisation Lead, Anita Albert to further our discussions. General manager, Dr Elizabeth Mati, said the ACC meeting was insightful for the new direction, given Atu-Mai has been running since 2018.

“We are grateful to ACC for supporting our previous Atu-Mai programme, allowing us to support our Pasifika communities to find their own solutions to stop violence before it happens.”

This approach is evident in Atu-Mai’s child sexual abuse prevention work, which resulted in 74 people taking part in nine focus groups to engage in a year-long consultation about issues and potential solutions to preventing abuse in our communities.

Le Va chief executive, Denise Kingi-‘Ulu’ave, says there is still more work to be done in violence prevention. She said, “Sexual violence against children is a taboo subject in many of our Pasifika communities. We want to ensure that all our children are safe and supported to live free from abuse and we urge the government to have the courage to address this issue head on.”

Hon Karen Chhour, the new Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence and Sexual Violence, also visited Le Va in February. She shared some of her views about the sector with the Atu-Mai team and outlined her priorities.

“I want to focus on core priorities we can work on as a sector, and I’m looking at prevention, critical care, disability and mental health,” said the Minister.