Taken in by the Sallies, that child grew up to become Alf Roberts, father of Major Campbell Roberts.

"His parenting was really done by the Salvation Army," Campbell Roberts says, sitting at the desk in his South Auckland office.

His dad wasn't the only one supported by the Sallies.

Before his mother met Alf, she too had turned to the organisation for help.

She "became an unmarried mother, and went to a Salvation Army hospital in Dunedin, and had her baby, and the baby (girl) was adopted out.

"Both sides of my family were assisted by the Salvation Army in one way or another, so it's part of my heritage and parentage, really."

Roberts has spent the better part of his life fighting injustice in New Zealand.

He was the founding director of the Salvation Army's social policy and parliamentary unit, and is a trusted voice advocating for those in need.

"I think as a society we often want to blame people because they're poor," he says.

"I always find it really difficult to sit down in our reception room and talk to some of these families, and see the difficulties they go through."

Roberts himself did not have a privileged upbringing.

"My father was a carpenter, and my mother was a seamstress in a shirt factory, so they came from fairly humble beginnings," he says.

"But I was fortunate to have a happy childhood with two sisters, and it was a very loving family."

Roberts was born in February 1947 in Arrowtown, Central Otago.

After stints in Invercargill and Hamilton, the family ended up in Christchurch, where Roberts left school and began working in accounting for a grocery wholesale company in the mid-1960s.

"But within me," he says, "there had always been that desire to do something greater than just make money."

By the age of about 20, he was drawn to the Salvation Army training college in Wellington. Continue reading

Sources

• Stuff article by Craig Hoyle, a Senior Reporter with Fairfax NZ
• Image: TVNZ

Major Campbell Roberts, the Salvation Army's director of social policy, described new rules that would take applicants off the waiting list for three months if they decline a property as "harsh".

Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett confirmed the change in policy on Thursday saying some people were being "unrealistically picky" when offered a place to live.

But Major Roberts told Radio NZ the tightening of unreasonable rejections of homes would do nothing to solve the problem. Continue reading

Through reference to social and economic data the Report identifies significant positive progress in areas of pre-school education and crime and punishment. It also demonstrates how little has been achieved over the past five years in at least three areas of serious social need: housing, child poverty and youth employment.

Salvation Army spokesman Major Campbell Roberts said over the past five years, Auckland had built up a housing deficit of more than 16,000 dwellings. Child poverty has been hovering around 21 percent. Youth employment has fallen to its lowest level in more than 10 years.

"If our children came home with a 'D' from school, most of us would have a vigorous plan of action to turn it around. That same vigour is needed from our political and Government agency leaders."

Roberts said we needed to stop saying, "She'll be Right" and start saying, "It's not alright" when it came to these issues.

Sometimes it seems that as a nation we're taking a "she'll be right" attitude to policy,' says Major Roberts. 'This results in people living in situations of unnecessary hardship.'

Report Card

• Teenage pregnancy A
• Early childhood education B
• Infant mortality B
• Housing related debt C+
• Drug related crime C+
• Wages and incomes C+
• Children at risk C+
• Benefits and pensions C
• Living costs and food poverty C
• Alcohol C Gambling C
• Housing affordability C-
• Children and violence D
• Educational achievement D
• Child poverty D
• Employment and unemployment D
• Housing availability D

Source

• The Salvation Army
• The New Zealand Herald
• Image: Eparcha.org

It made its apology in a joint release distributed by Rainbow Wellington and the Salvation Army.

Both organisations say they want a better cooperative future.

Tony Simpson, chair of the Wellington-based Rainbow Wellington and Campbell Roberts, head of the Army's Social Policy and Parliamentary Unit, were both involved in drafting the position statements of their respective groups.

Continue reading

Problem drinking is a major contributor to crime and a significant cause of public disorder and health problems in communities and the Alcohol Reform Bill will address these problems by empowering local communities to determine where and how alcohol is sold, increase personal and parental responsibility for the supply of alcohol, and introduce a risk-based licence fee regime, Collins said.

However The Salvation army believes the updated Alcohol Reform Bill does little more than pay lip service to a problem that is wrecking lives and haemorrhaging billions of tax dollars.

"The Government appears to expect its citizens to continue to meet the exorbitant social and fiscal costs of abuse by declining to provide robust legislation to mitigate the damage", Salvation Army social policy spokesman Major Campbell Roberts says.

"There is little evidence the Government wants to address the real problem driving the heavy culture so damaging to society, and this is deeply worrying," he says.

"The Salvation Army's deep and long-held concerns over how alcohol is sold and consumed comes from its close relationship with those most badly affected by the misuse of alcohol".

Director of the National Addiction Centre Doug Sellman says the Alcohol Reform Bill is "too timid".

"It is worse than weak, the new bill is shocking," he said.

"It is inexcusable that the government is too timid and too captured by the big alcohol-related businesses to tackle the real problem driving the heavy drinking culture in New Zealand - the vested interests of a powerful alcohol industry which will continue to enjoy relatively unregulated free market conditions to push their drug products at New Zealanders."

Source

• Media from Salvation Army
• Media from the Minister of Justice
• Stuff.co.nz
• Image: The Healthy Teenager