Read Getting Set for an Active Nation - Sport New Zealand

• The inclusion of sportspersons as ambassadors by The New Zealand Way, now
known as the Brand New Zealand campaign, initiated in 1993, illustrates the
Government’s awareness of the image held abroad of New Zealand’s sport
achievers.
Crime Prevention
An interdisciplinary programme, with physical activity as an integral component, can
lessen antisocial and potentially destructive behaviour in young people. The Australian
Institute of Criminology and Australian Institute of Sport have released a report that
supports the belief that recreation and sport, organised as a positive community
experience, can assist crime prevention.
It may be argued strongly that recreation and sport are particularly well placed in
providing programmes to combat the major risk factors for young offenders. The
Ministry of Youth Affairs has noted the following characteristics in youth offenders: a
lack of social skills and networks; a lack of motivation; poor school attendance, low
vocational skills and unemployment; substance abuse; and a lack of cultural pride or
positive culture identity. Intensive outdoors based and/or positive team sport
programmes could assist adolescents to overcome these negative traits. The
Department of Work and Income’s “Residential Motivational Training Programme” may
be an example of such a personally enhancing project through which recreation and
sport have an economic impact of savings and public good.
• “If it wasn’t for [my sport] I would have been in jail. The team became my family”
(provincial rugby player, in personal communication to a Taskforce member).
• “Sport and physical activity can combine with other interventions to reduce crime
in particular groups and communities. It appears that sport and physical activity
can reduce crime by providing accessible, appropriate activities in a supportive
social context. In other words, sport and physical activity must be connected
positively within the social fabric of groups and communities” (Cameron and
MacDougall, 2000, p.1).
• “We know that sport and physical activity can improve our quality of life. But this
report reveals just how it really can change people’s lives and society for the
better” (Dr Adam Graycar, Director of the Australian Institute of Criminology, in a 6
September 2000 media release).
• There is evidence that projects utilising the outdoor environment, as with
Conservation Corps and Youth Services Corps run by the Ministry of Youth Affairs
with unemployed youth, have a favourable outcome. Similarly, a combination of
outdoor activity and mentoring, as with Project K, a development programme for
14 year olds, can be effective (NZIER, 2000).
Ministerial Taskforce on Sport, Fitness & Leisure January 2001 page 44 of 153