These are tough times for #YouthWorkers in NZ right now - I just had to cancel another training workshop due to low ticket sales (and we have one of the best, and most respected, trainers in the industry).

Due mostly to massive funding cuts across the charitable & non-profit sector organisations can't afford to invest in PD at the moment, and that means less-qualified staff, who feel less valued, and who we know from internal research are paid well below other sectors.

Every week, another charity providing critical social work with at-risk populations goes under - even while funding for prisons is increased.

It reminds me that, actually, we have *all* of the answers we need to solve social problems - and the people to do it - but we do not have the will.

For some, it seems, charities must eternally exist as part of a moral eco-system where poor & vulnerable people must also eternally exist, along with 'baddies' that do crime. "That's just the way the world is" they will say, smiling, as they dispense Weetbix and budgeting advice with a patronising smile.

It's all rubbish. We made this world, and we can choose to make it different. The people I work with daily show-up and change people's lives for the better. They get shit pay and no respect, but they do it anyway. They have hope for the young people they work with. They foster that hope in these rangatahi. It is infectious. It is crucial. And I wish we had that same hope and aspiration for our society as a whole.

As it stands we are most definitely not #Sorted.