Navigate Initiative
October 6, 2026
October 2026
Money Talks
Cash is on its way out.
Most payments are a tap of a card or a phone now, and at some banks, putting notes into your account means booking an appointment first. For a man who went to prison when cash was king, the money world waiting outside takes some catching up.
Some of the Tū Ora in the Navigate unit will meet it with money of their own. An ACC payout, an inheritance, a sum that built up while they were away. Reece, who works in reintegration support in the unit, has seen what can happen when a lump sum arrives without a plan. "I've seen it with my own eyes. People get out to a decent sum of money and it's gone quickly. Six months later they're back inside."
So the unit started Money Talks. Every fortnight a volunteer who works in finance comes in to talk money with the men. She was already a familiar face after years helping with the writers' group, and the sessions run on what the men ask for. After one session they wanted to know about credit ratings, so the next covered how a rating works and how to check yours for free. They have asked about banking. They have asked about trusts, because some of the men are estranged from whānau but still want to put money aside for their kids.
Reece shares his own experience in the sessions, so the men hear what a credit rating can do from someone standing in front of them. "Since I changed my life around and got a credit rating, I'm being offered credit cards and home loans. It's crazy. And it's all just come from paying my bills, paying my power, having bills in my own name."
More than half the unit came to the first session. Men who were out at work that day heard about it when they got back and wanted to know when she would next be in. The change Reece notices is on the horizon. Less talk about what a payout could buy in the first week out. More about a long-term money future, and what it takes to still have something six months on.
None of it is complicated. A bill in your own name, paid on time. A credit check that costs nothing. The men are learning it now, before release, so that when the choices are theirs again, they are ready for them.
Names have been changed.
