This report was a collaboration between the Office of the Children’s Commissioner and Oranga Tamariki—Ministry for Children, supported by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.

WHAT MAKES
A GOOD LIFE FOR
DISABLED CHILDREN
AND YOUNG PEOPLE?
A summary report in the What Makes a Good
Life?: Children and Young People’s views on
wellbeing series. Published by the Office of the
Children’s Commissioner, September 2021.
Read the full What Makes a Good Life?
report on our website
In October and November 2018, the Office
of the Children’s Commissioner’s Mai World
team and the Oranga Tamariki Voices of
Children and Young People team, engaged
with more than 6,000 children and young
people, for the What Makes a Good Life?
report. In total, 423 children and young
people were engaged face-to-face and
5,631 participated via a survey run through
schools, community groups and available
publicly online.
As part of What Makes a Good Life? we heard from
474 disabled children and young people about how
they envisage a good life, and the barriers they face in
experiencing this. A total of 23 disabled children and
young people were interviewed face-to-face and 451 via
the online survey. We also heard from the whānau of one
disabled young person as the young person themselves
was non-verbal, but present for the conversation.
We mainly heard from disabled young people aged
14-19 and some children aged between 9 and 13.1 These
children and young people were from Wellington, the
Hutt Valley, Christchurch, and Dunedin. The ethnicities of
those we spoke to included Māori, Indian and Pākehā/
New Zealand European.
This summary report presents some of the key messages
we heard from disabled children and young people.
It is important to note however, that this report is not
representative of disability communities as the young
people participated as a part of the wider engagement.
What Makes a Good Life? informed the Child and Youth
Wellbeing Strategy, released August 2019. We hope this
summary report can inform people’s understandings of
what disabled children and young people experience and
that this understanding is reflected in the development of
policy, practice and service delivery. (From the report). Record #7307