Newshub can reveal more than $10 million has been committed to a media campaign aimed at fostering "safe, positive, and equal relationships", including helping Kiwis deal with break-ups.
It includes money already spent since work developing the campaign began in 2019 as well as money forecast for the campaign over the coming financial year. The vast majority - about $7.5 million - has been committed to or paid to advertising agency Clemenger BBDO.
The Love Better campaign, which began under the previous Government, is intended to have multiple phases. The first phase that has been rolled out is about handling break-ups and asking young people to "own the feels". This is focused on helping young Kiwis safely navigate the consequences of relationships ending by learning from and inspiring others.
The Ministry of Social Development (MSD) said a youth forum gave "extremely positive" feedback to the campaign, with people feeling "less alone" and "vindicated" after seeing the campaign. They also "love the diversity coming through", the ministry said.
But Louise Upston, who became the Minister for Social Development last month, wouldn't give a verdict on it.
Asked whether she supported the campaign and believed the expenditure was appropriate, Upston told Newshub: "In the lead up to next year's Budget, the Government will be reviewing a range of programmes to ensure they are delivering value for money."
"I expect the Love Better youth campaign to receive scrutiny as part of that process, including an assessment of whether the campaign is driving better outcomes."
The Love Better campaign was launched by the previous associate Social Development Minister Priyanca Radhakrishnan in March, describing it as a world-leading family harm prevention campaign that would support young people through break-ups to make a positive impact on how they approach future relationships.
A social media video shared at the time used to hashtag "#ownthefeels" and said the campaign was a "community of the freshly broken-up helping the freshly broken-up to keep a little hurt from becoming a lotta hurt".
The then-minister's statement said $6.4 million had been allocated over three years through previous funding announcements.
An Official Information Act (OIA) response to questions from Newshub about the cost of the campaign shows that as of October 31, $10,492,536 had been committed to the campaign since development started in 2019. That includes current and forecast expenditure until 2024/25.
That money comes from two Budgets. In 2019, the Government invested $30.75 million over four years into three ministry-funded initiatives for family violence prevention work, with $7.25 million allocated to the Campaign for Action on Family Violence. A portion of that funding was then allocated to Love Better.
In 2022, a further $37.625 million was given to family violence prevention initiatives over three years, with $9.51 million of that given to approaches for young people.
A breakdown of the expenditure shows the costs rising over the past five years, hitting $3.9 million in the 2023/24 year, with $2.3 million of that going to Clemenger BBDO. In the 2024/25 year, $2.3 million has been forecast, but more could be spent than that.
The spend on Clemenger BBDO includes the development of the brand, logos, imagery, supporting material and all advertising and promotion. The agency managed work by secondary media partners on the production of material for social media channels, podcasts, and segments on radio and television.
This included a $1 million partnership with Canadian-American culture media group VICE on video production, assets, TikTok channel creation and talent acquisition. Hundreds of thousands of dollars was also given to the Shit You Should Care About (SYSCA) group, MediaWorks and TVNZ.
The overall spend also includes $120,000 each year between 2022/23 and 2024/25 on FTEs. Work is undertaken by people in a range of roles, MSD said.
Newshub also asked about what assessments had been done on the effectiveness of the campaign.
So far, $1.25 million has been spent on or forecast for research and evaluation, including with an external agency Kantar Public. Feedback will be sought through a youth forum, online surveys and other testing, the ministry said.
"Our top-line findings from the first youth forum were extremely positive. Kantar spoke with 61 participants with a good spread of geography, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation and gender identity," MSD said.
The ministry said the campaign had been "well received and is well liked and appreciated by young people" from different genders, ethnicities and orientations.
Responses to the campaign fell into five categories:
- When I saw this, I felt less alone
- I feel vindicated
- Through seeing content, I realise how bad my relationship really was
- The problem was me. I realise now that what I did was wrong
- My breakup was fine
The ministry also provided a breakdown of engagement with the video content, primarily on TikTok and Meta. It showed 36.6 million total impressions across all platforms, 7.1 million engagements and more than 8000 followers. There were nearly 240,000 views of VICE's articles, more than 100,000 listens to SYSCA's podcast, and more than 9000 views of Mai FM's article that went live in September.
