The Auditor-general, Lyn Provost, said, in her report, millions of dollars allocated to help vulnerable families could have been better spent on people rather than administration.
The mainly critical report on the first four years of the flagship Whanau Ora policy was fodder for Labour and New Zealand First leader Winston Peters, with Mr Peters a long-time critic of the policy which the National-led Government adopted as part of its support deal with the Maori Party.
Ever since former National Party leader Don Brash stirred up racial controversy, notably after a speech to the Orewa Rotary Club in 2004, New Zealand has been on edge around programmes specifically aimed at ethnic groups.
Finance Minister Bill English has been at pains to talk about the difficulties in implementing such a radical change to the delivery of social services.
Whanau Ora is designed as a way of helping families help themselves through collective effort and the use of wrap-around social services.
It challenges the traditional bureaucratic method of helping individuals rather than the wider family.
Ms Provost's report does show, however, that when Whanau Ora works, it works well. Many whanau have learned new skills, retained young people in traditional areas to work on ancestral lands and brought young people and their families home.
What cannot be escaped are the instances where Whanau Ora has been lapse.
About a third of the nearly $140 million spent on the programme was eaten up in administration.
The Government defended the spending because the programme was new and different.
The existing Maori agency Te Puni Kokiri is the administrator of the programme and chief executive Michelle Hippolite says no funding has been misused.
Tribal development company Ngati Whatua Orakei Whai Maia chief executive Tupara Morrison says Whanau Ora has made a huge impact within its whanau and had allowed it to give people more knowledge and support.
What it does in a whanau way is saying ''you can actually make these choices, now we can help you, point you in those directions''.
Sometimes it can be scary for people just going into a government agency.
Mr Morrison said he had noticed more people becoming confident at managing and helping themselves and passing that on through their whanau.
Maori fill out many of the country's worst statistics, with the system being blamed for failing Maori in particular in education, health and and justice.
Despite Maori generally having access to all of the services the rest of New Zealand has, there is a genuine case for a better delivery of services.
Social Development Minister Anne Tolley has hit out at ''middle-aged, white, Pakeha men'' for their criticism of Whanau Ora, saying they do not understand the courage it took to establish the programme.
And that comes back to the lack of a coherent narrative which would have taken New Zealand along with the programme.
Former minister Dame Tariana Turia shrugged off any calls for a better explanation of the policy, despite much of the funding being directed into her electorate.
And now current Whanau Ora and Maori Affairs Minister Te Ururoa Flavell has been prevaricating in recent days about the internal workings of the under-scrutiny programme.
Mr Flavell needs to showcase some success stories from the programme and prove to doubters it is working and can only improve.
Until he does, he will be open to calls from Labour and NZ First the programme is a politically motivated scheme squandering public money.
There is no suggestion of Whanau Ora closing and Ms Provost says it would be a real loss for New Zealand for closure to occur.
Maori disadvantage is a drag on the New Zealand economy and a source of many social ills.
A reformed Whanau Ora can help solve those problems.
