A lawyer is calling for a state care system overhaul after an interim report of the Royal Commission into abuse in care yesterday revealed up to 250,000 people in state and faith-based care have been abused.
The report said most of those abused came from the most disadvantaged or marginalised segments of the community, particularly from whānau Māori and Pacific families, disabled people and women and girls.
"We took people from homes that were abusive or neglectful and we put them in places that were equally abusive or neglectful, or more abusive or neglectful," Amanda Hill of Cooper Legal this morning told TVNZ1's Breakfast.
"We shifted kids like cattle through so many placements, and there were people giving evidence to the Royal Commission who were still in care in the 2000s who were talking about being shifted around like cattle - 17 placements over a couple of years, that sort of thing.
"Absolutely injury upon injury."
Yesterday in releasing the report, Minister for Public Service Chris Hipkins said it was a deeply moving record of the state's past failings in looking after citizens in its care.
However, Hill said "it's still happening".
"There is a lot to do, let's be really clear about that, and one of the things has to be enormous structural change about how we care now and an enormous change in the way we respond to complaints of abuse, whether they are historic or current.
"We're not responding to complaints of abuse properly and we haven't for years."
Hill said there was a cycle of generational trauma which was not being broken.
"We need enormous change because nothing has worked - the tinkering with CYFS, the creation of Oranga Tamariki. The culture's stayed the same, the systems have stayed the same, the racism's stayed the same.
Hill said there was a need to "start again" from scratch.
Hill said people had scoffed at the idea of putting Māori children in the care of Māori, but "what have we got to lose?".
"Nothing we have done so far has worked so we've got to do it differently.
"Close the residences, they are places of abuse, and let's start again because we've had decades of tinkering."
In a rare appearance, Una Jagose admitted the Crown hasn’t always been survivor focused. (Source: Other)
SHARE ME