No one could fault the Government’s effort to support Christchurch terrorist attack victims, Jacinda Ardern said today as she defended the care available for survivors.
With some victims saying support promised to them by the Prime Minister was not there, Ardern maintained the Government has always cared.
“Even though it has been two years, when families have said, 'You can do better,' we have tried to do better,” she told Breakfast on the second anniversary of the attack.
“I don’t think anyone for a moment would fault us for the effort that was put in. It may be that they don’t agree with the decisions we’ve made and that is everyone’s prerogative.
“I can tell you there has always been a huge amount of energy trying to make sure we were doing, always, the right thing by people. Even where we may have been seen to fail or not satisfy people, the intent has always been there.”
Ten of the 23 ACC claims for mental injury as a result of the attack were by people who did not suffer physical injuries, meaning they weren’t eligible for cover.
“That’s a very specific group who weren’t injured but were witnesses who aren’t eligible for income replacement,” Ardern said.
“They are, of course, still eligible for support through our health system. Of course, they're still eligible for support through our benefit system.”
The Prime Minister said there is hesitancy to overhaul the ACC system to allow for large one-off payments to survivors.
“Our system is special in that we have ACC, but also for others, we have extended the eligibility of welfare systems so it can provide support too. That means we don’t have a form of bulk payment compensation because we have the loss of earnings replacement through ACC,” she said.
“If we were to change that, we change it for everyone. Those are things that, of course, have always been on our minds. Yes, we want to make sure that support is there and ACC is very special in that it does that.
“Of course, it would be a very substantial change to make to ACC.”
Ardern said existing support for around 200 survivors and families has been streamlined with the involvement of multiple agencies, including mental health services.
“Of course, we know that there was specific huge trauma by those who were witnesses even if they didn’t bear the physical scars,” Ardern said.
“Additional support went into making sure that our mental health services in the region were able to provide that. On top of that, we had, of course, individual case management for families, we’ve realised now that we need to intensify that even further.
“We have bought in, collectively, groups that are able to work out of MSD [Ministry of Social Development] to provide intensive case management, which we are doing for about 200 individuals and families.
“By bringing in extra agencies to support that, we hope we can also provide support for things that aren’t just about mental health. In some cases, families are saying, 'We want help with work brokers, we want help with immigration issues, we want further help with ACC,' so we’ve bought that group together so not just dealing with MSD.
“Getting all the Government agencies in one place at one time — they have drop-ins, they have a dedicated phone line, individual case managers.”
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