Katherine Rich MP National Party Social Services Spokeswoman

22 November 2004

CYF delay on phone pledge is unacceptable

"There is absolutely no excuse CYF can give that can explain away why it has not started recording telephone calls, some 12 months after pledging to do just that," says National's Social Services spokeswoman Katherine Rich.

"It has now been almost a year since Ailsa Duffy made this important recommendation after she identified disturbing failings in the handling of an abuse notification from Ron Burrows.

"The technology is available and it is being used by many other organisations. If the Government was serious about fixing the problem, it could have done so long before now.

"Ron Burrows is spot on when he says that children's lives depend on action sooner rather than later.

"Ever since CYF was assimilated by the Ministry of Social Development it has become an even slower moving bureaucratic elephant. "Today I'm appealing to CYF to pull out all the stops and get the recording equipment in place before Christmas, which is tragically always so busy," says Mrs Rich.

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