Relationships Aotearoa offended by Minister Tolley’s claims

Relationships Aotearoa (RA) is offended to discover Minister Tolley’s claims in Parliament yesterday following our meeting with her at 11.30am.

“The Minister made incorrect and offensive statements about RA’s funding of Earthquake services following the questions from Annette King in Parliament today,” said Cary Hayward, Principal Strategic Adviser Practice and Quality.

“On February 22nd 2011 we lost our base in the CTV building and a lot more. Despite being in crisis RA staff led the mobilisation of counsellors across New Zealand and within 12 hours we were ready to support Canterbury through its darkest days in recent history.”

“Funding provided in the form of “grants” were technically “one off”, but it is not true for the Minister to say that these were “top up” funding. They were not. The grants were used to fund service delivery in Christchurch.”

“We freely acknowledge that $9million is a significant sum of money – but, it must be noted that 30,000 people have accessed the service, and the funding arrangements have been in place since the first earthquakes in September 2010.”

Mr Hayward concluded, “We hope the Minister will choose her words more carefully in future. Clearly, the quality of her advice is questionable.”

ENDS

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