Calls for greater transparency around Emergency Housing Special Needs Grant

Thursday, 2 February 2017

Bing's Motel, in Blenheim, where some families have been staying on the Emergency Housing Special Needs Grant.

Motel rooms across the country are doubling as emergency accommodation, but it is unclear if the Government has a handle on where the need is greatest.

The Ministry of Social Development distributes and collects information about the Emergency Housing Special Needs Grant, but has never released a regional breakdown.

Social Housing Minister Amy Adams said the ministry collected regional information to track the need for emergency housing 'in great detail', however a ministry spokesman said last week such detailed information was not available.

'We can't break down the grant numbers regionally at this time,' he said.

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When approached for comment on Thursday, however, the ministry had seemingly changed its position without actually providing any figures.

'We are now able to capture a greater level of detail around emergency housing grants, allowing us to track and report demand for emergency housing assistance, including at a Work and Income region level,' he said.

The spokesman said regional breakdowns were not part of the ministry's standard reporting, which critics claim shows the Government is not adequately monitoring the situation.

Labour social development spokesperson Carmel Sepuloni questioned how the Government could make decisions about where to direct resources if it did not have regional records readily available.

'They continue to deny the public of any relevant information that might support the evidence we do have, that the housing crisis is real and that it is spreading across the country,' she said.

'The public expect the Government to make evidence-based decisions when allocating resourcing but that clearly isn't happening when it comes to housing because the Government isn't collecting relevant information.'

Sepuloni said she requested information from the ministry through the parliamentary questions process, but was told it was held on individual files and would be too time-consuming to compile.

'A starting point for the National Government would be in the very least, collecting the data for each region and reporting on it so there is transparency with respect to the emergency housing issue and the real need can be assessed and addressed,' she said.

The grant, which became available in July last year, allowed people to stay in commercial accommodation, such as motels, for up to a week if they were struggling to find housing.

In Marlborough, there have been reports of up to 10 families at a time staying in a single motel.

The ministry started recording nationwide data about the grant last October for the December quarter, which showed a total of 8860 grants had been issued, totaling around $7.7 million.

Adams said it was her understanding the ministry had information about the emergency grants on a regional basis, something she said was used to inform, report and track emergency housing demand.

'Not all information the Government holds is proactively released all the time, but is generally available under the Official Information Act,' she said.

'While it's my expectation that MSD give information as much as possible, I can appreciate that they've been focused on providing grants and assistance to those that need them.'

*An OIA request has been filed with the ministry requesting a regional breakdown.