'Appalling' family violence system made survivors question leaving abuse partners, new report shows

A new report has found responses to requests for help after leaving abusive partners made some women consider whether staying and tolerating the abuse would have been preferable.

The report, released on Thursday, examined five women's experiences with the system dealing with family violence between 2021 and 2024.

That included reviewing their agency records involving police, Oranga Tamariki, refuges and specialist family violence services, the Ministry of Social Development, health services, housing providers, courts, education providers, and legal services.

Lead author, University of Auckland law professor Julia Tolmie, said while some practitioners provided valuable support, they found multiple agencies were "punitive, judgemental, and demanding."

"Some of these participants, three out of five, spontaneously said they had lost so much, and the systemic response had been so terrible, they looked back and wondered if they'd done the right thing in leaving their abusive relationships.

"One of the women who said that actually left because she thought her partner was going to kill her.

"Even though she was facing life-threatening violence in her relationship, she'd ended up at different points in time with such an appalling response that she felt it would have been potentially better to stay and endure that than what she'd had to experience with the family violence response system."

One of the report's participants Ngākau* who lived with permanent injuries from intimate partner violence, was repeatedly required to obtain medical certificates to access financial and educational support.

"They would sit down ... all love and caring ... [you would] say your story and then what you needed help for ... and I soon learnt that ... you would never hear from them again," she said.

" ... when I got into emergency transitional housing ... I would get random phone calls ... some ... NGO, talking about my housing and it was the same narrative every time."

The report stated Ngākau's agency records showed she was contacted many times over the three-and-a-half-year period she was in emergency housing to discuss her accommodation needs, before she was given a "lecture" on the difficulty of meeting those needs and a ranking score for her level of need. But no further action was taken.

Tolmie said all of the women they followed were repeatedly referred between services without receiving meaningful help.

"All of our participants ended up homeless in consequence of intimate partner violence.

"A number of them were living in vehicles at one point in time or in emergency accommodation for years. Some of them couldn't care for their kids because they weren't materially able to provide for them at different points in time, which is absolutely heartbreaking."

Māori-centred approach

However, the report found three participants who were involved with Kaupapa Māori practitioners and providers had positive experiences.

*Māreikura went through a programme for homelessness, Manaaki Tangata e Rua, offered by Te Puea Memorial Marae in Auckland.

"She sort of fell through the cracks of the mainstream family violence safety system and ended up in this programme provided by Te Puea and received a very different response from what victim-survivors were experiencing in the mainstream system.

"She had a holistic, relational response that was deeply mana-enhancing. Very quickly, she was in her own home and put back onto her feet."

She said a Māori-centred approach could improve outcomes for everyone affected by family violence, not only Māori.

"All victim-survivors need this kind of response. One which isn't founded on distrust of them and who they are, which isn't fragmented, which is practically helpful."

She said the report's findings supported years of research that the system had serious shortcomings and needed urgent changes.

"When we look at what's working within the system, we can see pockets of safe practice at Kaupapa Māori service providers and practitioners, or certainly that's what we have seen in this report."

The report called for more funding for Kaupapa Māori services and a Māori-centred response throughout the system.

Where to get help:

• Women's Refuge: 0800 733 843.
• It's Not OK 0800 456 450.
• Shine: 0508 744 633.
• Victim Support: 0800 842 846.
• HELP Call 24/7 (Auckland): 09 623 1700, (Wellington): 04 801 6655.
• The National Network of Family Violence Services NZ has information on specialist family violence agencies.