A new report on New Zealand’s family violence system finds serious failures. It describes a system that places unsafe demands on survivors, delivers fragmented responses, and offers limited practical help. The report, led by University of Auckland Professor Julia Tolmie with Rachel Smith (AUT) and Leah Robinson (Ngāruahine), examines the experiences of five women and their agency records.
Systemic Failures Detailed
The researchers found a “fragmented, punitive and monocultural system” that compounds harm. While some practitioners provided valuable support, responses were often unhelpful, unsafe, and extremely harmful. Survivors were repeatedly referred between services without receiving meaningful help.
Tolmie, who chaired the Family Violence Death Review Committee for six years, said the women dealt with hundreds of professionals over decades, generating thousands of pages of records. She’s not aware of comparable research examining victim-survivors’ original agency files. The study included agencies like police, Oranga Tamariki, refuges, health services, housing providers, and courts.
The system treats family violence as a mental health issue and distrusts those it serves, the report states. Smith, an academic at AUT with over 20 years of experience in the family violence sector, notes that in times of crisis, the women, with limited resources and the responsibility of parenting young children, had to repeatedly “jump through hoops to receive the meagre resources that they were entitled to and needed for survival”.
Collusion and Harm
The report describes a pattern of system collusion with the predominant aggressors. In one case, a woman’s partner successfully had his version of her behaviour, mental health, and addiction issues recorded as the truth across multiple service providers for over a decade.
This is confirmed by agency records. For one survivor, Ngākau, who lives with permanent injuries from intimate partner violence, records show she was repeatedly required to obtain medical certificates to access support. Her files detail being contacted many times while in emergency housing, only to receive a lecture on the difficulty of meeting her needs and a ranking score, followed by no further action.
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Three of the women described agency responses to their requests for help as being so harmful they questioned whether it would have been preferable to stay in the abusive relationship. This involvement exposed them to practices they experienced as “degrading, coercive, and destabilising,” resulting in the loss of their ability to care for their children and material security.
The researchers note these problems reflect structural features and values within the system. Wāhine Māori are particularly poorly served by individualistic, Eurocentric approaches. However, the report also found hope in examples of safe, relational practice among kaupapa Māori services.
A Path Forward
The report identifies kaupapa Māori services as models for a better way. These services offered a “depth of relational reciprocity and awhi” that was starkly different from the mainstream system. They provided holistic, respectful support that acknowledged the strengths and roles of survivors, rather than focusing on perceived deficits.
For example, the Manaaki Tangata e Rua programme at Te Puea Memorial Marae demonstrated an effective alternative. Kaimahi used their relationships with state agencies to bring services directly to one survivor, reducing her exposure to the fragmented state system. This approach offered “relational, respectful and positive acknowledgement” of her role as a Māori māmā.
The researchers suggest a Māori-centred approach to systems change could improve outcomes for everyone, not only Māori. “All victim-survivors would benefit from an approach that’s holistic, relational, mana-enhancing, culturally safe and focused on the provision of equitable material support,” they write. The deep systems change needed to respond to family violence safely won’t be easy, they say, it will take time, and Māori leadership and governance, in partnership with Pākehā.
