By Lillian Hanly, RNZ News political reporter
Survivors of abuse in care arrived at Parliament today to hear the formal apology from the state which oversaw and inflicted harm on children.
Public sector leaders from Oranga Tamariki, the Ministry of Health, New Zealand Police, and Ministry of Education also apologised, as did the public service commissioner and the solicitor-general, at an event preceding Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s national apology in the House.
By the afternoon, many survivors were still trying to absorb what had been said and what it meant, with some saying it was a “PR stunt,” some calling the speeches “hollow” and others not willing to believe the words until they saw action.
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Abuse in state care — survivor reactions. Video: RNZ
During his apology, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said many survivors did not want to engage with the current compensation process — but more than 3500 were — and he signalled there would be an extra $32 million funnelled into that system “while we work on the new redress system”.
Opposition leader Chris Hipkins said he formally joined with the government in its apology, saying the day was a significant step forward.
“Today is a hugely important day for all of you, to finally hear what the Crown has failed to give you for all of these years, an apology.”
Ken Clearwater, a long-time advocate for survivors, was at the event, saying he heard some great words but it was about “what action needs to go with it”.
“Everyone’s saying the right things, but if you look at the policies and stuff we have at the moment, that’s not helping our children.”
He believed National, leader of the coalition government, was going to have to change a lot of their policies.
“So we’re apologising for what happened in the past, but the policies are still in place that are making it no different than when we were in the past.
‘Hollow words .. . dangerous’
“To have hollow words at this stage would be, would be pretty dangerous.”
He said there had to be a belief the government would look into things, “but there’s got to be a survivor voice”.
He mentioned Tu Chapman, a survivor who spoke at the event, who pointed out only having five minutes to speak as a survivor at an apology for survivors.
“So once again, the survivor voice is not forefront, and I think that that’s what they’re going to have to look at, is how they get more more of the survivor voice in whatever policies they look at.”
Another survivor, Reihana Tahau, who had been in state care in the 1980s, agreed, saying he found it ironic there was an apology on one hand while the government goes through the process of appealing Section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act.
For him, he said, “that’s the opposite, that’s counterintuitive” because 7AA was helping to stop bringing children into care.
“I can’t understand why they would appeal something that is actually working.
‘Mistrust, systematic trauma’
“And for me, my mistrust and systematic trauma, I can’t help but feeling that they’re not genuine in that, because if they were genuine, they wouldn’t be taking a thing which would potentially set up another generation for trauma.”
He acknowledged the apology was a step in the right direction, but “it still feels like a PR thing”.
“I do find it hard to trust people that read off a paper, because I talk from my heart.”
He said the speech from the prime minister was “part of his job” and he did not know how “authentic that is”.
Another survivor, Nicky, also said it was a “PR stunt”, and would not provide closure.
“This is a PR stunt for the prime minister to look good.”
Ardern thanked
She acknowledged Dame Jacinda Ardern for initiating the apology.
“We’d like to thank her for starting it, but they’ve sat on things, you know, for a quarter of a century we’ve been battling.
“We’re old, we’re broken but we’re still fighting.”
She called specifically for Salvation Army orphanages to be investigated and for their charitable status to be investigated.
“The government paid them to abuse me. We want that money.
“Where did that money go? It didn’t go in our care, it didn’t go in our food, and they worked us like child labour, just like Gloriavale [a small and isolated Christian community located on the West Coast of the South Island].”
Survivors in the room muttered or called out during the speeches, reacting — but saved their strongest reaction for Solicitor-General Una Jagose.
Boos, cries of ‘shame’
As she rose to speak, she was met with boos, and cries of “shame” and “disgrace”. One woman stood and turned her back. Another shouted: “You wanted us dead.”
Another survivor, who listened quietly and intently throughout the proceedings with tears streaming at times, said he wanted to hear what the public sector leaders had to say.
He said what Jagose said needed to be said.
“I’m disappointed, because I’m a lawyer, I’m disappointed that she was howled down and I couldn’t hear all that she said.”
He said he thought Jagose would be used by the government as a scapegoat.
“Us lawyers have to speak for the people we represent, whether they’re good or bad.
“And we shouldn’t be hung drawn and quartered because we’ve been instructed to say something or do something or fight something.”
Clearwater said he could not believe she was there.
‘Nobody wanted her there’
“By the noise there, nobody wanted her there, and so that was a bad choice on the government’s part.”
Tu Chapman spoke on behalf of survivors at the event, and did not think the chief executives should have been at the event apologising.
“It’s like putting the cart before the horse so to speak.”
Chapman was angry the prime minister left before hearing some speeches, saying it was “tokenistic”.
“I think he should have been there to listen to us, so that he could actually, authentically and genuinely apologise to us in the House this afternoon or early this morning.
“And it might have been a little bit more meaningful, because quite right now, it just feels tokenistic.”
Another survivor said the speeches today were “very empty, hollow”.
‘Carbon copy’ speech
He said the prime minister’s speech seemed to be a “carbon copy” of when he had been there for the tabling of the report.
In regards to the solicitor-general, he acknowledged “she was able to take what was getting handed to her and listen to it”.
“She actually took it on and then spoke when she could.”
He said the others seemed to want to get over with the speech fast, “that’s not how you do apologies”.
“You take what’s coming, surely they knew there was going to be some heckling going on.”
His message to the prime minister was not to wait, “take action now”.
Survivors representing mothers and adopted children said they felt they had been missed out of the equation.
More about abuse victims
One acknowledged today was more about abuse victims, but there could be a separate apology for mothers and their children that were “taken from them unlawfully and unwilling”.
“We would like the history of losing our children told in this country.
“I’ve flown from Australia for this and for the few words that were said, I really thought it was pretty poor.”
They want a full inquiry into what happened and an apology.
Another said in regards to the apologies, there were “some people who probably needed a brandy after getting up and speaking and apologising for the departments they worked for”.
“There was one in particular who shouldn’t have been there at all, who shouldn’t represent anybody, let alone the Crown.”
Healing process
Piiata Tiakitai Turi-Heenan said today was needed as part of the healing process for survivors, “this is a start”.
She also did not think the speeches were authentic.
“The words that were authentic came from the survivors themselves.”
She said if the government was looking for answers, they will come from “sitting down with the survivors and sorting everything out with them, rather than around a table with people who have had no experience of surviving”.
On the disruption of the speeches, she said “those were emotions”.
“The focus was on silencing those emotions, but that’s exactly why we are where we are today, because they were silenced in the first place.
“You have permission to not be silent anymore.”
Heart ‘on sleeve’
Another survivor said his heart was “on his sleeve at the moment”.
He had been speaking to various MPs after the event who assured him there was support across the House to make changes.
“I believe they’re sincere, but I’m still, I’m still thinking that I might get let down, but I’m hoping I’m wrong. I’m hoping that it does go ahead.
“Where to for me from here is that I’m gonna keep on doing what I do, until further notice, until I know for a fact, well, this is real.”
Chapman added the journey was only just beginning again for the survivor community.
“Another mechanism for us now is to actually encourage our survivor community to be more intentional about their engagement with the Crown, with ministers, and hold them to account.”
The new redress scheme
The minister in charge of the government response, Erica Stanford, told RNZ Checkpoint the current redress system was not perfect but the announced $32 million of funding to increase capacity and get through claims faster would help.
While some survivors queried why redress could not be addressed sooner, Stanford said nobody expected the government would be able to “turn on a dime” and deliver something straight away.
“We will have something up and running next year,” Stanford said, but she could not commit to an exact date.
Outbursts from survivors during the apology had been expected, Stanford said, due to the amount of “raw emotion” in the room.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
