Tuesday 26 May 2009

cuts to sexual abuse crisis line

and here's another cut in services, to the sexual abuse crisis line run by the auckland sexual abuse help foundation:

"ACC has funded the service to the tune of about $350,000 a year, but has recently advised it that this funding will not be continued.

“The money is used to fund the 24 hour telephone crisis and rape call out service in Auckland. Counselling, advocacy and information service are also provided....


it's such a relatively small amount of funding, i can't understand why this has been cut. better to cut funding to the plunkett helpline, which is simply duplicating the healthline service already provided by the ministry of health.

NGOs currently working to support victims of sexual abuse and assault are chronically underfunded already. it's appalling that funding is being cut further.

2 comments:

Julie said...

This is terrible. Auckland Sexual Abuse Help was the very first organisation I featured in our Thursdays in Black series and they do great work. My family gives a small monthly donation to them. They've had ongoing uncertainty about government funding contracts, including ACC, for years, as a result of the contracting practices those organisations use. It's very frustrating that an organisation that is doing really hard and essential work already has to waste time, energy and resources on this crap :-(

Anna S said...

How does cutting this service correlate with the National Party policy on victims of crime? It states: "Victims of crime have been neglected for too long.It’s time we gave them the support they deserve."

Not at all sure how reducing funding for the service helps support victims.