Officials not tracking how much money given to emergency housing moteliers

PHOTO: Emergency motel stays averaging three months, some tenants stuck there for over a year. Credits: Newshub.

Unknown sums of money are being handed over to moteliers to cover damages caused by emergency housing clients – officials aren’t keeping track of what’s being spent and can’t put a total figure on it.

That’s “not ideal”, admits Minister of Social Development Carmel Sepuloni, who wants a system that can better monitor those costs and the damage being caused.

Demand just keeps escalating, under a system where motels and other providers get paid on a weekly basis, or sometimes slightly longer, to house people in urgent need of somewhere to stay.

Hair-raising stories continue to roll in to RNZ about what life is like for some tenants and moteliers, who’re recounting stories of constant crime and gang harassment being confronted with knives and in one case a room burnt to the ground.

One of the government’s own ministers describes some living conditions as “inhumane” and the current system “inefficient and unacceptable”.

It is costing $1 million a day for emergency and transitional housing; the vast bulk – $900,000 – is spent on the former, prompting calls for much better oversight of some places described as dangerous and crime ridden. There are no contracts between the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) and those supplying the rooms, nor specific obligations tagged to the millions being paid out.

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