A Christchurch lawyer is raising questions after the Ministry of Social Development ordered that her client - who is on bail - to be evicted from emergency housing.
Canterbury Criminal Bar Association president Nicola Hansen said MSD staff in Christchurch told her that it was down to a policy change banning those on bail from using emergency accommodation.
A senior ministry official has told RNZ there has been no such change but Hansen is standing by her claim.
Hansen's client was told he was being evicted from his emergency housing unit on Thursday last week, just eight days before Christmas, although this had been reversed on Tuesday after enquiries by Hansen and the media.
She said he had been on bail there by the district court and is awaiting trial, which is months away.
"He was very distressed, he had just been advised he had to move out of his emergency accommodation and he was really struggling to find anywhere to go," Hansen said.
"He contacted me because he knew he'd need to vary his bail condition in terms of where he's living, and he didn't have anywhere else he could go."
Hansen immediately began to investigate what had happened.
"I then got in touch with his [Hansen's client's] integrated services co-ordinator at MSD. They told me that this was a new policy - Christchurch was only just beginning to implement it - but it [the policy] had come in a short time earlier and they [the local MSD staff] have been a bit slow to bring it into Christchurch, and they've been given the word that they needed to," she said.
"This was confirmed by his supervisor the following morning."
MSD declined an interview but in a statement the general manager for housing, Karen Hocking, said there had been no policy change and emergency housing did not usually meet the requirements of bail or remand conditions.
But she said the ministry had recently become aware of a small number of people staying in such accommodation while on bail, and it was trying to find them somewhere more suitable.
She said the grant for emergency housing was temporary and was paid up to a maximum of 21 nights.
Hocking said no one on bail would be evicted over the Christmas period.
The response was a surprise to Hansen.
"They seem to be suggesting that this has always been the policy. Certainly that's not been my experience on the ground and certainly it doesn't seem to have been the experience of other stakeholders down at the Christchurch District Court," Hansen said.
She said after her enquiries and questions by media, the ministry told her client on Tuesday that he could stay at the unit until mid-January.
Hansen has been aware of courts allowing people to be bailed to emergency accommodation since about the time of the nationwide Covid lockdown, and said it was a helpful option to have.
"It's been hugely helpful, particularly for women. In Christchurch, we don't have any dedicated shelters or accommodation providers for women in need of a bail address. So without emergency housing, there's really nowhere for them to go other than prison," Hansen said.
Disproportionately affecting Māori
She has the backing of Māori Law Society tumuaki wāhine (female co-president) Jamie-Lee Tuuta, who said despite MSD's statement, lawyers and others in the community insist there had been a change that meant people on bail could not use emergency housing.
Tuuta said it was a practice that disproportionately affects Māori.
"It's more likely for Māori to end up in prison because they don't have addresses to go out into bail in the first place, so there's more barriers that have been put in place by a new policy decision that is significantly concerning for everyone," she said.
Tuuta said this problem fed into an ongoing issue of structural and systemic racism in the justice system that needed to be addressed immediately.
"There needs to be a joined up agency response to this issue so people are not denied bail for equity issues or lack of housing available, whether that is through emergency social housing or otherwise," she said.
RNZ
