ACC help for sexual violence victims

An article from the Manawatu Standard by Thomas Heaton

Client-focused changes to ACC's services around sexual violence have been a long time coming, Palmerston North counsellors say.
ACC officially launched the new Integrated Services for Sensitive Claims scheme on Monday. The new service puts greater focus on maintaining wellbeing and increasing the provision of support, including increased hours for support.
Palmerston North counsellor Paulette Berryman, who is also on the Sensitive Claims Advisory Group for ACC, said the new system was very different from what was brought in in 2009. A part of the advisory group for about 15 years, she had seen a lot of changes.
Berryman said the system enlisted in 2009 was really awful for clients, as many were unable to get counselling services.
"When survivors have already been rendered powerless, they don't want to engage in a more powerless system."
It was found ACC was turning about 90 per cent of claims away. In 2009 there were 282 claims while in the 2013/2014 financial year there were 369 in the Manawatu-Whanganui area.
"The biggest change I see is that there is a client-centred approach," Berryman said.
Clients will also no longer have to pay surcharges for the services of counsellors.
ACC expected an increase in the number of cases coming in, because of the change to the client-focused system.
Manawatu Women's Refuge manager Dr Ang Jury said it was a long time coming. A more sensitive approach to the realities of what victims went through was needed. Flexibility in treatment, allowing victims to enter, leave and return to assistance was important.
Jury said the change made sense, as some people may not want to deal with issues immediately, or they may feel they had already dealt with their problems.
"A little bit down the track, they might realise they need support," Jury said.
"People are individuals ... They need to be treated on a one-on-one, individualised basis, taken seriously for what's happening to them."
Ann Kent, manager of Abuse and Rape Crisis Support Manawatu, said the new system was promising.
"It's a new system to us and everybody is still learning ... They [ACC] seem to have looked at what hasn't been working.
"[They] have put in a concerted effort to put in place a system that will be positive," she said.

© 2015 Fairfax New Zealand Limited

http://www.stuff.co.nz/manawatu-standard/news/66972110/ACC-help-for-sexual-violence-victims

Help us stop ACC cuts

An article from the Whakatane Beacon

Increasing fears among counsellors in the Eastern Bay that their at-risk patients may go without help under new ACC legislation may prompt them to provide their services for free.
The Government introduced a new Sensitive Claims Unit in October last year, which requires clients to be diagnosed with a mental illness as a result of sexual abuse in order to receive ACC compensation. Under these new rules, sexual abuse victims must first visit a doctor, clinical psychologist or psychiatrist who would determine whether the client has a mental injury arising from a criminal event. If the person qualifies they can then make a claim to ACC.
However a group of five counsellors from Opotiki and Whakatane say they already knew of several cases where this new process had been followed - but the claims had still been turned down. The five counsellors and Whakatane Women’s Refuge manager Wini Te Are recently met with Labour MPs Ruth Dyson and Moana Mackey in Whakatane to air their concerns and ask for answers. At that meeting Anne Doree, Caren Mandemaker, Debbie Magee, Marion van Delden, Tracy Hillier and Ms Te Are expressed their concern about the long-term social cost of denying people counselling and the effect on their clients, who were upset that nobody had asked them.
Opotiki counsellor Debbie Magee said the new legislation had created a big hurdle for those seeking assistance to get ongoing support. Quick intervention was crucial at that early stage. Since it had been introduced there had been a huge decline in people coming forward - but that didn’t reflect a reduction in need, which was how supporters of the change would likely interpret such statistics. “They are just too frightened,” she said. “The process is already frightening and this has made it worse. I’m really angry.”
Anne Doree, a counsellor for the Chrysalis Group in Whakatane, said they were likely to end up treating clients voluntarily if they did not qualify for ACC funding. “We can’t not help these women”. Providing their services for free would seriously undermine their years of experience, she said.
Private practice counsellor Marion van Deldon said many of her clients, particularly the men, wanted her to tell the MPs that they would be “out there killing people” if it wasn’t for counselling they received. Ms van Deldon said making counselling services less accessible to those in need would inevitably result in escalating crime and substance abuse and, ultimately, an over-burdened prison system.
Ms Te Are said she was worried the already-pressured refuge would have to cover services that were no longer available in the Eastern Bay and they would bear the brunt of the social impact of these changes. “We are really worried about the direction the Government is taking,” she said. “We are struggling to provide a service in the Eastern Bay and we are well over our voluntary level already. We can’t sustain all the work in the community.”
Rape Crisis was no longer available in the district and this was one of the extra services now being covered by refuge volunteers.
Former ACC minister Ruth Dyson said she and her colleagues were battling the changes in Parliament. “I have heard some heartbreaking cases and it is terrible that these people are the first ones to be victimised,” she said. Ms Dyson said it was clearly the Government’s agenda to eventually privatise ACC but if this happened, Labour would renationalise if they were victorious in the 2011 election.
Ms Mackey, Labour’s East Coast-based list MP, said the issue was too important to let go and they would keep questioning the minister Nick Smith about it. “It isn’t an issue we are going to drop,” she said. “The system was working before so we just need to keep the pressure on. This is a government that, when it’s put under pressure, it backs down.”

© 2010 Whakatane Beacon
http://www.whakatanebeacon.co.nz/cms/news/2010/03/art10006821.php

ACC changes discriminate against Maori women

Press release from the National Collective of Independent Women's Refuges Inc

Women’s Refuge supports the views of the National Council of Women, expressed this week in their media release outlining the discriminatory treatment of Māori women by ACC
“Although Māori women are most likely to be clients for ACC subsidised counselling, this has not been adequately considered in the implementation of the ACC Sensitive Claims clinical pathway,” says Denise Reynolds, Kaiwhakahaere for the National Collective of Independent Women’s Refuges.
Ms Reynolds says, “Although Māori kaupapa models for counselling may be in development, we are very concerned that Māori women’s needs have not been prioritised by ACC, when they are evidently in the highest risk group. Nor have Māori providers been adequately consulted and we agree with the National Council of Women, that communication must be opened up, as a matter of urgency.”
“Failure to consult with Māori on this issue, is in fact a breach of the Crown’s obligations under the Treaty of Waitangi as well as a breach of the United Nations Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination to which New Zealand is a signatory.”
Heather Henare, Chief Executive for Women’s Refuge says, “Limiting accessibility to these services breaches other international obligations too, such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women under which states are obliged to ensure women’s equality and guarantee a number of rights. I believe the state has a legal and moral duty to provide accessible, voluntary support services for women victims of sexual abuse.”
She says, “Sexual abuse is a form of violence. Some 80% of women who access Refuge services have a history of sexual abuse or rape.”

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO0912/S00148.htm