The country's lead agency supporting victims of crime and trauma is sitting on a report into allegations of bullying, bad training and delivery failure.
File image. Photo: 123rf
Victim Support, a charity largely bankrolled by the taxpayer, hired independent investigator Charlotte Stevens to look into these allegations in July 2021.
Stevens' report is now finished, and participants RNZ has spoken to say they want to see it, but Victim Support's board is refusing to release it.
Board chair Lorraine Scanlon has instead emailed staff a letter summarising the findings and requesting no one speak to media about the investigation.
RNZ has obtained a copy of this letter that confirms "some isolated individual instances of behaviour that could constitute bullying and/or one-off instances of rudeness".
Scanlon writes the board also accepts there were complaints made to Victim Support's National Office that weren't processed in a timely way.
However, she writes these issues are isolated and blames funding shortfalls and growing demand for services as the primary causes of concern over training and service delivery.
What we know
Victim Support has refused to share the report with RNZ so what is known about it has been lifted from Lorraine Scanlon's letter to Victim Support staff.
In 2021 the Ministry of Justice, the charity's primary contractor, advised the board concerns had been raised with them about the wellbeing of workers in a region.
This prompted the board to appoint Charlotte Stevens to investigate allegations of bullying, lack of training, health and safety and service delivery issues.
Stevens' spoke to 88 people during her 12-month investigation; 70 current workers, 16 former workers and two clients.
In her letter, Scanlon wrote the board "welcomed" the report's recommendations but shared only one of them to staff; to better manage the 24/7 roster.
The board chair told staff the investigation did not find significant gaps in training, widespread concern about health and safety or evidence of service delivery failures.
Victim Support is largely-bankrolled by the taxpayer but it's charitable status means it's not subject to the same public accountability as government departments.
RNZ can't formally request this report under the Official Information Act and it's possible not even the Ministry of Justice - Victim Support's primary contractor - will get a copy.
Scanlon has told RNZ she anticipates providing the ministry and police a summary-only document of the report when she meets with officials this week.
She was confident any problems had been fixed and explained the reason the report would not go further than the board was to protect the identifies its participants.
This is despite the report being anonymised by independent investigator Charlotte Stevens before it was given to the board.
"We won't be sharing the report. The report was never meant to be a public document," Scanlon said.
Participants want to see report
RNZ has spoken to several former workers interviewed by Charlotte Stevens who want to see the report for themselves.
Former volunteer Janine Schmidt complained about being bullied by a superior but the process dragged on for more than a year before it was resolved.
By then, the bully had left the organisation and Schmidt was in therapy to cope with on-again, off-again investigations carried out by different people at Victim Support.
"They'd bring back up again, stressing me out all over again, I didn't get a reply and then we'll do the whole thing again a few months later. It was really, really traumatising."
In the end, she got a letter confirming she'd been bullied and/or harassed and that this had amounted to a breach of Victim Support policies.
The letter gave assurances Victim Support had taken action, was committed to work safety and asked that Schmidt keep the complaint and ensuing investigation to herself.
Schmidt told RNZ the charity's response to her complaint hurt more than the behaviour she complained about.
"It's laughable that this can happen to somebody, let alone take so long to deal with, at an organisation that relies on volunteers; stresses that volunteers are the people on the ground and doing the work."
Former volunteer support worker Claire Buckley's workplace concerns came to a head when she watched a superior get bullied to the point of tears.
Like Schmidt, Buckley spoke to Charlotte Stevens and said she's "incensed" the board's letter tells staff problems are isolated and not systemic.
"I haven't read what Charlotte wrote but I know what she heard and I know that there's no way she said that there's isolated incidents and actually there's no big issue."
Buckley said it's not right Victim Support's board can sit on the report when the charity gets public money; receiving close to $16 million from central government in the year ending June 2021.
"At the moment these guys just keep getting the Ministry of Justice grant with it never been put out to tender to anybody else to come forward and run a different organisation.
"They're being handed money every year and there's no recourse; there's no way to say hold on how you accountable for this money that we're just giving you," she said.