Last week, Labour, the Greens and the Māori Party launched a Cross-Party Inquiry into Homelessness in New Zealand, after National MPs blocked a proposed Select Committee Inquiry.
There are many families who have no choice but to sleep in overcrowded garages, or in their cars. It hasn’t always been this way in New Zealand, and it doesn’t have to continue like this.
We want to hear from those who experience homelessness and agencies working with them, as well as members of the public, about the best ways to support homeless Kiwis and reduce the reasons they lose their homes in the first place.
We’ve just launched the Inquiry’s website, where you can make a submission online to the Inquiry. These submissions will be an incredibly important part of shaping our end report.
To make a submission, visit www.homelessnessinquiry.co.nz/submission.
To help guide your submission, the terms of reference for the Inquiry are:
- Consider whether the official definition of homelessness needs updating, and recommend accordingly.
- Assess the evidence on the current scale of homelessness, whether it is changing and how, and what the causes of that change might be.
- Evaluate possible policy responses to homelessness, including international best practice, and recommend accordingly.
- Consider how homelessness is experienced by different groups in society and evaluate policy responses that respond to that experience. For example, Maori experience of homelessness and Maori-led initiatives to respond
- Hear public submissions and expert evidence, particularly from those directly affected by homelessness and their advocates, and issue a written report.
Submissions close on Friday 12 August.
