The Green Party is celebrating a new complaints service for survivors of conversion practices launched today by the Human Rights Commission, and repeats the call for a Ministry for Rainbow Communities.
“We are thrilled help is now available for those who have suffered such awful practices, and we encourage them to seek out this free, confidential and impartial service,” says Dr Elizabeth Kerekere, Green spokesperson for Rainbow communities.
“Years of mahi and advocacy by our Rainbow whānau and survivors – and 160,000 signatures on our petition – has led us to this long-awaited result of the law banning conversion practices.
“Our vision is an Aotearoa where the diversity of Rainbow people is celebrated and our rights upheld, and that’s why we continue our call for a dedicated Ministry for Rainbow Communities.
“Chief Human Rights Commissioner Paul Hunt underlined that continued funding is needed beyond this starting point, as the burden of paying for mental health support is too often left with our survivors.
“A Rainbow Ministry would grow the capacity of the public sector to support, empower, and resource our communities for institutional discrimination and barriers we still face in health, housing, education and employment.
“It took us until 2022 to ban conversion practices, we should not be willing to wait longer for a dedicated voice for our Rainbow communities in Government.”
No we don’t need a dedicated Ministry for Rainbow Communities. First things first.
Right now families in Nelson face losing their homes or trying to survive in the wreckage of them. Climate change ? Don’t ask a Green, it’s not exactly an ideological gender issue, it’s long term survival, future proofing, current existentialism, the physical environment, the big picture stuff.
Right now mothers, ( if that’s not an offensive word) are trying to figure out how to delouse the heads of kids sleeping in car boots, garages, aunty’s shed, and granny’s garage. Cooking defeats them and is a skirmish anyway when they’re time- challenged with two badly- paid jobs, food costly, trying to supervise homework in car boots, garages, aunty’s shed, and granny’s garage and rustling up the next day’s school lunch and who gets to wear what and when and how to wash and dry it all.
Sympathy for Kerekere’s ancestors having their sex and gender activities circumscribed by colonial missionaries and similar kill-joys one hundred or more years ago, but if it is still impacting majorly upon her and her whanau, they can all apply for ACC counselling, sensitive counselling, courtesy of the taxpayer. Anyone similarly injured can.