Weeks before the government is set to give police powers to move on rough sleepers, officials have admitted to RNZ they can’t guarantee immediate shelter for anyone on any given night.

Auckland City Missioner Helen Robinson says she’s grateful it’s been “formally acknowledged”, but is “deeply distressed” that’s the reality in the country.

It comes as the largest provider of the most immediate form of shelter tells RNZ it’s managing with the resources it has, but demand is “relentless”.

In June, it was reported that Ministry of Social Development (MSD) managers had performance measures related to reducing emergency housing numbers. These measures have now been refocused to achieve “sustainable housing”.

At the time, the prime minister admitted he did not know there was no night shelter in Auckland for people sleeping rough.

Since then, RNZ has attempted to understand what shelter is available for someone who is sleeping rough.

Over the past month, RNZ sought clarification from both MSD and the Ministry for Cities, Environment, Regions and Transport (MCERT) – which leads the government’s overall programme of work to address rough sleeping – to understand where exactly someone is supposed to go if they need shelter immediately.

After multiple requests, RNZ was finally told by MCERT “there is no guarantee that shelter can be provided for every person in every circumstance in every location”.

The agency said access to accommodation was dependent on a range of factors such as “an individual’s circumstances, location, service capacity, and real-time availability of accommodation and appropriate support”, all of which could change quickly it said.

Robinson told RNZ she’d never had it formally acknowledged there was no guarantee, “I am distressed and I am calling for change.”

It comes as the government’s move on orders legislation, which has received strong opposition, are being progressed ahead of the election.

The law would give police the power to order people as young as 14 to move elsewhere or face a possible jail sentence if they were being disorderly, begging or rough sleeping.

It also comes following reports of rough sleepers dying outdoors overnight, a man found unresponsive in a Cuba Street doorway in Wellington and a woman found unresponsive on New Brighton beach in Christchurch. RNZ understands another rough sleeper died in Auckland in July.

So for those who had nowhere else to go, and may be told to move on, where exactly could they go?

As recently as Sunday, the minister in charge of move on orders, Paul Goldsmith told TVNZ’s Q+A there were “resources available and places available for people 24/7”.

Emergency housing grants are the government’s primary mechanism for providing immediate shelter to people who have “nowhere else to go” and “can’t stay where they are”.

Housing Minister Chris Bishop said in July emergency housing still existed “because there will always be people facing genuine housing crises”.

“But now it’s being used as it was always intended: as a temporary last resort.”

Housing providers and social services have consistently said the governments tightened emergency housing criteria has resulted in an uptick in homelessness. That concern was raised by RNZ as early as March last year, with Community Housing Aotearoa chief executive Paul Gilberd saying again this week there was a direct link between the two.

As recently as Thursday, Serena Moran – a nurse practitioner and clinic lead at Te Aro Health Centre in Wellington – told RNZ there’d been an increase in rough sleepers she was treating, including people being released from prison with no plans to continue accessing antipsychotic medication.

She said the reality most days was treating patients who may have been assaulted and having nowhere to send them.

“I basically have to say to them, ‘I’m sorry, I can’t find you anywhere to stay tonight. You’ll need to go back to the street. I’ll give you pain relief. I’ll try and make you feel as comfortable as I can’.”

But ministers and MSD have consistently maintained that emergency housing remains available to anyone who meets the criteria and has a “genuine need”.

Ministers and MSD have also repeatedly said that people who did not receive emergency housing could have their “needs met in another way”, including through other housing pathways.

Other options include:

But none of those pathways guaranteed a person sleeping rough today would have somewhere safe to sleep tonight, especially if the limited immediate access transitional housing beds were full. There were only 65 nationwide.

Kāhui Tū Kaha provided the majority of these beds and told RNZ it was managing with the resources it had, but said the demand was “relentless”. It also accepted referrals from police and hospitals overnight.

On Thursday evening, it accepted an elderly woman with physical access needs and a 17-year-old who had both been sleeping on the street. It also accepted a woman becoming homeless due to family violence, and a young woman who police wanted separated from a violent partner.

Kāhui Tū Kaha said things were tight but “we’re constantly juggling”.

RNZ