National Radio 12 May 2009

PRESENTER (SEAN PLUNKET): The Government is pledging to help extended family members who are raising children in place of birth parents to get a break from child rearing. The Minister of Social Development, Paula Bennett, says plans are underway to give grandparents and other guardians a break from the children they are taking care of. Here's our social issues reporter Teresa Cowie.

REPORTER (TERESA COWIE): Providing respite care for children who are victims of family breakdown is not a simple task. Sally and Norman Kapak, who are 61 and 71 years old, are caught in a situation where respite care wouldn't work. Sally says while they'll love a break from the 4-year-old granddaughter they're raising, the child's attachment disorder makes it impossible.

NORMAN KAPAK (GRANDPARENT): When she was an infant she lived in a number of different places. I understand as little as a week or two and then perhaps some months but always on the move. Until she's older there is that hidden sense that she might feel she's with strangers and starting that entire routine all over again.

REPORTER: Teri and Murray Ututaonga, both in their mid 50s, are bringing up her daughter's two boys, Reuben who's 10 and Isaiah, 8. They decided to raise the children because Teri's daughter's mental illness meant she could no longer look after them. But they say arranging respite care would be difficult. Like many children who have had to be removed from their parents, their grandson Isaiah has been traumatised by his experience. He has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, and the Ututaonga feel they'd lose gains made with his behaviour if they farmed him out to a camp.

TERI UTUTAONGA (GRANDPARENT): It's only delaying the inevitable, you know, like it might give you that bit of a breather, you think oh thank god he's gone [laughs] or that we could have our house back again, um, 'cause you know, you it's, the behaviour and how he is hasn't changed. So you just know that even though you might've had the weekend off, come Monday morning, it's all on again.

REPORTER: Teri says because of Isaiah's disorder the youngster needs routine and predictability. The Minister of Social Development, Paula Bennett, says she's serious about improving respite care within the next year.

HON PAULA BENNETT (SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT MINISTER): I'd love to see it happening in a camp, you know, so I'd love to ah, for it to actually be for, you know, a week or two weeks and for them to actually get that real time out. I think any parent needs a bit of time out every now and then and sometimes it's that sort of survival mode where you know it's coming up and you're going to get a bit of a break, you get to have that and then you start afresh and with, you know, renewed vigor when those children come back home.

REPORTER: Paula Bennett is considering funding the camps using the Out of School Care and Recreation, or OSCAR subsidy, which helps families with the cost of before and after school care and holiday programmes. A Massey University honorary research associate, Jill Worrall, says the problem of respite care is it's not being addressed properly.

JILL WORRALL (MASSEY UNIVERSITY HONORARY RESEARCH ASSOCIATE): When a grandparent, who is probably between 60 and 69, many are in their 70s and we even have some in their 80s, are saying just a bit of a break, you can just read between the lines the weariness and the tiredness that they're experiencing, having to get up to babies in the night and such things and they do need a break in order to maintain their own health; both psychological health and physical health.

REPORTER: Jill Worrall believes for respite care to work, partnering up of families would have to happen.

Ends.

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