Red Cross NZ admits it has faced “a lot” of criticism from Hawke’s Bay residents and those who donated to the NZ Disaster Fund after Cyclone Gabrielle.

The total amount it has committed from the disaster fund is now at $3.18 million, a fraction of the $21m given by Kiwis to the Red Cross since the fund was activated in mid-February.

That’s led to online anger that the immediate need of the cyclone has dissipated without Red Cross investment. The Red Cross has noted that it expects to spend most of the fund within six months.

Secretary-general Sarah Stuart-Black sat down for an in-depth chat with Hawke’s Bay Today editor Chris Hyde to explain her corner.

She explains why criticisms in the aftermath of the Christchurch quake informed the slower start, why Red Cross crews couldn’t shovel silt, and why a review of its Gabrielle response will be necessary.

THE FULL INTERVIEW

Have you noticed the feedback Red Cross has been getting in Hawke’s Bay about its handling of the NZ Disaster Fund? Some of it has been pretty intense.

Sarah Stuart-Black: There’s obviously been a lot of feedback. We see it, particularly on social media.

There is also misinformation being shared, which is kind of amplifying the misunderstanding around what Red Cross is doing.

One hundred per cent of the donations in the New Zealand Disaster Fund, and any interest that’s accrued, will all go to the purpose of the fund.

All of the running costs are being absorbed by New Zealand Red Cross.

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Special appeals are different, they’re ring-fenced, so there is no expectation that the money donated for a special appeal is used to run that appeal or implement it.

It means we absorb any of the running costs as well.

It’s the speed of Red Cross, or lack of speed, that has been the biggest annoyance for people in Hawke’s Bay, hasn’t it? Most of the money from the appeal is yet to be spent. Do you feel you’ve moved fast enough?

I think there’s a real balance here, and I’ll give you some context. In the 2011 Christchurch earthquake there was a special appeal set up. And one of the findings after that appeal was that we moved too fast as an organisation.

And so looking back on that review, we wanted to make sure we weren’t going to repeat those issues.

Also, with this disaster, it is not one geographic location impacted. There are multiple parts of the country that have needs, and they are not necessarily all the same, so it’s not a kind of one-size-fits-all approach.

We’re trying to balance the need for speed, and being able to support people affected, whilst equally providing enough assurance to the public that we’ve spent that money sensibly.

There’s got to be accountability around it, so that people feel confident giving their money to us, without us making it look like it’s hugely bureaucratic and slow.

And it feels like that sweet spot is very small.

Are you damned if you spend the money quickly, and damned if you don’t?

Correct. At a basic level, what we do has to pass a ‘sniff test’, where if you give $5, $50 or $50,000 to the fund and then look at what we’ve spent money on, you get why we’ve done it that way.

You don’t want people to go, ‘oh my goodness, what were they thinking’?

And so we’re trying to make sure that we don’t duplicate efforts, which was one of the issues in the 2011 quake, so we’re not seen as competing with others that are doing great work.

It’s $20 million, which is an extraordinary amount of money. But that fund is not there to rebuild roads. It’s not there to pick up on others’ responsibilities that have either a legislative mandate, whether that’s local or central government.

We’re trying to find where the gap is that supports people that have been impacted, and for that money to be used for the best effect.

You say you don’t want to double up on things. One of the areas where there was immediate need was in getting silt out of flood-hit homes. That was left to volunteers and homeowners in Hawke’s Bay. Why didn’t Red Cross crews come in with shovels to help?

Since Christchurch, Red Cross has had disaster welfare support teams on standby for potential deployment.

There are around 20 of those teams with around 300 active members.

We had about 80 people that were deployed into affected areas to support after the severe weather that started at the end of January that affected the upper North Island.

Equipment being delivered in Hawke's Bay after the cyclone. Photo / Supplied

Then of course there was the cyclone on the back of that. It was the first time that all 20 teams have been called upon.

We know that the silt was clearly an issue. But the people that were deployed, were actually being deployed to look after evacuation centres and do needs assessments, and other outreach.

They weren’t teams that would have had the right skills and equipment to be shifting that silt straight away.

With the fund we were able to provide equipment supplies, including protective equipment for people to be able to assist with the cleanup. But we saw that there were already volunteers out doing it.

We also see there are responsibilities there between local and central government around the physical cleanup and those areas of household items that need to be disposed of. There are organisations that have that responsibility.

People are clearly overwhelmed with the scale of the silt in some areas.

But I’m also really aware that there are things being worked through with insurance companies, and with local and central government.

So we’re trying to make sure that we’re not getting into that kind of area, where in fact there are others playing a role. Does that make sense?

I think part of the struggle is that you’ve used some of the funding so far for psychosocial support for flooding victims, which is obviously worthy, but these victims are saying ‘Okay, you’ve patted me on the back after I’ve just done a full day of labour, but what I needed was someone to help me with the labour’.

Yeah, absolutely. And I’ve seen a range of organisations and emergent groups, providing support for helping people with silt.

But I also know that in some areas, we’ve seen the silt up to the roof.

The scale of that means that it’s not as simple as people being able to go and dig out the driveway — there is much more complexity.

Red Cross worked closely with Hawke's Bay Civil Defence Emergency Management Group at evacuation centres. Photo / Supplied

Our volunteers were going in specifically to support the Civil Defence Emergency Management Group with the response, and then we’ve been trying to make sure that we’re not duplicating what other volunteers are doing.

We’re happy to of course continue to see if there are emerging issues that we can assist with. And we’ve continued to provide access to equipment to help with cleanups and dehumidifiers, water blasters, all of those kinds of things.

But at the moment, we wouldn’t have the scale of volunteers to come in and actually look at cleanup specifically.

Does Red Cross New Zealand have enough staff and resources at the moment to effectively respond to future disasters? Climate change isn’t going away.

It’s a great question.

With the impacts of climate change and the increasing frequency and severity of weather-related emergencies that we’re seeing across the country, we, as an organisation, have been going through a process actually over the last year of looking at how do we keep pace?

Volunteering has changed over recent years too, and we need to adapt to that.

Not everybody wants to be a person who volunteers in a disaster, but they might be really happy to be volunteering in one of our shops, which earns money that enables us to do great work that we do.

So we’re trying to look at ‘how do we scale up our volunteers’?

We have over 1800 Red Cross people living in the areas across New Zealand that were affected by these two weather events.

Some of them are directly impacted, and somebody being able to volunteer their time when an emergency happens is reliant on them being okay.

There are other challenges too — is their employer prepared to free them up when in fact their employer might be affected?

Maybe their workplace has suffered damage? And also, there is the increasing cost of living challenges, which might not make it so easy for people to volunteer for blocks of time.

Red Cross NZ secretary-general Sarah Stuart-Black. Photo / Mark Mitchell

We’ve seen an increase in registrations to become volunteers with Red Cross since this emergency happened, and we’re just thrilled with that.

But we also recognise we need to take a medium and long-term view to continue to grow that capability of Red Cross people.

We need the capacity to respond not just today, but next week, next month, and the month after that, if we are to continue to have this kind of frequency of emergencies.

That’s going to take some time to really build up.

What does your volunteer base for responding to disasters actually look like? Aren’t those who deliver Meals on Wheels or work in the shop mostly pensioners?

We want to have a much more diverse workforce that encourages youth.

We see the real strength of young people feeling a commitment to wanting to make a difference in their communities.

And we want to provide those opportunities through Red Cross. We also want to make sure as an organisation we reflect the communities that we serve.

So being able to have people that might be retired, and may have more time on their hands to volunteer, is absolutely fantastic.

But equally fantastic is having people that potentially have skills from their professional lives that are relevant to Red Cross, or those that might have access to knowledge or expertise that would be incredibly relevant after an emergency.

So we’re wanting to encourage the full range of people in our communities to participate so that we build a really strong capacity and capability to support communities.

You say you reviewed your involvement in the Christchurch earthquake — is there likely to be a similar review of Red Cross for Cyclone Gabrielle?

We will certainly do a review. After any emergency we’re asking ourselves: ‘what went right? what didn’t go so well? what could we do better next time’?

We’ll be looking at how we responded on the ground and at the fund. We will be looking at how it worked in practice, the lessons coming out of that, and if we need to make adjustments to the way that we run special funds.

There are always lessons to be identified. Part of it is trying to work out the timing [for a review], to allow a bit of time and a bit of distance for reflection, so that you can [learn and implement change] in a way that benefits communities going forward.

Why should people donate to the Red Cross in the next disaster?

We’re an organisation that has been around for nearly 100 years. Our intent is to be here, when people need us at their darkest moments that their toughest times.

Red Cross in Wairoa. Photo / Supplied

The mission of New Zealand Red Cross is to be here to support those most vulnerable in our communities.

And we absolutely uphold those fundamental principles around impartiality and neutrality. We want to make sure that people can trust our organisation when they donate to us, and that the money makes a difference.

I think local fundraising and local community volunteering are a huge part of the way we do things in New Zealand.

We see the amazing effort that happens after an emergency of friends, family, and organisations that already exist in communities wanting to do something to offer support. We’re not saying we’re the only ones doing work.

For those who want to either use or donate directly to local organisations, we just encourage people to do their homework, to understand what they’re donating to.

We have signed up to the Fundraising Institute of New Zealand, which has a code of ethics and professional conduct. And we’re bound by their code of ethics, which includes rules around honesty, integrity and transparency.

And so if people have offers of ‘you could give to our organisation’ and ‘it would make a real difference’ then actually doing that bit of homework just to find out ‘what are they doing?’ and ‘are they signed up to this code of ethics?’ is a great way to make sure that the money goes to where they think it’s going to go.

Is there anything else you would like to say?

One of the key things for Red Cross now is trying to make sure we commit most of the money in the first six months, from the date these weather events happened.

We’re getting the majority of the money out now, whilst there is absolutely a need for it on the ground, where communities are being impacted.

After that there will be a small amount of the fund that we’re looking at and asking, ‘can we build some resilience for next time rather than responding to what’s occurred out of this emergency’?

We’re going to commit that within the first year.

This is not Red Cross holding on to money. I know there’s been some commentary about whether that’s the intention — it’s not.

Within the first year the money will be spent, the majority of it in the first six months.

All of the money stays in New Zealand too. It’s not going offshore, because I saw that there was another query as well.

I’m hoping that reassures people that we’re spending it quickly enough so that it is making a difference.

And lastly, a shout-out to thank people for their huge generosity to the New Zealand Disaster Fund, and also to the people that have wanted to sign up as volunteers for Red Cross.

We know this cyclone has had and is having such a massive impact on individuals, families and friends in Hawke’s Bay, which is such a tight-knit community.

We’re going to be working as hard as we can to continue to provide support. And I’m really looking forward to continuing to kind of hear how progress is being made over the coming months.