Trust for the disabled paid managers to push closure

AUCKLAND: Leaked documents show a cashstrapped Auckland trust for the disabled paid senior staff bonuses to manage its closure and wants to reopen with a focus on private clients.

Until its closure last month, the Laura Fergusson Trust in Greenlane provided residential living, respite and rehabilitation services, receiving about $11 million in annual funding mostly from ACC and the Ministry of Health.

The leaked document shows the trust was worried about its reliance on public sector funding and the state of its buildings.

Over the next decade, it wants to reduce public contracts to 20% of its business, with the balance coming from insurance companies and other private contracts.

Options listed include selling the site, selling part of the site or going into a joint venture with a health insurer, retirement village operator or other health service provider to run a rehabilitation facility.

But a former staff member, who wished to remain anonymous, doubted the plan would work, saying it would be a huge amount to spend for a very small number of patients, even in a city the size of Auckland.

‘‘Without doing any market research it would be ludicrous to think that you’re going to be able to run a facility like that on just private clients,’’ she said.

In November — the same day the trust informed the Health Ministry of its intention to end its contract — trust chief executive Heather McLeish drafted a letter to senior managers offering a 5% salary increase and two months’ gross salary to manage what she called ‘‘a transition’’.

Former staff, who only received two months’ redundancy, were angry.

They said it was a closure, pointing to the fact clients lost their services, staff lost their jobs and families were left with an uncertain future.

In January, the trust told RNZ its decision was financially driven and insisted it had asked the Government for more money, without success.

Other documents released under the Official Information Act show officials at the Ministry of Health were stunned by the trust’s notice it was pulling out of its Ministry of Health contract, after learning about it from the communications team at ACC.

Another former staff member who also did not want to be identified but who had seen the documents said it was clear the trust did not want the ministry’s help.

‘‘The ministry seemed to be so genuine in their surprise, so willing to try even at that late stage and the trust seemed to be so dogmatic and set in their opinion that they will be closing,’’ she said.

Directorgeneral of health Ashley Bloomfield even offered to meet board members, but they declined.

The documents give an insight into the ministry’s frustration with this.

‘‘Messaging that the contract exit is due to underfunding from the Government is disingenuous, as the trust never raised this as an issue with the ministry — the ministry has no record of these conversations happening. The trust agreed that the decision was made due to their current business model,’’ it said.

The documents show Laura Fergusson Wellington and Laura Fergusson Canterbury — which are completely independent of the Auckland trust — are financially sustainable.

Staff had to sign a nondisclosure agreement and the board has refused to release an expensive PWC report, which the board used to justify its closure, to the ministry.

The trust declined to comment but said it had an open mind on the form the rehabilitation facility would take. — RNZ