Commission breaches survivor’s privacy

WELLINGTON: An abuse survivor’s privacy has been breached by the royal commission investigating abuse in state and faithbased care.

The breach involved the survivor’s personal details being mistakenly sent to another survivor.

In an email to survivors, the Abuse in Care Royal Commission said it was an isolated but serious incident, which was caused by human error.

The commission said it was deeply sorry for what happened and the staff member involved was understandably devastated.

Although the commission’s procedures were robust, they were now being reviewed so survivors could rest assured information they shared would be safe, it said.

One survivor, Tyrone Marks, questioned how robust the commission’s systems were.

‘‘Someone has got to be answerable to it . . . You can’t just send out something and ‘oh yes we made a mistake and we won’t do it again’.

‘‘To make sure you don’t do it again, are you going to plug that hole up?’’ Mr Marks asked.

He said the breach indicated disorganisation in dealing with private information.

‘‘Someone isn’t doing their job obviously. That sort of mistake you shouldn’t be making, really, at this time.’’

Mr Marks said survivors should be able to expect the commission to have better safeguards in place.

The commission said the two survivors involved had been contacted and offered sincere apologies and support.

Commission executive director Mervin Singham emailed survivors, assuring them of the commitment to ensure their confidentiality was maintained.

He acknowledged the incident and the reporting of it would concern some people and said support was available. — RNZ