Source: Radio New Zealand
Bruce Ford is head of the Stewart Island Seniors Cottage Trust. RNZ / Mark Papalii
Stewart Island resident Bruce Ford reckons there’s a problem with getting old on Rakiura – there’s nowhere suitable to do it.
The local of 60 years is the head of the Stewart Island Seniors Cottage Trust.
The trust is trying to raise an additional $1 million to build small, warm, accessible homes for elderly residents at a site in Oban.
It has already raised $750,000, purchased a section and drawn up plans for between six and eight one-bedroom duplex units.
Ford said seniors were stuck in ageing, draughty homes or paying housing costs beyond their means in a bid to stay put on the island.
“If there’s only one person in the house on a pension, you’re on about $28,000. By the time you take off $8000 of rates and insurance and perhaps another $4000 for electricity, you’ve still got to get some food and you’ve still got to do some maintenance on the property and it just doesn’t fit very well,” he said.
“We’ve got one chap here that lives on a boat because he doesn’t want to pay the insurance and the rates. And every day you’ve got to get in your dinghy and paddle ashore. If you’re in your 70s that’s a bit of a handful.”
Often people were being forced to leave the island and ended up in care facilities on the mainland far from friends, neighbours and familiar places, he said.
“People get medevac’d – perhaps they’ll have some ailment – so they get medevac’d and of course the chances are that they don’t get back because they can’t look after themselves quite well enough. We do have home help, some of those services are here, but some of the people that we’ve known have finished up in those rest homes and they die,” he said.
Seniors in Stewart Island are stuck in ageing, draughty homes or paying housing costs beyond their means in a bid to stay put on the island, Bruce Ford says. RNZ / Mark Papalii
Proud, independent islanders struggled to adjust to life in rest homes and retirement facilities, Ford said.
“You turn up in Invercargill or wherever and you don’t know anybody and, of course, you don’t know who to ask for any assistance or anything,” he said.
“There was one lady we went to see one day, a lovely old lady, and she said ‘oh, I wish I was home with my own place and cat and garden’… She said ‘I don’t like it here’.”
The existing donations included a gift left in late island character Sam Sampson’s will, Ford said.
The trust had a memorandum of understanding with Habitat for Humanity and the charity would help decide who would get to stay in the new houses, Ford said.
The Stewart Island Seniors Cottage Trust is trying to raise an additional $1 million to build small, warm, accessible homes for elderly residents at a site in Oban. RNZ / Mark Papalii
Southland mayor Rob Scott said he was right behind the trust.
“I take my hat off to them. They’ve certainly rolled their sleeves up and they’ve done a heap of really good work and they’ve managed to attract some really good funding to date,” he said.
The council did not have the ability to fund the homes but the benefits were clear, Scott said.
“We don’t have a magic pot of money that we can throw at it so I’m supporting with advocacy – whatever I can and wherever I can,” he said.
Age Concern says the issue of a lack of suitable housing for older New Zealanders is not restricted to Stewart Island. RNZ / Mark Papalii
Age Concern chief executive Karen Billings-Jensen said the need for seniors housing went beyond Stewart Island.
Many older New Zealanders faced the same choice – unsuitable housing or leaving their community, she said.
“In some of our cities there are suburbs where there are only large houses or double-storey houses, which don’t make it easy if you want to look to move somewhere accessible or to downsize. We know in rural communities, similar to Stewart Island, that there just aren’t the choices of housing,” she said.
It was crucial to have housing stock in place that allowed people to age – “so they can age where they know the community, where they have connections”, Billings-Jensen said.
“The proportion of people aged 65 and over who are renting is expected to double by 2048… As home ownership rates decrease and there’ll be more people looking in the rental market, and we know there’s some real challenges around rental stock,” she said.
Often people are being forced to leave the island and end up in care facilities on the mainland far from friends, neighbours and familiar places, Bruce Ford says. RNZ / Mark Papalii
Ford said he had sought help from the government but they were not forthcoming.
“I’ve written to many different government ministers and, as often as not, they come back full of encouragement and say ‘oh, I’m very sorry but there’s nobody registered for poverty at your end of the country. There’s no need, because you have to be registered social welfare, MSD, to be recognised as a region in need’. And of course our people are proud enough that they don’t get registered… they just stick it out and try and survive,” he said.
Ford remained optimistic the trust would meet its goal.
“It’s a big challenge but we’ve had big challenges before, community-wise. We have a new museum across the road – it cost $4 million and there’s no rates on it. It was all fundraising to get there. We have a town hall and stadium around the corner there and I believe it’s got insurance value of $6 million and it was all done with community work. The bowling green has a synthetic turf – that’s all done with local fundraising,” he said.
“Nothing’s impossible and we’re having a damn good try.”
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