"...Clients at Parklands, a residential facility in Pukekawa, south of Auckland, were forced to live in crowded, dirty conditions surrounded by more than 35 small dogs, fed inadequate food, neglected by untrained staff, provided with no meaningful activities and denied access to their own money, according to the Ministry of Health...
...on the internet, the Joslins describe Parklands as being in a farm environment and promise clients they will enjoy riding for disabled, farm bike rides, a swimming pool and access to farmyard animals "to add to your quality of life"...
The audit reports reveal something far different - residents were verbally and physically abused, made to do farm work and laundry and pick up dog faeces for as little as $4 per week.
In perhaps the worst example of abuse, a teenage boy who was unable to talk was regularly left unattended in a paddock to eat grass "like an animal"...
That this should happen in New Zealand disgusts me.
It reads like the story of one of the type of institutions found in the old USSR.
If this is true, people should be looking at a short drop, stopped by a rope! Were it someone I knew in this hell-hole, I would track the owners down and deal out a more meaningful punishment than our soft-dick courts invariably will.
And the government agencies that are MEANT to oversee these facilities should also be in the dock, for their obvious dereliction of duty!
