Earthquake anniversary protest – seven long years and we are still waiting.

Next Monday 4th September, on the 7th anniversary of the September earthquake I will be holding a personal protest outside IAG office in Show Place, Christchurch from 11.30 to 12.30pm.

My whānau has been through hell these last seven years and we are still waiting for our house to be settled.

We’ve compiled a book for our sons. It explains what we went through with our earthquake repairs, and why they were robbed of our time during the most influential years of their lives. They will receive it when they are adults so they can understand the environment they grew up in.

It explains why there was household stress and little money when they were tamariki. We are living in a diabolical repair. IAG have paid for 2 reports – they both raise major concerns. They were also warned by project manager Hawkins Construction before the repairs were completed.

We have had four reports done - these all support the position that it is a disastrous repair job and they believe would be easier to rebuild than to repair. There has only been one report done that says it is ok - that was the builders self review.

We are at our wits end getting IAG to act. They denied until we filed in court when they promised a proposal by July 17. We still wait. We are down $100k fighting them and still a long way off court. We, and other families like us, need help from politicians.

Earlier this week I sent three questions to the leaders of our political parties. I hope you, the media, will follow up and get answers for our family and the many hundreds of other families in Christchurch and now Kaikōura and Edgecumbe in awful situations like us.

Our family’s questions to the political parties are:

Question 1: Do you think it is acceptable that a family has to wait 7 years for satisfactory earthquake repairs?

Question 2: Should an insurance company which is recording huge profits this year of A$1.3b be able to ‘delay, deny, defend’ and hold out families for 7 long years.

Question 3: What will your political party do, and I mean ‘actually do’ to support families like us fighting huge battles with big corporations who are refusing fair and timely settlements?
ie. a compulsory arbitration system to force these companies to meet their obligations.

We will be outside the IAG offices in Show Place, Christchurch this Monday 4 September at 11.30 - 12.30 to showcase our book and parade our questions. See you there.

ENDS

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