"Once the report by the Children Youth and Family Service is completed, I am calling on the Minister of Social Welfare, Steve Maharey to release it publicly", Dr Newman said.

“This couple, using taxpayers money, ran a child farming business, abusing the very children they were receiving money for.

“I’m just amazed that these people received $132,000 in benefit incomes over the past two years and nobody at the Department of Work and Income had any concerns. I want to know why?” Dr Newman asked.

“Very little if anything was spent on the children yet the couple were able to leave New Zealand frequently over a seven year period, spending more than$20,000 on air fares to carry out their child-farming business,” she said.

ACT also wanted to know why the Child, Youth and Family Service stands by its decision to leave all of the adopted and fostered children with the family, five months after concerns about the children’s welfare were first raised with the agency.

“The conditions in which these children were living were appalling. Court reports of the way many of them were treated read like a script from the very worst horror movie. I am, yet again, amazed at the apparent lack of ability of CYFS to protect our children.

“Mr Maharey says the department will carry out an inquiry and I want his assurance that the report will be immediate, wide-ranging and made public”, Dr Newman said.

ENDS.

© Scoop Media