Urupare mōrearea: Crisis responses monitoring report

This report focuses on crisis responses over a five-year period, from January 2020 to December 2024. Crisis responses form a critical function in ensuring people and whānau who are experiencing crisis get the urgent support they need.  

Our report examines how the current crisis response system is functioning and provides insights on the responses and pathways people and whānau navigate when experiencing crisis. We also define what a good crisis response system could look like for Aotearoa New Zealand. This report makes two recommendations on what needs to happen to improve crisis responses in both the short term and the longer term. 

Our key findings include:

• Crisis services are hard to navigate, fragmented and patchy, and many people don’t get the help they need.
• Fewer people have a recorded crisis activity, however, a higher proportion are urgent, particularly for Māori and young people.
• The system is under significant pressure, including longer wait times for crisis phone lines, people staying longer in services than five years ago and increased complexity of distress and needs.
• Crisis responses vary across the country, and in some areas, there are limited options, pathways and resources – particularly for people experience crises related to substance use.
• We continue to see the impact of workforce shortages, and are concerned about challenges of coordination and consistency of care for tāngata whaiora.

Changes we want to see

In the report, we set out the system changes (based on our key findings) that we want to see to improve crisis response pathways for tāngata whaiora and whānau:

• A well-designed, coordinated national system 
• Crisis responses that are person- and whānau-centred
• Strengthened system enablers and data insights.

Our recommendations

By June 2026:

• Every district has 24/7 phone-based crisis support with reasonable wait times 
• Clear pathways exist from GPs to crisis services when needed 
• A thorough evaluation of peer support in EDs and crisis cafés is undertaken to understand what's working and develop a plan to scale up effective solutions.  

By June 2027:

• A nationally cohesive crisis system where everyone knows where to turn  
  Crisis response pathways that offer a timely and compassionate response as well as safe and welcoming places to go
• Diverse options in every area: phone support, mobile teams, crisis cafés, respite care, and hospital care when needed 
• Crisis response services that are co-designed with lived experience and include peer support. These need to be culturally responsive, rights-based, and trauma responsive, include youth-specific, peer-led, and Kaupapa Māori options. 

Published: November 2025