Kia ora - welcome and thank you for your interest in this Backbone questionnaire.
Backbone is committed to ensuring that the voices of women victim-survivors are heard so that the system and services work better to keep women and children safe and help them to recover and rebuild their lives. We believe that victim-survivors understand better than anyone what the issues are with the system, and how a mana-enhancing and supportive system could change lives.
Your knowledge, thoughts and experiences are taonga, and we appreciate that it takes precious time to share them with us. We understand that this may be a distressing experience for some of you and we value your courage and commitment to helping build a safer response system for present and future tamariki, children, māmā and protective whānau. Your kōrero/responses will join the voices of hundreds of wāhine/ women who have taken part in Backbone surveys and projects over the past eight years. Together, we will keep pushing for much needed change.
The introduction to the questionnaire contains a lot of background information so you can make an informed decision about whether to take part. Once you move through this section and into the questions, there will be much less to read.