MSD told thousands food was 'not an essential need'

The Ministry of Social Development has told thousands of people struggling with hunger that food was "not an essential need", in what it now calls an admin error.

Documents obtained by 1News through the Official Information Act show MSD has routinely used that reasoning to decline Special Needs Grant applications for help with food over the last six years.

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The grants are typically only applied for if someone is in emergency need with no other way to cover their costs.

An analysis of the documents showed the ministry increasingly used the reason over time, declining applications on the basis food was non-essential on more than 8000 occasions.

Trudy Burrows, who runs a food pantry in the Christchurch suburb of New Brighton, said the figures were "shocking".

"I just think it's diabolical, food is essential,” she said.

"A lot of these people have nothing left."

That sentiment was echoed by Nicki Dutton of the Salvation Army in Porirua, Wellington.

"I think telling anybody that is struggling to find enough food to eat that food is not an essential item is hard to understand," she said.

"I don't believe that an admin error for so many people is reasonable."

In a statement, the ministry maintained it was an admin error.

MSD group general manager of client service delivery Graham Allpress said some categories the ministry uses are relevant to certain payments, but not others.

In these cases, the wrong option had been selected.

"Where the code was entered, it does not mean the underlying decision was incorrect, but selecting this category was an administrative error," he said.

He added its staff had processed more than 8.5 million applications over the six years.

"With 0.094% of them, they used the wrong decline code," Allpress said.

The ministry declined an interview request and would only respond through the statement. Allpress did not apologise for the error.

Social Development Minister Louise Upston did not respond to specific questions about the error. Instead, she deferred to MSD’s statement.

The data also shows MSD have been turning more applicants away in recent years, with an increased number of applications rejected for special needs grants for food.

While the overall number has fluctuated, there was a jump between 2023 and 2024, continuing in 2025.

Overall, more than 88,000 applications were declined last year.

Together, the numbers reveal significant numbers of Kiwis have been struggling to feed themselves and their families, with more than 318,000 individuals – nearly 6% of the New Zealand population – asking for grants for food in 2025 alone.

On average, each person asked for help around four times, leading to a total of more than 1.4 million applications in 2025.

The majority of those were accepted, with the ministry paying out more than $130 million last year.

However, the data also includes the reasons the ministry uses when it decides who to turn away.

In recent years thousands of applications were rejected on the basis the person "did not have an immediate need" or that they had "caused or contributed" to their immediate need.

Last year, more than 18,000 applications were also declined on the basis that the "circumstances could have been reasonably foreseen" – with that reason becoming the most common used.

Burrows, of the New Brighton community pantry, said MSD's reasoning behind the denial of applications was "quite a judgement".

"When you have no money and you're living from benefit to benefit, there's no opportunity to save for a rainy day," she said.

"It only takes one puncture from the car or a tyre out or something that disrupts [their] whole budget."

Several people at the pantry spoke to 1News about being turned away for special needs grants.

Among them was Rangimarie Whaanga, who is in her 70s. She frequents the foodbank, lining up with dozens of others for food.

"I've got to be strong, and I've got to eat to keep healthy for my next generation, which are ten great-grandchildren," she said.

MSD said that it had not changed its criteria for food grants but had instead gradually returned to "pre-Covid-19 practices".

That included requiring managers to sign off on some applications from December 2023 – something that had been relaxed during the pandemic.

"Before Covid-19 managers were required to approve some hardship grants. These requirements were temporarily waived during the Covid-19 response, but this was never intended to be permanent,” Allpress said.

He added that numbers fluctuate for several reasons, but MSD continued to approve most food grant applications – around 94-96% each year.

“They are intended to be one-off payments to help with urgent and unexpected need. If someone applies more frequently, or for greater amounts of assistance, we may not continue approving them without a discussion,” he said.

Upston also would not be interviewed but sent a statement defending the Government’s spending on community food support.

She said at Budget 2026, the Government had “enabled $45 million for community food support to assist those in highest need”.

“MSD continues to provide Special Needs Grants for food to hundreds of thousands of eligible New Zealanders."

Burrows, however, said the demand on her food bank was only growing.

"There's a desperate need here for food at the moment and it's got worse," she said.

"The numbers here have exploded in the last few months. The numbers of homeless, the ones sleeping in their cars. Honestly, it's just increased so much.”

Others lining up for food described going days without food or struggling to make ends meet on as little as $80 a week, with no work available.

Whaanga said she didn’t want to "go near" MSD’s food grants now.

"It's like they've broken not only my heart, but a whole lot of hearts out there that are my age – 70, 80," she said.

"We're too old to be rubbished. We've worked hard all our life for our country."