Through interviews with Phillips’ family members, among others, the inquiry found that he was not completely cut off from the outside world.
For instance, he visited his mother without the children in February 2022, during which she handed him NZ$1,000 ($575; £426) in cash and food.
He also managed to move through the community during an hours-long shopping trip in August 2023 where he visited various businesses in the Waikato region.
He spent nearly NZ$6,000 in a single day on a haul of goods which include food, children’s clothing, gardening supplies, fishing gear, knives and lighters, among other things, the inquiry found.
The inquiry also said the agencies involved – the police, the national child protection agency Oranga Tamariki, the defence force and the ministry of education – could have communicated and coordinated more with each other to better protect the children’s welfare.
On Wednesday, Luxon also apologised to the children’s mother, acknowledging that they were “let down through this process that spent four years in the bush”.
Apart from the prime minister, other government representatives have also apologised and accepted the inquiry’s findings.
“To the Phillips children directly, this report has found that our agencies did not take all practical steps to protect you. For that we are deeply sorry,” Social Development Minister Louise Upton said on Tuesday.
Upton acknowledged how the children spent four years “in squalid conditions which deprived them of… a happy and healthy childhood”.
Deputy Police Commissioner Jill Rogers acknowledged the police’s failings but said the investigators involved in the case had “put [in] their hearts and souls”.
“Did it take too long? Did we miss opportunities? Yes, we did. You know, you can’t unsee the images of where those children were living in those campsites… It’s heart-breaking,” Rogers told Breakfast, a talk show produced by local news service 1News.
She went on to say: “We have to be better in this. But at the end of the day, our responsibility was to recover the children, and that is what we did.”
