Terms of use

Welcome to Awhi Ngā Mātua operated by IHC in partnership with the Awhi Parent Governance Group. These Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy set out the agreement between Awhi Ngā Mātua and you and your use of our platform. By using our our platform, you are deemed to have accepted, without limitation or qualification these Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.

Use of the Awhi Ngā Mātua

We reserve the right to change the Terms of Use from time to time without notice, as we deem necessary. We encourage you to review the Terms of Use periodically to check you understand the latest version. Continued use of Awhi Ngā Mātua is deemed to be your acceptance of any changes to the Terms of Use and if you are not happy with our amended Terms of Use you should stop using the Site.

Medical advice

Our content or any content on other sites linked to from Awhi Ngā Mātua, is never a substitute for professional medical advice. Even if another user appears to be a medical professional they are not in a position to undertake a physical examination or understand your or your child’s full medical history. You should always speak to a doctor or other health professional about a condition and/or treatment.

Privacy Policy

PERSONAL DATA: If you use Awhi Ngā Mātua it is likely that this will involve sharing information about you and your family. You agree to provide only true, accurate and complete information. Any personal information provided by Users, including health and health-related information, will be treated with appropriate care and security in accordance with our Privacy Policy. You may choose to register with an anonymous username, although please note that any information or experiences you share may carry some risk of revealing your true identity to other Users.

It is important that you understand how our data sharing relationships work and what information is shared with our different partners and Users. We have set out further information in our Privacy Policy which we encourage you to read.

Non-commercial use

Awhi Ngā Mātua is for the use of individuals for non-commercial purposes only. To use information gathered from Awhi Ngā Mātua commercially, or to reach users with commercial interest, unless expressly authorized by Awhi Ngā Mātua, is against these Terms of Use. Please refer to the “ Acceptable use” section below to understand what actions will be taken if you breach these Terms.

Commercial use refers, but it is not limited to, promotion or advertising of a company or website, self-promotion of a personal cause or digital content or service, promotion of a research opportunity, and recruitment of participants for a project.

Registration

You will not be able to access the Awhi Ngā Mātua community unless you register with us. By registering and becoming an account holder, you agree that we may provide you with information about Our Site (whether by email or any other medium) that we consider appropriate in accordance with our Privacy Policy. You may opt-out of receiving these materials and notifications in the "settings" area of your account or by writing to or emailing us to inform us that you wish to be removed from our email notification list.

Awhi Ngā Mātua accounts should only be used by individual parents of disabled or medically fragile children. Any accounts portraying themselves as healthcare professionals, providers, researchers or organizations need to be approved by us.

In order to register with us and become an account holder, you will be invited to provide a password, a username and an email. You are entirely responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your password and account details. You will never be required to reveal your full password to any representative or agent of IHC or any Awhi Ngā Mātua moderators . If you forget your password, we may ask you to answer a specific question such as your username, date of birth or postcode. Furthermore, you are entirely responsible for any and all activities that occur under your account.

You agree to notify immediately of any unauthorised use of your account or any other breach of security. We will not be liable for any loss or damage that you may incur as a result of someone else using your password or account, either with or without your knowledge. However, you could be held liable for loss or damage incurred by us or another party due to someone else using your account or password. You may not use anyone else’s account at any time, without the express permission of the account holder. If you think that someone else has access to your password you should change it immediately.

Acceptable use

You may only use Awhi Ngā Mātua in accordance with these Terms of Use, our community-specific guidelines and, in any event, for lawful purposes in compliance with all applicable laws, regulations and codes of practice in New Zealand or in any other jurisdiction from where you access Our Site. Your contributions must:

• where they are posted be accurate (where they state facts);
• be genuinely held (where they state opinions);
• not include any illegal content (defined below); and
• comply with applicable New Zealand law and law in any country from which they are posted.

Your participation in Awhi Ngā Mātua should be with respect, honesty, and in the spirit of supporting and learning from your fellow Users. We ask that Users respect the rights and views of other Users who present their individual experiences, regardless of whether or not they are in agreement, and that all disagreements are expressed considerately.

Illegal content: You are prohibited from posting illegal content, in addition to the other items listed below. Illegal content should be immediately removed from the platform and includes:

• Advertisements/promotion of regulated products. Any content that could be construed to be the advertising or promotion of (i) unlicensed medicines; (ii) medicines to children under 16; and (iii) advertising of prescription-only medicines to the general public, shall be taken down immediately.
• Hate speech. Any unlawful hate speech, including but not limited to hate speech based on religion, ethnicity, nationality, race, colour, descent, gender, sexual orientation or other identity factor.
• Other illegal content. This content is unlikely to be generated in a community, but it is not tolerated and must be taken down immediately. This includes content related to topics such as: terrorism, child sexual abuse material, illegal drugs and weapons.
• You further agree that you are responsible for everything that you transmit to or in relation to Our Site and you specifically agree that your contributions and communications must not:
• contain any material that is obscene, offensive, potentially explicit, hateful, harmful, vulgar, obscene, bullying, libellous, abusive, duplicitous, threatening, inflammatory or defamatory of any person or otherwise includes objectionable material;
• advocate grooming behaviours or sexual exploitation including requests for contact on or off Our Site, requests for personal information, sexual solicitation or comments;
• endeavour to persuade Users into doing something that could be damaging or harmful; include unsafe content in relation to self-harm and suicide, including, but not limited to, explicit means or methods, graphic descriptions (including images), concrete plans, suicide notes;
• promote any discrimination based on race, sex, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age;
• promote false cures for illnesses, anti-vaccination advice, manipulate contents to mislead users by distorting the truth of events, misinformation or post content that originates from disinformation campaigns;
• infringe any copyright, database right, trademark or any other right of any other person;
• be threatening, abuse or invade another’s privacy, stalk, troll, intimidate, exclude or silence others, or cause annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety;
• be likely to harass, degrade, upset, shame, embarrass or alarm any other person;
• be used to impersonate any person, or to misrepresent your identity or affiliation with any person;
• give the impression that they emanate from us, if this is not the case;
• advocate, promote or assist any unlawful act such as (by way of example only) copyright infringement or computer misuse;
• use Our Site to engage in any commercial activities not approved in writing by Awhi Ngā Mātua governance group;
• post any inaccurate or misleading information, or opinions which you do not genuinely hold;
• publicly publish your own contact details or those of anyone else;
• register more than one account for yourself or anyone else unless you are part of a moderation team;
• re-register or register a new account after you have been banned;
• input or transmit content that contains software viruses or any other computer code, files, or programs that are designed or intended to disrupt, damage, or limit the functioning of any software, hardware, or telecommunications equipment or to damage or obtain unauthorised access to any data or other information of any third party;
• input or transmit content that contains anything which could be used to determine or alter the architecture of Our Site, or could be used to decompile, disassemble, or reverse engineer Our Site;
• input or transmit anything that constitutes or contains any form of advertising or solicitation or that disrupts the normal flow of dialogue with an excessive amount of content (flooding attack) to the Service, or that otherwise negatively affects other users’ ability to use the Service or that employs misleading email addresses, or forged headers or otherwise manipulated identifiers in order to disguise the origin of content transmitted through the Service;
• collect personal data about other Users for commercial or unlawful purposes;
• This list is indicative only and not exhaustive.
• Awhi Ngā Mātua is moderated at the discretion of the “Community Moderation Team”, which includes administrators and moderators. Public content that is reported by a User is sent to the Community Moderation Team. They may edit, delete or turn off replies to the post. In addition, they may contact, restrict or warn the User. They can also decide that the User or content in question is not objectionable and no action is required.
• The Community Moderation Team will determine whether there has been a breach of the Terms of Use and what the appropriate course of action is. When a breach of these Terms of Use has occurred or inappropriate material has been posted, we may take such action as we deem appropriate, including, but not limited to, editing or removing any posting or material you have uploaded to Our Site; withdrawing your right to use Our Site; taking legal action against you; or disclosing such information to law enforcement authorities as we reasonably feel is necessary or mandated by law.

Objectionable material

If you encounter or become aware of any objectionable or infringing or unlawful content available anywhere on or via Our Site, please immediately report such material (and the specific page on which it is found), or if you believe that you are the owner of the copyright or other rights in any material appearing on Our Site, or if you have any other complaint about Our Site, or any content or other posted materials, please contact us at (link) (making sure to include both the Uniform Resource Locator ("URL") for the non-complying content and the reasons you believe it does not comply). Please note that there may be adverse legal consequences if you make a false or bad faith allegation through this process.

• Third parties and third party websites and links
• We may also provide, or you may find links or references on Awhi Ngā Mātua to the websites of other companies, charities or other organisations and individuals whether affiliated with us or not. By clicking on these links and accessing these other websites, you will be leaving Our Site. Some of these links are added by Users and we do not verify every link posted on Our Site.
• Where Our Site contains links to other sites and resources provided by third parties, these links are provided for your information only. Such links should not be interpreted as approval by us of those linked websites or information you may obtain from them.
• Similarly, Our Site may be accessed through third party links over which we have no control. We make no warranties or representations of any kind as to the accuracy, currency, or completeness of any information contained in such websites and shall have no liability for any damages or injuries of any kind arising from such content or information. Inclusion of any third party link does not imply an endorsement or recommendation by Awhi Ngā Mātua.
• You may link to our home page, provided you do so in a way that is fair and legal and does not damage our reputation or take advantage of it, but you must not establish a link in such a way as to suggest any form of association, approval or endorsement on our part where none exists.
• You must not establish a link to Our Site in any website that is not owned by you.
• Our Site must not be framed on any other site, nor may you create a link to any part of Our Site other than the home page.
• We reserve the right to withdraw linking permission without notice.
• The website in which you are linking must comply in all respects with the Acceptable Usage standards, outlined above in these Terms of Use.
• If you wish to link to or make any use of content on Our Site other than that set out above, please contact us.

Proprietary rights

The entire contents of Our Site are owned or controlled by IHC Programmes and the Awhi Ngā Mātua governance group. The content is for your personal use only, and is not for re-distribution, transfer, assignment or sublicense. The contents of Our Site may not be copied, displayed, downloaded, distributed or republished other than for non-commercial individual reference with all copyright or other proprietary notices retained, and thereafter may not be published, extracted, re-utilized, recopied, reproduced or otherwise redistributed.

Written communication and notices

When using Awhi Ngā Mātua, you accept that communication with us will be mainly in electronic format. We will contact you by email or provide you with information by posting notices in the community or on the website. For contractual purposes, you agree to this electronic means of communication and you acknowledge that all contracts, notices, information and other communications that we provide to you electronically comply with any legal requirement that such communications be in writing. This condition does not affect your statutory rights.

Content and Limitation of Liability

Awhi Ngā Mātua is a technology platform. All views, opinions, and knowledge expressed on it are the sole opinions of Users and are likely to relate to their own specific circumstances which may be different to yours. Awhi Ngā Mātua and the affiliates we work with make no warranties or representations of any kind as to the accuracy, currency, completeness, reliability, operability, or legality of information or opinions contained or expressed within Awhi Ngā Mātua. Commentary and other materials posted on Awhi Ngā Mātua are not intended to amount to advice on which reliance should be placed. We and the affiliates therefore disclaim all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on such materials by any visitor to Awhi Ngā Mātua by any account holders, or by anyone who may be informed of any of its contents.

Awhi Ngā Mātua may include information and materials uploaded by other users. This information and these materials have not been verified or approved by us. The views expressed by other users on Awhi Ngā Mātua do not represent our views or values.

Awhi Ngā Mātua is provided to users free of charge on an "as is" and "as available" basis. You agree that access to and use of Awhi Ngā Mātua and the content available on Awhi Ngā Mātua is at your own risk. To the fullest extent permitted by law, Our Site and any individual person connected to Our Site and any party involved in creating, producing or delivering Our Site hereby exclude:

• All conditions, warranties and other terms that might otherwise be implied by statute, common law or the law of equity; and
• Any liability for any direct, indirect or consequential loss or damage incurred by you in connection with the use, inability to use, or that results from the use of Our Site or websites linked to Our Site, including, without limitation any liability for loss of income or revenue, loss of business, loss of profit, loss of data, loss of goodwill, wasted management or office time, and for any other loss or damage of any kind, however arising and whether caused by tort (including negligence), breach of contract or otherwise, even if foreseeable.

This does not affect our liability for death or personal injury arising from our negligence, nor our liability for fraudulent misrepresentation or misrepresentation as to a fundamental matter, nor any other liability which cannot be excluded or limited under applicable law.

We do not guarantee that Awhi Ngā Mātua, or any content on it, will always be available or be uninterrupted. We may suspend or withdraw or restrict the availability of all or any part of Awhi Ngā Mātuaor business and operational reasons. We will try to give you reasonable notice of any suspension or withdrawal.

You are also responsible for ensuring that all persons who access Our Site through your internet connection are aware of these Terms of Use and other applicable terms and conditions, and that they comply with them.

Waiver

If we fail, at any time during the term of your use of Awhi Ngā Mātua , to insist upon strict performance of any of your obligations under these Terms of Use, or if we fail to exercise any of the rights or remedies to which we are entitled under these Terms of Use, this shall not constitute a waiver of such rights or remedies and shall not relieve you from compliance with such obligations.

No waiver by us of any of these Terms of Use shall be effective unless it is expressly stated to be a waiver and is communicated to you in writing in accordance with the methods specified above.