An Oranga Tamariki social worker says there are not enough residential options to allow vulnerable women to stay with their babies and avoid having them being placed in state care.
Nearly 300 babies under three months old were taken from their parents care last year, but there are only five residential homes nationwide that can have a total of 24 women and their babies at any one time.
RNZ's Maori news correspondent Leigh-Marama McLachlan reports.
