Catholic churches in Otago and Southland are ditching traditional insurance policies due to skyrocketing premiums.

It was going to cost the Catholic Diocese of Dunedin almost a quarter of a million dollars this year to insure about 50 churches, including Dunedin's St Joseph's Cathedral.

The church now plans to establish a million-dollar trust fund, paying the equivalent of annual premiums directly to that fund to be used in case of disaster.

But it is not actually enough to replace major churches should they be destroyed, and Catholic schools will continue to be covered by insurance companies.

Father Gerard Ansley told Checkpoint the church had seen a steady rise in insurance premiums of about 25 percent a year, every year.

In 2022, their premiums were $135,000. This year, they were predicted to be close to $250,000, he said.

"So, when do you stop?"

The diocese's new plan of ditching insurance came when they looked at the numbers.

"We can't actually afford it. When people give money to the church they're really wanting the church to be doing its work, not to be paying insurance.

"Probably the main driver is that we realised we can't afford not to insure but there are other options."

The church went through a lot of research about what to do. Ansley admits that even a million dollar fund would not be enough to cover all its assets.

"It's not really a self insurance fund," he said.

"The million dollar target is, we're working on the idea that if one of the priest's homes in an area was destroyed, then that would be enough to replace a priest's home.

"For most of our churches we would just look for other alternatives, and maybe the fund could be used for demolition costs.

"But in almost every case we would be looking at our church and saying we won't rebuild, we've got another option. A major disaster, of course, we would have to deal with that."

Ansley said parishioners had reacted positively to the idea.

"The response we have had is almost enthusiastically in favour, and I was expecting a lot of backlash."

Each parish independently made its own decision and had agreed, he said.

"I'm at St Mary's Basilica in Invercargill, magnificent church. Of course we'd be devastated if it fell down, but if it fell down we wouldn't be rebuilding it anyhow, even if it was insured."

The church could find better uses for the money paid to insurance premiums, he said.

"In my parish here last year, the insurance was $26,000. That's a lot of money for a community to be paying and I think the people would see, we could spend that $26,000 doing other things."

Catholic schools will not be part of the change, however.

"Personally I would love to do with it our schools but we are legally obliged by the government to insure our schools."

The insurance paid for schools is even more than for the churches, around $300,000 a year, Ansley said.

Reproduced with permission