Mental health advocate Mike King demands action from Andrew Little over Ministry of Health deputy CEO's funding comments

Mental health advocate Mike King is calling on Health Minister Andrew Little to take action over comments from the Ministry of Heath's deputy CEO Robyn Shearer.

In early July, Shearer said the ministry was unable to fund Gumboot Friday, which was spearheaded by King, because the application was sent "outside the planned procurement processes".

But King has called the claim a "blatant lie", designed to perpetuate a false narrative that he's "dumb". He told Newshub he actually hadn't applied in the first place.

"The fact is, I have never applied for funding for Gumboot Friday - we have never put in an application and if you haven't put in an application, it can't be late."

On Friday he called for Shearer to resign over the comments for "deliberately misleading the New Zealand public".

Shearer didn't comment on King's call for her resignation.

"We run Government-prescribed procurement processes. These are required to be fair, open, transparent and equitable for any organisation applying for funds," she said.

"To be able to fund any organisation or service, we need to have requests for funding come through a process that is designed to be transparent and fair."

Now King is calling for Minister of Health Andrew Little to get involved.

"I am still waiting on the Health Minister Andrew Little to take action. Will this be the standard we set of our senior officials in New Zealand?" he asked.

King reaffirmed neither he nor Gumboot Friday had put forward an application for funding, which they are attempting to confirm via an Official Information Act (OIA) request.