The technical advisory group is made up of the same advisers who wrote the drift re-entry plan which was implemented by the Pike River Recovery Agency (PRRA).
In a report prepared by the PRRA, Minister Responsible for Pike River Re-entry Andrew Little was given the option of directing the agency to complete a full risk assessed and costed plan or to simply decline to implement the plan without any further consultation with the families or their experts.
The group of Pike's families are dismayed by the decision rejecting their plan, claiming there has been no consultation, amounting to a "breach of the Government's commitments to the families".
They say it has caused "them further pain", according to a press statement released today.
"The report prepared for Minister Little states, 'while the plan is technically feasible, there would be significant costs associated with developing and implementing the detail," the statement says.
"However, as Minister Little has rejected the agency option to complete a full costing on the plan, the figures and time frames quoted in the agency report cannot be substantiated and appear to be guesswork."
The figures included in the plan presented by the families were, they say, supported by data provided by the agency itself.
And while Little says there has never been a "blank cheque" with regards to the drift re-entry, the families say "no one expects there to be".
"That said, early on the police advised that they were treating this investigation as a 29 man homicide," the families statement says.
"Never before has the New Zealand justice system been subjected to arbitrary fiscal restraints in this way.
"The Government has effectively taken a 'cut and run' stance in relation to Pike River.
"They made commitments to the families and to the people of New Zealand but the minister seems to have forgotten what they were."
