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Making the Grade:

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Whakaata Māori

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Crown intent on absorbing kura kaupapa

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Emotional haka

Led by the New Zealand Defence Force, they were embraced by the descendants of the Māori Battalion, including one 87-year-old who was determined to make her ancestors proud. Under the April sun in Turkey, New Zealanders embarked on an Anzac mission - making the steep eight-kilometre walk up from Anzac Cove to the New Zealand national memorial at Chunuk Bair.Link to video and article: Emotional haka concludes Anzac commemorations in Gallipoli (msn.com)...

New iwi-led plan paves way for child support

When Oranga Tamariki attempted to uplift a newborn baby from its mother in Hawke's Bay Hospital in 2019, it was filmed and became the basis of an exposé on the Newsroom website, sparking an outcry and a national debate.In direct response to that, Oranga Tamariki on Wednesday handed back power to local iwi Ngāti Kahungunu to look after the welfare of their own tamariki with their own support networks.Link to video and article: New iwi-led plan paves way for child support after Oranga Tamar...

Whānau Ora sign ground-breaking deal

A ground-breaking first was signed between Whānau Ora Tāmaki collective, Te Pae Herenga o Tāmaki and Māori business network, Whāriki to improve the Māori Auckland economy.Te Pae Herenga’s lead partner, Te Whānau o Waipareira CEO, John Tamihere is pleased that within two months these two entities have a common goal, to make life easier for whānau.“To now have in-depth access into the Tāmaki Māori business sector is invaluable for us as a collective because we will accelerate our vis...

A man and his dog:

Halfway through a six-week tour of the South Island, Gary Anderson and his dog Kairo have been overwhelmed by the support they have received on their fundraising ride.Anderson has been riding his Yamaha XJR 1300 with a sidecar for his furry friend to sit in, from the East Coast down to Stewart Island, then back up to Lake Takapō/Tekapo and Wānaka, before heading to Picton.He is a member of Taranaki Riders Against Teen Suicide (RATS), a non-profit group working to support people through difficu...

The nurses ditching New Zealand

It took Kiwi nurse Sandra McMullan more than 24 hours to get to her first job in Australia and there was no one to meet her at the airport, but she cannot stop smiling.To start her nursing stint in Bamaga - the northernmost town on Australia's mainland - she first had to call the hospital to be picked up from the little airport and, when she arrived at the office, someone handed her some sheets and pointed her to her house. Shortly after, she started her work in wound care.Link to video and arti...

'You cannot get rid of the mould':

Once a swamp, always a swamp - that is what one Kāinga Ora tenant says about the home she's lived in for decades, built next to a creek in Auckland.The house is among more than 4000 in the state housing provider's Auckland portfolio that were built on flood prone land.Oakley Creek winds through the Auckland suburb Mt Roskill, where many state houses straddle the waterway.Kāinga Ora tenant Elizabeth Gedye has lived next to the creek for 41 years and said her back yard regularly flooded.She did ...

Teachers complain of racism, bullying, unsafe practices

A support group for early childhood teachers is gathering evidence of what teachers say are traumatic and horrific experiences at a small number of early childhood services.The Teachers Advocacy Group, a support network run by teacher Susan Bates, has been told of bullying, racism, and breaches of regulations designed to protect children's health and safety.Bates said teachers had described centres that had poor or no resources, unsupervised children and stressed babies.There were also consisten...

French delegation returns WWI taonga

More than 100 years since a te reo Māori message was carved into chalk tunnels under the French town of Arras during World War I, a delegation has returned the taonga to descendants of the New Zealand Tunnelling Company.On Monday, the eve of Anzac Day, a mayoral delegation from the city of Arras in northern France returned a framed print of the message left by members of the 43 Māori Battalion Pioneers in World War 1.Receiving it on behalf of the group, known as Kia Maumahara Māori Pioneers �...

Far North Lotto winner

A man from Kaitāia is celebrating his “crazy” win of $18,611.His win — one of sixteen nationwide to come away with nearly $20,000 from Lotto second division drawn on Saturday, April 15 — was outdone by only three players who also won Powerball for total wins of $25,196, one of them from Whangārei.The man, who wishes to remain anonymous, said he plays Lotto “now and then”.He had bought his ticket on MyLotto and didn’t check it until nearly a week after the draw on Friday, April 21...

People who need modified public housing have to wait

If you're disabled and looking for accessible public housing, you will wait 90 days more compared to non-disabled people.The average wait time for public housing is 344 days, according to data released under the Official Information Act (OIA) by the Ministry of Social Development (MSD), which manage the Public Housing register.However, the average wait time for people who have requested a modified house is 434 days.MSD does not record the nature of the housing that a client has entered, but the ...

Zealandia:

Scientists have reconstructed the 100-million-year story of the lost continent that Aotearoa sits upon, in a series of maps charting the formation of Te Riu-a-Māui/Zealandia.Being nearly completely underwater – New Zealand represents the largest portion of it above sea level – what is the world’s youngest, smallest and thinnest continent is largely invisible to us.But, if we drained the oceans, we could see it unfurling some 4.9 million sq km across the South Pacific.Link to article: ...

Māori traditional construction techniques ‘conclusively proven’

Endangered Māori construction techniques have been “conclusively proven” to be capable of withstanding major earthquakes, Professor Anthony Hoete (Ngāti Awa, Ngāti Ranana) says, after his team successfully tested a full-scale timber structure in Ōpōtiki this weekend.This knowledge will now be used to rebuild a historic Bay of Plenty wharenui, Tānewhirinaki.Professor Hoete, an architect and researcher, along with a team from the University of Auckland, used endangered construction knowl...

St Peter's school carves piece off farm

St Peter’s School is embarking on a residential subdivision venture to ensure the long-term financial independence of the school.The private Cambridge school has entered a partnership with local developers 3Ms to transform 32 hectares of the school’s 170 hectare farmland into a residential subdivision over the next four years.In a dawn ceremony on Monday morning, the subdivision was named Arikirua by mana whenua - Ngāti Koroki Kahukura and Ngāti Hauā.The name comes from a nearby Pā site ...

Retirees are "suffering in silence"

Around 40% of retired New Zealanders have to get by on their pension alone – a maximum of $496.37 a week for a single person living alone.Unlike previous generations, many don't own their own homes. To balance the budget in a cost-of-living crisis, something inevitably must give.Age Concern chief executive Karen Billings-Jensen told Breakfast while last night’s Sunday story on retirees struggling to make ends meet “would have been quite shocking for a lot of people".She said "it is the rea...

David Tipene-Leach:

David Tipene-Leach’s 40-odd years as a doctor has covered a period of significant progress. There’s still the need for more Māori and Pacific doctors, nurses and other health workers. There’s still a shortage in New Zealand’s health system of professionals who are helping fix the ills for many of their Māori and Pacific patients. And there’s still a blindness among privileged New Zealanders of the inequities in our society.But all along — as a GP, hospital house surgeon, researcher...

What if we think about native forests

David Hall is the Climate Policy Director at Toha.OPINION: After Cyclone Gabrielle, forestry experts are calling for permanent native forest to be restored to the upper catchments of the East Coast.This would transform local biodiversity. But the reduction of climate-related risks is the leading rationale.Forest canopy and tree roots protect the region’s soft soils from wind and rain, which reduces erosion and sedimentation.Flood risk is also reduced because trees capture and divert rain water...

Teens crawl into laundromat machines

When Sam Sheikh opened Double Bubble Laundromat in the Hamilton suburb of Dinsdale, it didn’t occur to him that the overwhelming scent inside wouldn’t be laundered clothes, but deodorant.The fragrance isn’t as a result of perspiring customers, but a group of young people who are using Sheikh’s shop as a space to hang out and huff deodorant.The group of about a dozen young people have been loitering in his business for the last month, Sheikh says. Often getting so high off deodorant that ...

Architectural experiment tests seismic merits

Technology from the 17th century used in making waka for sailing the Pacific is now being trialled in our disaster preparedness.Seismic testing is being conducted in the Bay of Plenty this weekend to test the merits of the ancient Māori building technique of mīmiro.It might not look quite like Grand Designs but if successful, this architectural experiment at the foothill of Te Urewera could revolutionise the way we build and earthquake-proof marae using ancestral knowledge.Link to video and ar...

Māori worker injuries in workplaces

Today Te Roopu Marutau o Aotearoa held the first Māori health and safety conference in Kirikiriroa, with the aim of promoting a “by Māori for Māori” approach to achieve equitable outcomes for Māori workers.According to WorkSafe, there are 103 work-related injury claims for every 1000 Māori fulltime workers. That’s compared to 83 claims for every 1000 Pākehā workers.Te Roopu Marutau o Aotearoa (the Māori Health and Safety Association) chairman Wayne Kohi acknowledges the poor statis...

Kids still 'trickling' into school

South Auckland schools are experiencing an influx of enrolments as new students keep walking through their doors months into the year, educators say.Despite the sharp growth, principals are still concerned for the thousands of pupils who disappeared from the education system during Covid-19.Grant McMillan, the principal at James Cook High School in Manurewa, said many students enrolling in his school hadn’t been in education for about a year.“We’re seeing a slow returning to schooling afte...

Salvation Army

The Salvation Army is making strategic tactical decisions to Māori who make up 40 per cent of its client database.The Salvation Army has asked Anglican Bishop Te Kitohi Pikaahu to chair a revamped Māori Ministry Rūnanga which will provide overall strategic guidance to the organisation, which receives government funding to manage a range of social services.Link to article: Salvation Army moves to incorporate Māori to help set new strategic guidance - NZ Herald...

Could changes to proposed law

Traditional healers fear echoes of a tool of colonisation, but the Government says it’s listening to concerns as a “messy” law-change makes its way through Parliament. Eugene Bingham reports.Even before the floodwaters had receded, even before the roads around her Hawke’s Bay home were safe to drive on again, Dr Charlotte Mildon started getting calls for help.“The marae down the road was asking me to come, and I said ‘as soon as I can, I will’,” says Mildon, recalling the immedia...