Back to Blog

Serious offenders aged 10-13 to get 'fast-tracked intervention'

The Government says it's taking further steps to tackle growing youth crime, announcing a "circuit-breaker" to crack down on young repeat offenders. Children aged between 10 and 13 who repeatedly engaged in serious offending would have a fast-track intervention introduced within 24 to 48 hours of crimes being committed. Funding of $2 million would also be spread across four regions - Auckland, Waikato, Northland and Bay of Plenty - to fund locally-led solutions to reduce youth crime. T...

Harmonic Resonators

Since going viral for their feel-good folklore take on waiata Māori years ago on Facebook and YouTube, whānau band The Harmonic Resonators are back again with another album featuring hits by Fleetwood Mac, The Doobie Brothers, Coldplay and others – all in te reo Māori - and called Rongo ki te Oro. Having travelled from Tauranga to talk to teaomāori.news, Jenny Hantler spoke of son and lead singer Jeremy’s passion for music as someone who “couldn’t stop moving” to any genre but...

'Moana' decision appealed,

The nation’s highest court has been asked to hear an appeal on the “Moana” case. Janet Mason, the lawyer acting for Moana’s mother, has made an urgent application for leave to appeal a High Court decision to the Supreme Court. Moana, who is now 7 years old, is a Māori girl placed in the care of a Pākehā couple in September 2018. The girl had been traumatised and neglected before Oranga Tamariki placed her with the couple (the “Smiths”), after they agreed to care for her on a ...

Fewer Kiwi children living in poverty

At just 22 years old, Walter has weathered enough trauma to fill several lifetimes. He has lived on the streets, been in and out of prison, and has attempted suicide multiple times."I was on the streets for years," he said. "Stealing, fighting, and smoking drugs every day." Poverty, what he calls a "generational curse", gave him nowhere else to turn. Now, he hopes to save others from the path he struggled to escape from. Walter is one of many kids left behind, Children's Commissioner Judge Franc...

Baby blood donor battle:

Two divergent realities came crashing together in the High Court at Auckland on Tuesday morning, with the life of a gravely ill baby on the line. On one side was a young family. They do not want their ailing six-month-old boy to receive a blood transfusion during life-saving heart surgery if the donors have received a Covid-19 vaccine. On the other was the weight of established scientific and medical evidence.Link to video, interview and article: Baby blood donor battle: The court case wher...

From emergency motel

Kisa Vaoga​ is hoping her new home will be the start of a new life that will see her one day become a judge. The mother of two this week moved into her new home in Taitā with partner Jaiden​ Ah-Waihi​ and children Leiloa, 5​, and Jhavis, 9​. Having spent time in a motel after living with her mum, Vaoga is delighted to have found somewhere permanent and suitable for her children. “It feels like home.” Her new home – part of a 19-home development called Te Ara o Takapū Taitā​ ...

‘Coming home in a box’:

An Auckland mum has described the almost helpless feeling of watching her 14-year-old daughter get sucked into a life of stealing cars and disobeying authorities with a youth ram raid gang. She fears her runaway child “coming home in a box” and believes the disruption of Covid-19 lockdowns on daily school life started the chaos. From what Zoe* knows, her daughter joined a group of about 15 teens - most of them like-minded school drop-outs - and has committed ram raids on businesses, includin...

Bid to change river's name from controversial colonial leader

A Hawke’s Bay river named after an 18th century British military leader of questionable character may be in for a change of identity after the NZ Geographic Board agreed to consult on a new name proposed by mana whenua. Clive River, which enters the Pacific Ocean near the town of Clive, midway between Hastings and Napier, was given its name in 1975. It’s a short river, created by the confluence of the Karamū and Raupare streams, just a few kilometres inland from the town. The bed of the riv...

‘Momentous’:

Wellington: New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has issued a “long overdue” apology to a Maori tribe for warmongering and almost two centuries of breaches to the Treaty of Waitangi. Ardern travelled to the King Country settlement of Te Kuiti to issue the Crown apology, the first she has delivered personally as part of reconciliation and treaty settlement efforts. After 30 years of negotiations with the Ngati Maniapoto tribe, the government agreed to $NZ165 million ($155 million) o...

Clinical training for teachers to ID students

A new initiative will have mental health clinicians train teachers to identify and support rangatahi experiencing mental health issues. Under the early intervention programme, mental health clinicians working in Te Whatu Ora’s Marinoto (Child and Adolescent Mental Health) team will implement an apprenticeship training model for teachers in some intermediate schools in North and West Auckland. The project has an initial capacity of up to 18 schools annually, with those prioritised in the first ...

The tricky complexities of Māori tapu

Women being kept away from a building site in Hamilton is one of the latest examples of traditional Māori tapu raising questions in a modern context from those who don’t understand it. Read this story in te reo Māori and English here. / Pānuitia tēnei i te reo Māori me te reo Pākehā ki konei. “Sacred or restricted” is a simple te reo Pākehā definition of tapu and contrasts with noa (free of tapu, ordinary, unrestricted). A member of the public queried why a fen...

Call for customary rahui over

A call for a customary rāhui over the Parimahu reef area in Central Hawke’s Bay produced a lively hui at the Pōrangahau Hall recently. The Ngāti Kere Hapū Authority (NKHA) called the community-wide hui on Sunday, November 27 after a call from the mana whenua group, Ngāti Kere Tangata Kaitiaki (NKTK) and the whole-of-community group Pōrangahau Taiapure to establish a customary rāhui over the area. The customary rāhui was proposed as a prelude to a wider inshore fisheries sustainability ...

'Repeated, catastrophic failure'

Repeated and catastrophic failure constituting systemic abuse. This is the view of a commissioner of the Royal Commission into historical Abuse in Care in both state and faith-based institutions.The stories of abuse inflicted on neurodiverse people and those with disabilities have been released today in a study by the Abuse in Care inquiry, which highlights repeated failures by carers to protect them.Link to article: 'Repeated, catastrophic failure' in care institutions - commissioner (1n...

One in five schools needs intensive help,

One in five schools needs intensive help and only 15 percent have effective teaching firmly established, the Education Review Office says. It also warned nearly half the early childhood services it visited in the past financial year breached regulatory or licensing criteria. The Education Review Office's (ERO) annual report for 2021-22 said 30 percent of schools it reviewed were in the "foundation" stage of establishing effective teaching, meaning they had a low level of maturity in that area. A...

Up to 20,000 people at the park:

IronMāori Toa will create a bit of cultural and sporting history on Saturday.Dubbed the world’s first indigenous full-distance triathlon, it marks the culmination of 14 years of planning and development. As many as 250 athletes - aged between 26 and 76 - are expected to dive into the water off Ahuriri when the 3.8-kilometre ocean swim starts at 6.30am, followed by a 180km cycle and 42.2km run which will finish at the Napier Soundshell. Competitors have 17 hours to complete the gruelling cours...

Moving moments at Hawke’s Bay marae

At 4.30am on Saturday, November 26 history was made with the dawn opening ceremony of the Manahau meeting house at Wharerangi Marae. This has long been a dream of the people of that marae and all their hard efforts came to fruition with the celebrations held at the official opening. The dawn ceremony was carried out by a kāhui tohunga comprised of local practitioners and also those of the Te Pōkaitara academy. The incantations rang out one after the other as the hundreds of visitors advanced o...

Hillmorton Hospital's Tupuna mental health unit

The Tupuna mental health unit at Christchurch's Hillmorton Hospital is due to close amid ongoing staff shortages, with the building to be "refreshed" and ready to accommodate new patients from next August. It follows an "extensive consultation process" with feedback from 47 submitters, Te Whatu Ora's Canterbury general manager specialist mental health service, Dr Greg Hamilton, said today in a statement. The inpatient extended care unit currently provides 24-hour care and support for people wi...

High Court dismisses Hawke's Bay farmer's appeal

A Hawke’s Bay farmer’s efforts to overturn a decision by the Environment Court that part of his land be classed as wāhi taonga has been dismissed by the High Court. Peter and Caroline Raikes​ brought the appeal after 70 hectares on their farm, Titiōkura Station​ in northern Hawke’s Bay, was found to be a “site of significance”. Justice Christine Grice​ described the matter as a “direct cultural clash about religious views” during an appeal heard in the High Court at We...

Māori and Pacific academics at Auckland University of Technology

Māori and Pacific academics at one of the country’s biggest universities are concerned about the impact of job cuts, with one saying the campus feels like a “morgue”. Auckland University of Technology earlier this year proposed a restructure in an effort to reduce costs. AUT’s Vice Chancellor, Damon Salesa, said the proposed cuts were driven by a decrease in international student enrolments, rising inflation and neighbouring economic pressures. Under the proposal, 250 workers could lose...

Morgan Godfery:

OPINION: Property developers in Whakatāne, a lifestyle town in the Eastern Bay of Plenty, plan to build a rest home over an ancient graveyard. To an ordinary person that plan seems, at best, distasteful and, at worst, malicious. Who would send their parents or grandparents to live atop the bones of other people? Yet MMS GP Ltd, the developer, with resource consent from the Whakatāne District Council, intends on proceeding anyway. So 240 residential allotments, several roads, and...

Otago University PhD student

Otago University PhD student Mana Mitchell will use a $138k health research grant to further develop mātauranga Māori to guide biomedical research. Mitchell (Ngāti Maniapoto) is one of the 19 researchers and students from Otago awarded $3.8 million as part of the latest Health Research Council’s development awards. Two years into his PhD studies and three years into his medical degree. Mitchell says that today’s medical practices are not working for Māori, and are one of his drivers to w...

Waimārama:

A ban on taking pāua along a large section of Hawke’s Bay coastline - including Waimārama - has been extended for another two years. Ngāti Kahungunu chair Bayden Barber says it will “do a world of good for our pāua” and warns neighbouring areas may also follow suit with restrictions of their own. The ban protects blackfoot pāua from being harvested around Waimārama and was introduced in December 2020 by Fisheries New Zealand.Link to article: Waimārama: Pāua ban extended for tw...

Hundreds of Oranga Tamariki staff

Oranga Tamariki says it is in talks with a collective of wānanga after hundreds of ministry staff successfully completed a Māori-focused cultural capability training programme. The programme, called Tū Māia, was delivered by wānanga (learning institutions) and forms part of the wider Oranga Tamariki Te Hāpai Ō strategy designed to improve outcomes for tamariki and their whānau. It was established by Tā Wira Gardiner during his time as Secretary for Children and Oranga Tamariki...

School rejects criticism

A parent believes an Invercargill primary school’s decision to axe a whānau class for its students is a backward step, but the school disagrees. Parent Vanessa Shanks (Ngāi Tahu) said the full-time whānau class at Invercargill Middle School was different to the other classes in the school. Its year 4 to 6 students choose to be in it to learn in te reo Māori and English and learn about the culture, history and stories of Māori people. The class had given many children “belonging” with ...

Oranga Tamariki's senior leadership and pay packets grew

Top staff at Oranga Tamariki have seen their salary pool grow to $17 million over the past four years despite the ministry being castigated by ministers as frontline staff threaten strike action and children continue to fall through the cracks. In September, the salary pool for the top tiers of Oranga Tamariki managers, not including the chief executive increased to $17 million – an average of $208,000 per staff member. The number of top tier managers has grown by a third to 84 from 63 in the ...