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UK company Invictus

A UK company has been slammed for using Māori culture to sell carpet.Invictus Carpet & Flooring incorporates numerous elements of Māori culture in its website branding and its advertising, including a video ad released in 2015 showing white children performing a haka in their living room.The company has caught the attention of Kiwis in the UK who have expressed concern at the use of the Māori cultural elements.And Māori cultural adviser Karaitiana Taiuru told the Herald he had "never seen an...

Te Puea Marae whānau

The marae was thrown into the spotlight five years ago as it opened its doors to help dozens of homeless whānau.It is still helping vulnerable families, as a transitional housing provider, giving them a place to live and wraparound support as they wait for a permanent home.Out the back of Te Puea Marae, behind the wharekai, are five portable cabins. The cabins are basic - a couple of beds, a kitchenette, and a small bathroom. There is a shared kitchen and whānau room as well."They're pretty ba...

Consent should be basis for all learning,

A Christchurch student-led group working to tackle sexual violence and rape culture plans to take its action a step further by presenting Parliament with a school curriculum focused on consent.“Consent should be the basis for all learning,” one admin of Culture CHCHange said.The group, initially organised by three Christchurch Girls’ High School students, has grown since it first came together in March, and is stepping up the fight for better education on sex, consent, and eradicating...

NZ lagging behind other developed countries

Around 40,000 Kiwis aged 15 to 25 are believed to be responsible for providing a significant level of care for family who are ill, disabled or struggling with addiction or mental health issues. The issue was brought to light after an in-depth investigation by Sunday looked at how this hidden group of young people have been propping up their families.  New Zealand ranks bottom of the global index for young carers, with little to no awareness of the huge degree of responsibility held by these...

Imagining Decolonisation with Moana Jackson - our first BWB Talks video!

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Māori content shake up

All law schools in Aotearoa will have to include Māori content in their core courses, AUT Law School Interim Dean Khylee Quince (Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Porou, Te Roroa) has told followers online."Well, my first meeting of the Council of Legal Education was a memorable one. The CLE prescribes the core courses that all schools offering an LLB must deliver - public, criminal, contract, torts, property," Quince said in a Facebook post Friday."Today we unanimously passed a resolution requiring the te...

Oranga Tamariki strip searches

Minister for Children Kelvin Davis says he doesn't want kids being strip-searched in Oranga Tamariki facilities, but it can't just be stopped without a replacement. © Video - Newshub Nation; Image - Getty Images Kelvin Davis on Newshub Nation.Newshub Nation on Saturday morning revealed dozens of strip searches have been carried out in the state agency's Youth Justice residences in the past six months, mostly at a single facility in Christchurch.Items found ranged from broken ...

South African rugby team stops

A South African rugby team who went viral over their use of the haka have stopped performing the Māori challenge after being requested to do so by New Zealand Rugby. Last month, Walter Sisulu University were filmed doing a pre-match haka in a Varsity Shield game against the DUT Rhinos in which they performed a combination of both Ka Mate and Kapa or Pango. The team, nicknamed the All Blacks, said at the time the haka was performed out of admiration for how New Zealand's national team plays...

Educating rangatahi

"Don't just use books as a base to teach children.”That's according to Ha,ilton's Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Te Ara Rima principal, Tony Walker.He says the best teaching tool is leaving the classroom and connecting with the land, sea, and forest to grasp its infinite wisdom from a Māori perspective.Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Te Ara Rima made its way to the Waikato River today and took in history lessons from Kīngitanga elders. The childrens' minds and hearts were filled with stories of Te R...

Mahara Tatou: Whanau Ora: A Critical Engagement

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HE WHAKAARO HERE WHAKAUMU MŌ AOTEAROA: Revisited

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Mana Ririki

Link to website: Mana Ririki | Inspiring change for Tamariki...

FASD Support Group: Blockhouse Bay

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He Puapua report:

Concerns about the He Puapua report - on how to better uphold indigenous rights - are being dismissed by Minister for Māori Development Willie Jackson.Jackson has prepared a draft paper, setting out the next steps the government could take in response to He Puapua, which he says will go to Cabinet soon.He Puapua was handed to former minister for Māori development Nanaia Mahuta in 2019 and suggests the establishment of a separate Māori parliament or upper house an...

Why Māori women aren't accessing the healthcare they need,

Māori health professionals are hopeful the new Māori Health Authority will improve access to care for wāhine, one blaming colonisation for the inequities they face. The Government two weeks ago announced a major reform of the health system, getting rid of the 20 separate district health boards and setting up an agency focused on Māori health outcomes, which have long fallen behind that of other ethnicities. Māori women have it the worst of all, experts on a panel hosted ...

Don't play sick children off against each other -

Children's Commissioner Andrew Becroft is warning Pharmac not to play one group of children with a life-threatening illness off against another.His comments come after RNZ revealed that Pharmac is likely to end the blanket provision of child cancer drugs.Pharmac says it has long viewed the special exemption for child cancer drugs as "inconsistent" but it was jolted into finally addressing the issue in response to a discrimination claim taken under the Human Rights Act.Patient advocate ...

Why whānau should be discussing

Money might be the last taboo topic, but entrepreneur Rachel Petero says lifting the veil on her and her partner’s finances have helped them on their quest to become debt-free.Petero, founder of consultancy Rise2025 and co-author of Take Your Space: Successful Women Share Their Secrets and husband John embarked on a two-year goal to eradicate all of their debt, including mortgages and about $50,000 worth of business debt. They found an expert to steer them on the right course, and re...

Smacking children doesn't work,

Participants in the study were members of the Christchurch Health and Development Study (CHDS) - a longitudinal study of 1,265 children, including 630 females, born in Christchurch over a four-month period during 1977. According to the Christchurch campus of Otago University, this cohort has been studied regularly from birth to age 40. The latest data, released today, shows the patterns of discipline used by 763 parents from the cohort between 2002 and 2017. Senior research fellow at the Christc...

Ardern acknowledges 'failings' in state care

The Prime Minister made the admission on Friday after the Waitangi Tribunal released the findings of an inquiry launched in October 2019 over concerns Māori children were significantly overrepresented in state care. The Waitangi Tribunal has told the Crown to step back and let Māori establish an independent Māori authority to overhaul Oranga Tamariki, the Government department that came under the spotlight after distressing child uplifts were caught on camera. "I have...

Waitangi Tribunal: Oranga Tamarki: Report

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Oranga Tamariki:

An independent Māori authority has been proposed by the Waitangi Tribunal to work out how to eliminate the need for tamariki Māori to be placed in state care, but it has stopped short of supporting the abolition of Oranga Tamariki.The tribunal held an urgent inquiry after Oranga Tamariki came under scrutiny for its removal practices of tamariki and pēpi Māori from their families, following an attempt to take a newborn baby from a teenage mother at Hawke's Bay Hospital in 2019.The hearin...

Māori teachers who fought school over te reo honorifics

Last month, Breakfast talked to Hawke's Bay student teachers Arihi Raiha Hutana and Rangi Mitchell, who during their school placements were both told they could not use the Māori titles matua and whaea in the classroom. The direct translation of the titles mean uncle and aunty, however they also have a greater significance and are a mark of respect to their culture and heritage. The pair were instead left with two options — to change their titles to Mr and Mrs or leave to train ...

Good intentions are not enough:

A challenging essay by Michaela Keeble on the problems of how Pākehā fiction presents and frames MāoriI read Lawrence Patchett's novel The Burning River when it first came out late in 2019.A year later, I’m brave enough to contribute to a public conversation about Pākehā writing, so that Māori don’t always have to do the work of responding, and so that Pākehā have access to an alternative perspective.Critiquing the fundamental decisions of a novel about identity makes a rev...

Māori and Pacific expertise

Māori and Pacific expertise is being excluded from advice and decision-making roles around science policy, according to a new report.Te Pūtahitanga: A Tiriti-led science-policy approach for Aotearoa New Zealand, states the exclusion has been particularly evident during the Covid-19 pandemic.Lead researcher Tracey McIntosh said because the impacts of Covid-19 are experienced differentially, the pandemic has revealed “deeply embedded inequities” in New Zealand.This report is lookin...

Boy with autism asks Children's Commissioner:

Judge Andrew Becroft intervened in the case after the boy, 13, wrote to him following his suspension for his involvement in a fight.The boy moved to the school last year as a directed enrolment, meaning the Ministry of Education ordered the school to enrol him after it initially refused.Becroft recently defended the rights of such children after the Principals' Federation suggested schools refuse to enrol them unless the ministry provided sufficient support to keep them and others...