“Every time decision-makers are given the opportunity to take action that is pro-equity, they find reasons not to.” — Dr Rhys Jones.
“The challenge for small parties inside a coalition is to survive and hold on to your kaupapa.” — Catherine Delahunty, former Green MP.
"There is no doubt that certain voices are privileged by the editorial process of health and medical journals, whereas others are systematically screened out. " — Vanessa Selak, Rod Jackson, Matire Harwood.
“Why are we even looking at restricting a successful programme that’s doing exactly what it was designed to do? Have we reached maximum equity?” — Māori medical student at Otago University.
“The overarching reality is that politics remains incredibly disconnected from some of the communities who most need structural change.” — Leah Damm.
“The very real life effect of this rumour has been felt by the Pacific community. There have been multiple racist attacks on Pacific peoples online and verbal abuse in person." — Emmaline Pickering-Martin.
“I’ve been part of endless debates which assume that we Pākehā can’t trust tangata whenua to look after the environment as well as we can.” — Catherine Delahunty.
“Overall, a key issue is the need for the government to provide Māori and Pacific whānau with ‘choice and control’ rather than ‘forced and compulsory’ isolation management.” — Dr Elana Curtis.
“Predictably, we’ve seen damaging racist views vilifying Pacific communities on mainstream and social media since the family at the centre of the Auckland cluster was first identified as Pacific.” — Dr Collin Tukuitonga.
“JT leads a fight to win at least one of the Māori electorates for the Māori Party next month and Willie leads the Labour Party campaign to stop him. Neither can afford to let the other one win.” — Matt McCarten.
“I’m not suggesting the NZ Public Party is knowingly supporting white supremacist groups. What I’m saying is that their rhetoric both originates from, and serves, white supremacist groups.” — Tina Ngata
“We’re committed to ensuring that Māori hands continue to have a firm grip on all the levers needed to transform our lives — not just on the shovels.” — Te Kāhui Amokura.
“Despite Pasifika women being some of the leading figures in my life, I never saw their myriad, colourful personalities reflected on screen.” — Litia Tuiburelevu on the new comedy sketch show 'Sis'.
Is it time to turn to Māori law for the answer to a legal issue that would affect all New Zealanders? — Māmari Stephens on the Peter Ellis case and the growing role and status of tikanga Māori in Aotearoa's laws.
“Her caucus hates and fears her in equal measure, but she will survive because the Trumpian base in the National Party love her. And, more importantly, she’s more ruthless than any politician who may covet her new throne.” — Matt McCarten.
A landmark decision delivered by the US Supreme Court last week has stunned Native American communities because of its forceful defence of their rights, writes Kennedy Warne.
"One of the perceived political difficulties to arriving at a settlement that will attract broad public support is that 'private land' is involved. But this is a red herring that misleads and distracts us from the relevant and important questions." — David Williams.
The current protests over names and statues isn’t about erasing history, writes Kennedy Warne. They’re awakening us to a side of history that’s been ignored and suppressed.
“Māori own the water because our customary native title has never been extinguished.” — John Tamihere.
"Pushback to call-outs is often from the powerful — those who benefit from the status quo." — Khylee Quince.
“To move from dismay to justice, we have to become serious about economics — about wealth and who has it, and why." — Kennedy Warne.
“Korowai Manaaki is run by Oranga Tamariki. It’s labelled as a ‘youth residence’. The authorities like to highlight the fact that it has a school and that it helps young people get on the right track. But, let’s be honest. It’s a prison.” — Kingi Snelgar.
“It’s difficult to escape the conclusion that our cannabis laws have been yet another tool of colonial oppression.” — Tim McKinnel on the upcoming cannabis referendum.
“Labour has bent over backwards to help businesses. But the government must make a priority of being mindful of the people at the bottom.” — Matt McCarten.
"If it seems surprising for a New Zealand court to provide a lesson in the Māori worldview as part of a decision about a proposal to mine the seabed, then it is equally surprising to hear the court lecture decision-makers on their failure to engage meaningfully with that worldview." — Kennedy Warne.
“The distrust many Māori have for police comes from recent and very legitimate places of fear, and it’s rooted in historical racism.” — Irihapeti Edwards & Stephanie Muller-Pallares on what you need to know about the Covid-19 response law.
"I know, and work in, communities where the feeling is that we are much closer to the precipice than we care to admit." – Tim McKinnel on why we need to resist militarised policing.
“Genuine, ongoing consultation and partnership with Māori throughout Covid-19 would have allowed concerns to be voiced, and potentially harmful unintended consequences like these to be mitigated.” — Dr Pounamu Jade Aikman.
“Much of the conversation that led to this budget came through Pacific media vehicles and not just in English.” — Richard Pamatatau
“Jacinda Ardern is lauded in this country, and feted as a leadership icon around the world, while Bridges flounders as an embarrassing and irrelevant lightweight. He exudes desperation and panic.” — Matt McCarten.
“Digital inclusion means doing things differently for, and with, Māori." — Kirkpatrick Mariner.
“If history is anything to go by, I fear any confidence would be misplaced.” — Pounamu Jade Aikman on whether police will apply their Covid-19 powers fairly and evenly.
“If these leaders succeed in getting things back to our deeply dysfunctional and inequitable normal, I’m sure many of us will be relieved and happy to forget the lesson that this Covid-19 pandemic has provided.” — Dylan Asafo.
New Zealand’s response to the short-term Covid-19 crisis should guide our response to the long-term issues facing us, writes Kerensa Johnston.
“The question of authority, how and where it’s exercised, and by whom, is not just an academic one.” — Kerensa Johnston.
“Millennials are the functional generation in an environment we’re all being forced to occupy: the online world.” — Wiremu Manaia.
“Let Aotearoa show the world how Indigenous rights and health equity can be meaningfully upheld and respected as we face this crisis together.” — Dr Elana Curtis.
“The reality is that we have a digital divide that mirrors the social and economic inequality in our society. And that’s a major concern as the Covid-19 pandemic exposes just how digitally unprepared we are.” — Kirkpatrick Mariner.
“It’s precisely in these moments of panic that a country’s inequities are most visible.” — Patrick Thomsen
Whanaungatanga, manaakitanga, and aroha will get us through, writes Moana Maniapoto. But stay in your bubble.
Moana Jackson on whether Bob Jones’s NBR column, as well as various other examples of his writing and public statements, express views that could be regarded as “racist or amount to hate speech”.
"Whether we like it or not, Aotearoa is a disease gateway to the Pacific," writes Lana Lopesi.
“The building of new relationships and the telling of new stories begins with the identification and ‘un-telling’ of colonisation’s past and present lies.” — Moana Jackson.
“My culture is not the cause of, and therefore not the solution to, contemporary Māori health inequities.” — Dr Elana Curtis
“When this government is led by a prime minister who is without question the most supportive of Māori empowerment in our history, Māori who sit around the cabinet table have no excuse.”
“Denying racism provides cover for racist attitudes and excuses for unequal outcomes. It gaslights people who’ve experienced racism, and blocks people who want to start the real work of moving beyond our colonial heritage.”
"How do we begin to have conversations about critical issues when we’re so far apart?"
"There’s a litany of examples, including admissions by the police themselves, of unconscious bias. Or racism, as we called it in the good old days." — Moana Maniapoto.
“Their tūpuna inhabit every room they enter, they embody every act, and they help guide every word.”
“The simplicity and universality of the NZ Superannuation model is the envy of many across the world, but it doesn’t address the needs of all — nor is it guaranteed to be sustainable without refinement.” — Peter Cordtz, interim Retirement Commissioner.
“The longer I stay at university, the more I realise that not only are universities not made for me, but there are institutional structures embedded within them that actively exclude me."
“The Treaty relationship needs to underpin the Climate Change Commission — and in fact, all the commissioners should be bound by Treaty obligations, such as to actively protect Māori rights.”
“With Māori people, it's not just one thing. There's a plethora of social barriers and problems that are against us at the moment, such as the recent kaupapa about Oranga Tamariki.”
“Even in the most liberal of spaces, such as universities that publicly commit to being a space that welcomes and celebrates Pasifika, we see a pattern of racism and sexism.”
Nine years of race and religious hate crime in New Zealand, based on news media reports between 2004 and 2012.
“Instead of placing Māori and Pacific literatures as late arrivals to English literature, we instead recognise a whakapapa of Māori literature that goes all the way back to Te Moana nui a Kiwa.”
“Those who cannot truly and freely choose should be protected by the state, not exposed to greater risk of death.”
"Let’s be honest. Both sides of politics abandoned the provinces last century. The Provincial Growth Fund is the first injection of capital in a long time."
The upcoming Crown commemorations of James Cook’s voyages are "part of a wider narrative in which racism has been denied more often than it has been acknowledged".
"Israel Folau’s demise is one that I can’t fully celebrate as a gay Pasifika person."—Seuta'afili Dr Patrick Thomsen.
“The number of far right groups or individuals isn’t important. It is their potential to harass and intimidate, and to be violent.”
“The Christchurch terrorist was not some ‘lone wolf’ psychopath. He may have acted alone, but he drew upon the shared ideas and history that still lurk in the shadows of every country that has been colonised.”
"We haven't 'lost our innocence', as so many have said. We never had any."
Maybe it's too late for some of us to learn our history, but why subject our children and mokopuna to the same fate?
“Every single approach to ‘fixing’ our people has been designed and decided by Pākehā — and it has made things worse.”
"The Māori experience of colonisation, disease, war, urbanisation and deprivation within this country is unique to Māori."
“I don’t just see numbers when I’m reporting research. I see people’s faces and hear their kōrero, and the impact inadequate gout management has on them — all from a condition that is entirely manageable.” Leanne Te Karu, prescribing pharmacist.
A one-stop shop of Māori news won’t mean less diversity of voices. —Mike Rehu, media consultant and broadcaster.
Our ability to care for and protect rivers, lakes, and wetlands is based on our ability to hear what they’re saying to us.
This is too important to leave to the whims of individual schools and teachers.
We won’t see significant change in educational achievement for Māori until we free our children from the negative narratives about them in their everyday lives.
We have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to transform our justice system so that it better serves humanity.
"Education can provide information but may do little to change a person’s worldview or heart."
Both major parties are more than happy to put the boot into Māori if that helps position them in the political centre at election time.
“Labour’s Māori MPs live and work in two worlds, relating to Māori voters as Māori, but also as workers, citizens and more. The problem for the Māori Party is it never did the same.” —Morgan Godfery, in an extract from a new book, 'Stardust and Substance'.
"For the first time in political aeons in Aotearoa, we’ve seen a demonstration of political leadership based on principle, on what must be done, rather than on populism."
“While the fight for whose truth is the truth continues, the reality of child sexual abuse remains the same. High. Under-reported. Not understood. Silent.”
“The so-called humanitarian colonisers who came here in the 19th century did not necessarily hate Maori. Indeed, they sometimes professed to love us and simply wanted to dispossess us in a sensitive and caring way.”
Failure is part of the Treaty settlement process, at least if you understand a settlement from the side of iwi and hapū — who never get what was taken.
"I think for those of us who identify as Pākehā, or who grew up in Pākehā dominant spaces, there's a special responsibility to strive to be aware of our own advantages in Aotearoa New Zealand."
“All that has come out of the moko kauae debate is that, as Māori, we’re still having to justify ourselves in order to appease those who think that what is ours should also be theirs.”
For a decade or more, there have been no marked gains in economic progress for Māori. Instead, there’s been stagnation and even some setbacks.
"The bliss of freedom enjoyed by those who have power should never mean the right to cause pain to those who are comparatively powerless."
A few weeks ago, Australia’s number one rugby star, Israel Folau, responded to a question on God’s...
Bob Jones’s column on Māori was “mean, malicious and infantile”, but it gets a Press Council pass under the humour defence.
“This is a small part of a much larger conversation we need to have about underemployment, security of work, and the standard of living you can expect in Aotearoa.”
If you can't kill us or shut us up, redefine us — then make us extinct. Problem solved.
So once again racism has been in the news. In the last few months, the numerous examples that have...
Frustrated by inaction from central and local government over kauri dieback disease, which is...
I love a good debate. When I was at St Joseph’s Māori Girls’ College, I was in the school debating...
In two years’ time, Uluṟu /Ayers Rock will be closed to climbing — an outcome the traditional...
New Zealand might not be ready to see itself as a Pacific country, but its Pacific future has...
Last week, I was at home finishing off a paper for a conference when I heard a hacking smoker’s...
When there were cries of “Māori snowflakes” in the media, it seemed to me the writer...
Birds are singing, the grass is greener — and after Winston Peters’ announcement, there’s...
The announcement of the new government by Winston Peters on Thursday night felt more like a...
The recent election had its usual, predictable talk about law and order — and that talk ranged...
Symbols come in many forms, tangible and the intangible. They tell us stories we may not even be...
At the beginning of this election campaign, I had the privilege of being with the Māori Party and...
As usual, we now wait for Winston to determine who will be our new government. Of course, there...
When I was young and apolitical, I didn’t get around to voting. It was the ‘80s. Party time. I met...
Amid the post-election clamour to form a coalition government, an interesting development has...
It is often said that politics is the art of the possible. The election campaign over the last few...
Laura Toailoa — 22, graduating in December with a BA (Honours) in English Literature, and...
In this essay from Ora Nui 3, Going Global, Hautahi Kingi, a Whanganui-born economist now working...
Lately, the polls have been telling us that maybe only three or four parties will make it into...
One of the things I’m really enjoying about this election season is how many cats are being...
Lisa Marriott, Professor of Taxation at Victoria University’s Business School, has spent six...
In the opening moments of the 1970s, my father left my mother and followed his elusive business...
Would Māori Television executives have considered broadcasting a show based on a Pākehā man in...
I’ve been to a fair few marae in Auckland. The first one was Hoani Waititi at Glen Eden, in...
Tukoroirangi Morgan, who’s been the president of the Māori Party over the past 12 months, has set...
Our father died in 2012. He’d been living in Australia for about 42 years and had only rarely...
Tahu Kukutai is an associate professor at the University of Waikato. As a specialist in...
When you step into the polling booth to vote on election day you are equal to every other...
I don’t get personally offended easily. I learned a while ago not to buy too much into the...
Alfred Ngaro did a lot of apologising after his “naïve, poorly worded” comments at the National...
When Adam Goodes, an Indigenous Australian footballer, was abused and humiliated by football...
I’ve always liked the idea of New Zealand having an unwritten constitution. I was a reporter...
It always requires a certain courage to speak the unspeakable. The increasing number of Māori men...
Twenty years ago I graduated from Whitireia Polytech with a Certificate in Journalism. I scraped...
Max Harris is a good bloke who has written a book. He doesn’t need me to repeat all his...
A couple of weeks ago, on a Lower Hutt street, a woman and her children decided to do something...
Four years ago, there was an unprecedented Chinese presence at Ōrākei marae. And that event...
A few years ago, I worked as a quiz writer on a TV show aimed at secondary school kids. Trial runs...
Every time Anne Tolley and Bill English talk about the new Ministry for Vulnerable Children, or...
I am no political pundit. I have no great insight into Māori politics on the national or local...
Willie Jackson can be really annoying. In fact, that was one of the reasons we divorced about 16...
“2016 has been the story of that first Christmas played out once again,” writes Rev Don Tamihere,...
Sex is a sticky topic to unravel and explore for many young Pacific Islanders, writes Laura...
Last month, almost every schoolkid in Wairarapa — more than 6,000 — stood together and performed a...
A few years ago, I visited Destiny Church in my hometown of Rotorua. It was my sister’s church and...
I started US election week in San Francisco, hanging with a bunch of Māori and native Hawaiians...
I remember waking up one morning last year, lying awake for a moment, feeling warm, contented and...
The NCEA final exams that are about to take place in a few weeks will, for a large proportion of...
Doesn’t life pack a wallop sometimes? One minute our family was laughing, singing and dancing,...
There has been a lot said lately about people of privilege behaving badly. You remember. There...
Sixty-five percent of young people who end up in front of the Youth Court are Māori. How do we...
Our daughter turned eight this week. She is a bright, happy and curious little girl with lots of...
‘Akilisi Pohiva, who was in New Zealand on his first state visit a few weeks ago, was the hero of...
I’ve grown up in Auckland. I can’t say I love it as a city, but I’ve spent enough time in...
Heading the list of present-day Māori challenges is still the apparently hopeless task of...
There’s all this doom and gloom in world news these days. Fear and fearmongering too. From the...
All quiet on the TPPA front. Is that good or bad news? Well, it’s a bit of both, actually. The bad...
I reckon we’ve come a long way in New Zealand. Yes, we have our fair share of nutters and racists,...
“Bet we’re the first Māori to come here,” I whispered to Toby when we landed in Inari, a tiny...
I imagine John Key must have had a lovely warm feeling as he announced before the world (well, the...
A Catholic education wasn’t something that we ever considered for our kids. It’s not...
Numbers. Spend an hour with Lance Norman and numbers will come up. Numbers of people. Numbers of...
We can all understand plain old personal racism. Like the time the friendly stranger at the bus...
Karakia are cultural practices, but are they religious as well? Or just spiritual? And how exactly...
We can all recall a horror story from our time at school. But Māori are likely to have a longer...
The other day we got a letter from our 13-year-old son at boarding school, wanting to know which...
Many Māori veterans have opposed a change to the New Zealand flag because it was the flag they...
Black Pearl, precious little girl, let me put you up where you belong. Yep. That was me. And that...
My mother was born in Washington, DC, the capital city of the United States, the seat of...
You’d think that, moving about in the biggest city in the world, you’d struggle for space on the...
There is a tin. It looks like Nana’s biscuit tin, but is actually the tin from which private...
It’s never very far from my memory. The time, in 1988, I took a taxi to Jupiter’s Casino on...
The first assignment that ever captured my imagination at school was to devise a three-week tour...
So it’s game on. Next week, on February 4, our PM, on behalf of himself and others who, like him,...
I’m not a great fan of political awards. The way I see it, it’s usually better to criticise than...
When Pala Molisa argued in an article on this website that prostitution was a form of male...
Like many others in New Zealand, I first became aware of Jonah when he played for Wesley College...
Anti-violence campaigns like White Ribbon are all about men being “part of the solution”. Around...
When I converted to Christianity about 15 years ago, my dear, late mother was not impressed. She...
Back in October 1994, Mike Smith headed up to the top of One Tree Hill in Auckland and, according...
I heard the news yesterday and my heart gave a leap. In fact, I think it must have levitated a...
There are many people — and not just Pacific Islanders — who’ve been disappointed that our teams...
So they did it. They finalised the TPPA. But it will be hard for us to get our heads around the...
A whānau dinner earlier this year was a life-changing experience for six Māngere cousins. That...
It’s hard to soften and cool the little hot knot of rage that has been living in my...
It’s not for everyone. In fact, some people can’t handle it. They rebel, take off or drop out....
Hekia Parata, as the Minister of Education, has made it clear that Turakina Māori Girls’ College...
Behold, the “hakarena”. And yes, that’s a combination of “haka” and “macarena”. It was coined in...
When I was a little girl, I dreamed of doing aid work in distant Africa. Feed the starving. Heal...
Naida Glavish was in the limelight in 1984 when, as a young tolls operator for the Post Office,...
Going back a few years, the Maori and Pasifika boys at Auckland Grammar School amounted to less...
My deepest impulses are pacifist, something that seems out step with what I’m told it means to be...
Here’s an unwelcome stat if you’re Māori or Pasifika. It confirms that you’re more likely to be...
Kiwis mostly aren’t at all familiar with Aussie Rules players, even the big guns. But a 35...
NOTE: Update from Tuesday, August 4, at the bottom of this page. This update is prompted by a...
The native wood pigeon – that’s our kererū or kukupa – has been a tasty item on the news menu...
There’s a new treaty in town. It looked as though Waitangi was a game changer in 1840. But this...
This whole “Sonny stole the pigeons” fiasco has turned real ugly here in the north, and some of it...
What is official and what is moral and acceptable don’t automatically line up. For instance,...
The National Government likes to point to the number of Treaty settlements it has arranged in the...
We’ve just had Budget 2015 which Labour has called the budget of broken promises. National,...
The axing of Campbell Live and the loss of John Campbell is a blow for those television viewers...
Last week the Auditor General, Lyn Provost, released a report on the Whānau Ora programme....
From time to time, New Zealanders from any number of political persuasions have rubbished the way...
It doesn’t take much for the Establishment in New Zealand to find fault with any Maori effort to...
Winston Peters is the most successful Maori politician since Apirana Ngata. Or so says Tau Henare....
There’s more news out of the north, but it has nothing to do with Winston’s win in the Northland...
Winston Peters returns to the North every year to go fishing. His boat is tied up near the shore...
When it comes to exercise, my natural inclination is to skip the sweaty stuff and head straight to...
He wants to “overthrow” the Kingitanga, he “boycotts” Waitangi Day, and he seems to think a...
Eleanor Catton copped a lot of flak for her comments last month. There were plenty who challenged...
I’m not a journalist. Nor am I an academic. I’m not religious either. And, although I hate...
There’s no point in exhuming the sovereignty debate – or so we’re advised by right-wing...
Looks like there’s a brand-new Moana in town. Disney have announced that their next big animated...
The final results are in and #Kowhiri2014 is now part of history. The National Party gained a...
A couple of months before the election, a plant told me who to vote for. Not literally of course,...
Democracy thrives in turbulent times. Where there is resignation, passivity or inactivism – the...
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