State Highway 2 Open
State Highway 2 south of Dannevirke is now open following the earlier crash.
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NEW ZEALAND POLITICS
Gordon Campbell: On The Aussie Election Finale
The only spectre haunting Anthony Albanese's government going into Election Day tomorrow will be the way the polls got wrong the likely 2019 election outcome. Back then, the Scott Morrison government got re-elected in an upset result. Opposition leader Peter Dutton is clinging to that precedent, in hope of a miracle. This time, all of the prevailing signs – including the consistent theme of the polls for the past month – indicate that Albanese's Labor government will trounce Dutton's conservative coalition. What's different from 2019? Albanese, like Morrison before him, is a known quantity.
UnionAID: Fiji Union Leader Visiting NZ Highlighting Struggle Of Garment Workers
At the event in Wellington, Jotika will join Living Wage Aotearoa New Zealand Executive Director, Gina Lockyer, to explore the struggles and resilience of Fiji's garment workers and their collective fight for better pay and conditions.
Hokotehi Moriori Trust: Historic Translocation Of Hakoakoa Marks New Chapter In Moriori Conservation Leadership
In a significant milestone for indigenous-led conservation, Hokotehi Moriori Trust has successfully carried out the first imi (Moriori tribal group) translocation of hakoakoa (muttonbird), relocating 50 juvenile birds from Mangere Island to a newly prepared site in Kaingaroa.
Department Of Internal Affairs: Government Chief Digital Officer Issues Standard To Protect Government-Held Personal Information
The new standard requires public service agencies to conduct a risk assessment whenever personal information is to be shared and includes robust safeguards to protect individual privacy and directs agencies to apply best practices when granting access to personal information.
Te Pāti Māori: Keep The Window Open- UCOL Must Stay
'Matapihi ki te Ao is more than a name, it's a promise. A window to the world for our rangatahi and whānau,' says Te Pāti Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. 'We won't sit back while this Government shuts the door on Māori futures. Our commitment is clear—we would invest more in regional tertiary education, not less.'
Unions Otago: May Day Workers' Hui
Unless your workplace is already utopia – and we haven't come across one yet – there is a good reason for all union members to come to this hui. Whatever your union and whatever matters most to you and your workmates, please join us at the union meeting this May Day so that we can keep building our relationships and strength as a movement for workers' rights.
People Against Prisons Aotearoa: Voting Ban 'Undermines Democratic Principles' Says Justice Group
The right to vote is the basis of democratic government. Legitimate governments cannot arbitrarily remove people from the pool that elects them. If the Government strips New Zealanders of the right to vote, it is attacking the democratic principles it claims to be founded on.
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NZ Herald
3 hours ago
- NZ Herald
Aaron Smale: Jail for a haka? The arrogance of ignorance in Parliament
Act MP Parmjeet Parmar wanted to know if imprisonment was an option for Te Pāti Māori members who did a haka in Parliament. Photo / Supplied Recently, I took a crack at Te Pāti Māori for being big on theatre but not backing it up with being an effective opposition party. The obvious example was their haka in the House in protest at the Treaty Principles Bill. But I didn't think the haka was the problem. Since then, the government has focused on dishing out utu for Te Pāti Māori daring to bring its brand of political theatre into the House. A privileges committee headed by Judith Collins – who inaccurately claimed the haka prevented Act from voting at the bill's first reading – recommended a punishment of 21 days' suspension from Parliament for Te Pāti Māori's co-leaders and a week for Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke. Even that delicate flower Gerry Brownlee, Speaker of the House, seemed uneasy about the harshness of the proposed penalty. But not Act MP Parmjeet Parmar. She wanted to know if prison was an option. When questioned about this, she rolled out the 'just asking questions' line, supposedly wanting to know what the whole spectrum of options were to punish the unruly natives. So, in the spirit of just asking questions, here's a few Parmar might like to consider. Speaking of a whole spectrum of options, does she realise Te Pāti Māori MPs not only represent but belong to communities who had members who were imprisoned, raped, hanged or shot for expressing their political opinions in ways the crown objected to? Does Parmar know the white feather Debbie Ngarewa-Packer often wears in her pōtae is a symbol and reminder of Parihaka and the government invasion of the Taranaki pacifist community where men were imprisoned without trial and, as the Waitangi Tribunal reported, women were raped? Does she know this community was resisting the confiscation of land taken by the crown she represents? Does she know UK newspaper reports about the leaders of Parihaka, Te Whiti and Tohu, influenced Gandhi, who influenced Martin Luther King? Does Parmar know Rawiri Waititi is from the Whakatōhea iwi, whose rangatira, Mokomoko, was hanged in 1866 for a murder he did not commit? That it and the neighbouring iwi Waititi also belongs to had their land confiscated? Does she know Mokomoko's body was exhumed from Mt Eden Prison and taken back to be buried with his people in 1989 and he was eventually pardoned by the crown in 1992? Does she know his final words before he was hanged were a request to sing: 'Tangohia mai te taura i taku kakī kia waiata au i taku waiata' (Take the rope from my throat that I may sing my song)? Then his neck was broken. Does Parmar know Maipi-Clarke whakapapas not only to Taranaki but also Waikato, who were invaded by the crown and lost a million acres through confiscation? Does she know about Rangiaowhia, where civilians, including women and children, were burnt and shot as they sheltered in a whare? Does she know Waikato men were imprisoned when they refused conscription in World War I because of the invasion and confiscation of their lands? Since Parmar objects to Māori gathering in their own spaces at universities, does she know government policy was opposed to Māori even attending university until the 1960s? Has she heard of Sir Āpirana Ngata, Sir Maui Pōmare and Te Rangi Hiroa, who went to Te Aute College and on to university to become lawyers and doctors, only for the government to pressure the school principal to desist from preparing Māori students for tertiary study? Does she know these three men, along with many iwi leaders, led a targeted – ie, race-based – health campaign that helped save Māori from extinction after the population plummeted due to poverty and disease resulting from land loss? I recently spoke to a leader of an NGO that supports Māori and Pasifika children in education who told me many of the kids they support end up dropping out of university because they are suddenly alone in an alien environment without community support. Does Parmar think that is a problem that should be addressed? Has she ever bothered to read the history of Māori political figures like Ngata and Pōmare, whose portraits hang in the halls of Parliament? Does she know Pōmare walked those halls with a limp, due to an injury he suffered when he was one of the children who welcomed the troops who invaded Parihaka with singing, only to be trampled by horses? In March, Parmar pronounced the University of Auckland should scrap its compulsory Waipapa Taumata Rau course. Does she think a history lesson might be of use to MPs like herself who claim to represent the country but know little of its history? Or does she take her history lessons from her party leader, who mangles or ignores the past to create a constant stream of political controversies to hold the media's attention and misinform and distract the public? And was Parmar's question about the option of sending Te Pāti Māori to jail for a political protest really her question? Or was she simply doing the party leader's dirty work for him?
The Spinoff
4 hours ago
- The Spinoff
Inside the Waitangi Tribunal's Mana Wāhine hearings
The Waitangi Tribunal's latest hearings delved into the historical and systemic marginalisation of Māori women – and the constitutional future their voices demand. As the cold embrace of Hine Takurua set upon Te Upoko-o-te-ika-a-Māui, the wharenui at Te Herenga Waka Marae was warmed by the testimony, challenge and reassertion for the Mana Wāhine claim. Last week, the Waitangi Tribunal held hearings for the Mana Wāhine Kaupapa Inquiry: a landmark claim addressing the Crown's ongoing failure to uphold the status, rights, and constitutional authority of wāhine Māori. Heard before judge Sarah Reeves and panel members Robyn Anderson, Kim Ngarimu, Linda Tuhiwai Smith and Ruakere Hond, the Mana Wāhine inquiry centres on the enduring impacts of colonisation, patriarchy and the Crown's exclusionary systems of power. From the appointment processes of state boards to the structure of commercial fisheries, the claim argues that wāhine Māori have been deliberately sidelined from decision-making, leadership and economic participation. Claimant representative Natalie Coates opened with a challenge to look inward as well as out: 'Acknowledging that the patriarchal ideas infiltrated our tikanga and how we conduct and order ourselves in our whānau, hapū and iwi is a necessary part of our healing journey as a people.' It was a confronting reminder that while colonisation imposed new systems, some damage manifested through the reshaping of tikanga. Legal academic Ani Mikaere was the first witness, opening proceedings with a clear articulation of what has been lost: 'Our creation stories and tikanga once upheld the mana of wāhine Māori, recognising them as leaders, protectors of whakapapa, powerful spiritual figures. Colonisation has rewritten those stories, often with misogyny, fear and racism layered over our own truths.' Across four days of presentations and cross-examination, a diverse group of lawyers, historians, researchers, kuia and claimants took the stand. The hearings wove together a narrative that was both historic and current, doctrinal and lived. The claim traces its lineage to one woman in particular – Mira Szászy. As the sole wahine commissioner on the Māori Fisheries Commission in 1990, her exclusion from subsequent appointments was a catalyst for Wai 381. Several witnesses described her as having 'grandparented' both the fisheries settlement and the Mana Wāhine claim. Ripeka Evans, an original claimant, told the tribunal: 'The opportunities for wāhine Māori weren't lost. They simply weren't presented.' Much of the testimony outlined how the Crown's systems are structurally incapable of recognising mana wāhine on their own terms. Tribunal veteran and claimant representative Annette Sykes framed the inquiry as 'a constitutional moment'. 'This is the first time the tribunal has been called to confront the Crown's breaches through the distinct and intersectional lens of wāhine Māori.' That lens includes land and resource alienation, gendered violence, the denial of political agency and systemic exclusion. According to historian Aroha Harris, the doctrine of discovery and the English common law model erased not just indigenous rights, but indigenous women. Tina Ngata highlighted the stark link between the two: 'The doctrine of discovery replaced our systems of sacredness with a hierarchy. The more white, and the more male you were, the more sacred. The further you were from that, the more disposable.' That disposability has consequences. Deputy dean for the faculty of business and economics at the University of Auckland Carla Houkamau presented research highlighting how contemporary state systems continue to harm Māori women, particularly in education, health and criminal justice. 'Our pain is more likely to be ignored. Our leadership is more likely to be invisible. Our participation, purposefully hidden.' But the hearings showed that wāhine Māori are not just participating – they are leading in the way. The final day was dedicated to testimony from the Māori Women's Welfare League, led by current president Hope Tupara. The league, with its ECOSOC status at the UN and more than 70 years of intergenerational organising, emerged as a central vehicle for mana wāhine. Former president Areta Koopu described the league as a whare: 'We are one family, one house. We stick together.' That unity was tested over decades of Crown interface. Tupara told the tribunal: 'They don't value our mātauranga. The Crown doesn't understand our way of thinking, because it doesn't operate that way.' Several former presidents outlined how Crown processes had repeatedly sidelined the league from major policy decisions. One spoke of the 'opportunity cost' of the Crown's insistence on engagement with newer pan-Māori bodies: 'Despite our leadership in communities, we were increasingly outside the consultation room.' A core focus of the next steps is remedies. Many witnesses called for changes to appointment structures, constitutional recognition of mana wāhine, and support for pathways rooted in whakapapa rather than CVs. Indigenous rights lawyer Dayle Takitimu urged the tribunal to consider the fundamental shift needed: 'Wāhine Māori have inherent mana and authority embedded into us. The Crown must confront the ways it has polluted or denied that truth – not just in history, but in policy today.' Barrister Natalie Coates reinforced that any future framework must move beyond individual fixes: 'We're talking about the wellbeing of wāhine Māori being inseparable from the communities from which we come from… It's not a zero sum struggle, it's a return to collective health and justice.' The claimants were also clear that this was not about slotting women into existing colonial frameworks. Rather, as Mikaere said, it is about restoring a reality that existed long before colonisation – one where mana was understood as shared, relational and grounded in whakapapa. 'It is only when women achieve mana recognition that the Māori people will rise up,' she said. Last week marked the first round of hearings in a long process. However, for many present at Te Herenga Waka, it was also a reclamation. In the words of former Māori Women's Welfare League president Druis Barrett: 'We were always doing the mahi. The question is when the Crown will finally see it.' The Wai 2700 hearings will continue later this year.
Scoop
5 hours ago
- Scoop
PSA Welcomes Withdrawal Of Suspension Of Disability Workers At Te Roopu Taurima
Mediation is set to resume with disability support provider Te Roopu Taurima and the PSA following the withdrawal of a lockout and suspension of workers without pay by the employer, the PSA in return agreed to lift the strike notices. Te Roopu Taurima o Manukau Trust is the country's largest provider of kaupapa Māori-based support for people with disabilities in residential facilities in Northland, Auckland, Waikato and Canterbury. "We welcome the withdrawal of the harsh and oppressive suspension and lockout and as a result the PSA also withdraws strike action in support of the collective agreement," said Fleur Fitzsimons National Secretary Public Service Association Te Pūkenga Here Tikanga Mahi. Te Roopu Taurima told the PSA it would suspend 38 workers late Friday without pay for six weeks in response to low level strike action taken in support of their collective agreement. Last year the trust also locked out Kaitaataki (house leaders for residential disability support) preventing them from working the extra hours they rely on to earn enough to support themselves and their whānau, this forms part of legal action in the Employment Court. The PSA and Te Roopu Taurima attended facilitation run by an Employment Relations Authority member recently. The Authority member then provided recommendations to settle the collective agreement. "The PSA did not get everything we wanted but nevertheless agreed that we would recommend the outcomes to our members. Te Roopu Taurimu now needs to come to the party and accept the recommendations, this is the basis on which the PSA attends mediation. We will now return to mediation with the hope of settling this dispute. "Our members want to put this dispute behind them, get the fair wages and conditions they deserve, and get on with their important work of supporting tangata."
