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Dr Ashley Bloomfield and Lil Anderson, CEO of the office for Māori Crown Relations, were among those who gave evidence at last week’s hearing. (Image: Archi Banal)
Dr Ashley Bloomfield and Lil Anderson, CEO of the office for Māori Crown Relations, were among those who gave evidence at last week’s hearing. (Image: Archi Banal)

ĀteaDecember 13, 2021

Where was te Tiriti in the government’s Covid response?

Dr Ashley Bloomfield and Lil Anderson, CEO of the office for Māori Crown Relations, were among those who gave evidence at last week’s hearing. (Image: Archi Banal)
Dr Ashley Bloomfield and Lil Anderson, CEO of the office for Māori Crown Relations, were among those who gave evidence at last week’s hearing. (Image: Archi Banal)

At last week’s urgent inquiry, Māori health providers gave evidence before the Waitangi Tribunal, while the Crown defended its Covid-19 response for Māori. Gabrielle Baker followed it all.

Since day one of the Covid-19 response, Māori have been concerned that the government’s response would forget equity and te Tiriti o Waitangi in the interests of speed and centralised control. To make sure our communities had the best protection, iwi set up structures to collectively communicate with whānau and engage with the government on Covid-19, Māori communities were out in force to protect their people with checkpoints and ensure they had the essential supplies they needed to be safe under the more restrictive Covid alert levels, and collectives like Te Rōpū Whakakaupapa Urutā, a group of Māori health experts and professionals, united to support a Māori- and equity-centred response to Covid.

But while the government rhetoric was that we are all in this together, the inequities highlighted by the delta outbreak call that into question. Māori vaccination rates are lower than non-Māori in every DHB in the country, with no DHB having reached 90% coverage of its Māori population. Māori have also been disproportionately affected by the delta outbreak. This is the backdrop to the hearing held in the Waitangi Tribunal last week. 

This hearing was prompted by a claim from the New Zealand Māori Council (NZMC), which sought a priority inquiry into Covid-19 because of the change to the alert level system and the imminent ability of Aucklanders to travel around the motu. A technical point here is that the hearing time had been set aside to inquire into Māori disability issues. This has been postponed, as a result, until next year (probably March). 

The fact it was a priority hearing with very short notice (only a couple of weeks) meant, out of practicality, only a few elements of the Covid response were within scope. Specifically:

  • Covid-19 vaccine sequencing and programme implementation 
  • The introduction of the Covid-19 Protection Framework (or as you may know it, the traffic light system). 

So issues like the government’s woeful approach to tangihanga guidelines, for example, were not covered in the hearings.  

The NZMC was joined by a set of interested parties that included claimants from Māori health groups Te Puna Ora o Mataatua, Te Kohao Health (based in Kirikiriroa), Tāngata Turi (Māori who are deaf), Te Ohu Rata o Aotearoa (Māori doctors) and Te Roopu Waiora. To quote National Hauora Coalition chief executive Simon Royal: 

“Simply put, our main argument is that the Crown’s approach to Covid-19 has been inadequate and inequitable.”

On a surface level, the evidence presented shows the government knew the higher risk of Covid-19 to Māori, and had a “plethora” of advisory groups with Māori and Pacific health experts, as well as other public health experts, who were all saying similar things about the need to prioritise Māori in the vaccine rollout, and in the decisions to change to the Covid-19 Protection Framework, abandoning alert levels and the elimination strategy. However, this did not change the decisions made by cabinet that continued to leave Māori exposed to harm. 

Te Whānau O Waipareira help with a Whānau Ora vaccination campaign in Papakura, Auckland, in November (Photo: Fiona Goodall/Getty Images)

In the case of the vaccine sequencing strategy, which set the timing of eligibility for the Pfizer vaccine, no specific provision was made to ensure an appropriate allocation of vaccine for Māori. As Mike Smith, who gave evidence to the tribunal on behalf of iwi leaders, has said elsewhere:

“The vaccination strategy failed Māori and Pacific communities. It didn’t recognise the different demographics in our respective communities – Pākehā have a high number amongst its elderly, for us the highest proportion of our population is our youth, so when the government’s tier approach targeted the elderly, it did not reach into our communities.”

Liam Rātana has written more about this for The Spinoff.   

In the case of the Covid-19 Protection Framework, the subset of Māori groups that Te Arawhiti (the Office for Māori Crown Relationships) consulted with rapidly (at very short notice), plus science and technical advisers who provided urgent advice, were unanimous that a move to this framework would make sense only if it was based on much higher levels of vaccination for Māori. Yet the government’s decisions were that we would move when DHB regions reached 90% vaccination. As we can see in the latest data, this doesn’t assure 90% vaccination rates for all of a DHB’s population (for example, Canterbury DHB is at 92% fully vaccinated, but the Māori vaccination rate is about 79%, meaning about 3,900 Māori in Canterbury still need to be vaccinated before the DHB reaches 90%). 

Beneath the surface of these issues, the evidence presented by claimants and the Crown show fairly consistent themes. To me the most apparent was the disconnect between Crown rhetoric and tangible action. 

Lady Tureiti Moxon (Photo: RNZ)

Let’s take racism as an example. In the first stage of this inquiry, the director general of health Ashley Bloomfield agreed that racism was a determinant of health for Māori. Since then, in its policy documents, the Ministry of Health has said racism is bad and we need to do something about it collectively. Yet given the opportunity to take anti-racist action (like in making decisions on the vaccine framework to prioritise Māori), they didn’t. 

As Lady Tureiti Moxon said on day one of the hearings last week, “We’re battling every single way, and you know that the tribunal report was clear about racism and about all of that, and yet here we are having to fight for every little morsel we get.”

What Bloomfield and Jo Gibbs from the Ministry of Health emphasised in response was that whānau-centred approaches were put in place around vaccination to counter the negative impact of government decisions. Speaking from personal experience, I know you couldn’t make whānau bookings on the booking system and in my DHB area, nothing about whānau was advertised until August, five months after the whānau-centred approaches were supposed to have started. 

The evidence also raises some serious concerns about the advice given to ministers and whether it was followed. Officials from Te Arawhiti, Te Puni Kōkiri and the Ministry of Health all at varying times gave advice that would have aligned with what Māori were asking for. But in many instances, cabinet made decisions that didn’t reflect this advice and it isn’t exactly clear why. Ministers of course don’t have to follow any one agency’s advice, but the pattern emerging is that they are more likely to deviate from advice when it is about acting on Māori concerns. 

There was a lot of other ground covered in the hearing week. Data quality and access was a big theme, with considerable attention given to the Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency’s recent High Court action to access data that would allow it to find and offer vaccination to Māori who haven’t had two doses. Bloomfield spent three hours answering questions, which would provide fodder for a future PhD on the public service. But for me, maybe the biggest impression I’m left with is that Māori frustration at the Covid response is palpable, and kaimahi Māori on the frontline are at high risk of burnout as they take on the heavy work of protecting and supporting our communities who have been knowingly put at risk by the Crown. 

In the closing submissions on Friday, it emerged that the NZMC and the Crown have been in talks to set up a group called Ngā Mana Whakahaere to work together on the Covid response. It remains to be seen if this is just another of the plethora of advisory groups or if it’s the step change we have needed to drive te Tiriti o Waitangi-centred action, but experience over the last two years (not to mention the decades before that) must tell us that odds are not in its favour. 

The tribunal has said it will issue its report speedily, which could provide recommendations on how to strengthen the NZMC’s proposals, or might take into account the submissions of many interested parties who seek solutions more focused on action and less on having a seat at a government table. However it goes, I can tell you with certainty the Māori providers who spent the past two weeks preparing and then giving evidence will today be offering vaccinations to their communities and will carry on showing us what tino rangatiratanga looks like. 

Keep going!
Kasey and Kārena Bird (Photo: supplied, additional design by Tina Tiller)
Kasey and Kārena Bird (Photo: supplied, additional design by Tina Tiller)

ĀteaDecember 9, 2021

Kasey and Kārena on hākari and the art of feasting

Kasey and Kārena Bird (Photo: supplied, additional design by Tina Tiller)
Kasey and Kārena Bird (Photo: supplied, additional design by Tina Tiller)

Kasey and Kārena Bird have cooked for Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, and in some of the best kitchens in the world, but at home on the marae they’re still learning from the aunties.

Nau mai Hine Raumati and the abundance that she brings. It’s a time for feasts and sharing meals with whānau, to reflect on the year gone, and recharge for what lies ahead.

For Māori, hākari is a cultural custom and a fundamental part of who we are. The experience of preparing kai with cousins, aunties and uncles is a communal and nourishing tikanga that sits at the heart of our whānau, hapū and iwi identities.

Karena and Kasey Bird are well accustomed to this. The renowned Te Arawa sister chef-duo have been serving up culinary delicacies with contemporary twists and growing a reputation locally and abroad.

The 2014 winners of MasterChef New Zealand, creators of ‘The Creation Dinner’, and Te Whare Auahi instructors are putting kai Māori on the map while becoming leaders in the industry.


Follow Nē? on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favourite podcast provider.


The pair talked to the Nē? podcast panel about their experiences in their own wharekai at home in Maketū, revealing that no matter how famous or successful they might be, the wharekai has its own hierarchy. They laughingly describe themselves as being at “mid-tier”.

“The aunties are always going to be at the top, and then we get our instructions and follow,” says Kasey.

“It’s got nothing to do with clout. It has to do with time in the kitchen, so you can’t get to the top of the ladder if you’re off flitting around the country,” adds Karena.

Humble in their success, the pair say their whānau and aunties keep them grounded. Growing up in Te Ihu o Tamatekapua, more commonly known as Maketū on the east coast of Waiariki, the sisters also have ties to Ngāpuhi and Ngāti Manawa.

When it comes to working in the kāuta, they say everyone knows what their roles are.

“Sometimes I’ll get there and they’ll have a list of jobs to do, and then next time I go down they only want me to butter the toast,” says Karena.

“It definitely keeps your feet on the ground, too. You come home, and everything is put into perspective. You’re still from where you’re from, and you’re still a part of everybody else which I think is really cool,” her sister adds.

Kasey and Kārena greet the Duke and Duchess of Sussex in Ohinemutu in 2018. (Image: supplied)

Many hapū and iwi will go to great lengths to satisfy manuhiri through the spreads they put on. For coastal iwi, it’s often about sharing local kaimoana delicacies. For inland iwi, traditionally it’s been about foods foraged or hunted for.

One thing you don’t mess with, the sisters say, is kaimoana, particularly tio or pipi.

“You just want it as they are because they’re so perfect as it is,” says Kasey.

That said, sometimes you have to push the boundaries.

“I tried to make this coconut Asian broth and cook the pipi in it and serve it over oven-baked salmon, and it did not go down well,” says Karena.

They draw a striking contrast between the wharekai and high-end commercial kitchens.

“You’ll go into commercial kitchens with top-tier equipment. Up north at my mum’s marae, they’re still cooking on open fires. You don’t know what ingredients you’re using because a lot of it is koha so on a day-to-day basis you don’t know what you’re actually going to be cooking, and you don’t know how many manuhiri are going to show up,” says Karena.

Speaking with a homegrown affection for their whānau and upbringing, the sisters acknowledge these lessons and skills as invaluable utensils in the kete when they travel around the country or abroad, cooking in their pop-up restaurants or their live demonstrations.

“The fluidity and the ability to adapt in marae kitchen is unparalleled,” says Karena.

Being flexible is imperative in the kāuta, when catering to manuhiri depends not only on the size of the ope but also who you are feeding. Hundreds of manuhiri may show up at once. Thousands may be welcomed on to a marae over a number of days, all of them needing to be fed. There are no reservations.

“You might get an ope of ten people, and then you’ve got a bus showing up of say 50, and you have to have kai on the table every time those manuhiri walk through the door. I think we’re talented like that,” says Kasey.

When it comes to tikanga, manaakitanga is arguably the common ingredient that sees Māori from different whānau, hapū and iwi engage to break bread. Manaakitanga covers many aspects of welcoming manuhiri, but possibly none as paramount as the meal.

“You have to uphold your reputation as a chef in your restaurant, but when you go to the marae it’s about the mana of your hapū, and your iwi, and your whānau, so there’s this whole other layer of pressure.”

The sisters learn about First Nations cooking in Arizona on their show Kitchen Diplomacy. (Image: TVNZ)

For those who have spent time in the kāuta, they’ll know it’s a different kind of pressure. The Birds have cooked with top chefs from Korea to the south of France, and believe the aunties on the marae could keep their cool in any kitchen – but they’re not 100% sure it could go the other way.

“Sometimes when we’re at the marae doing things I think, I wish I saw this chef in this situation and see what they would do. You get a whole thing of fish heads and you have to cook it because it’s good kai, you don’t want it to go to waste, and I wonder how they’d do. Like, you’ve 20 minutes and 200 fish heads,” says Kasey.

“And people that won’t listen to you,” adds Karena with a laugh.

The duo have found the transition from the wharekai method, where you gauge portions by eyeing things up and there are “no hard and fast rules”, to measuring exact ingredients for recipe writing a new and challenging learning curve.

When they were in charge of catering during a visit by Prince Harry and Meghan Markle to Rotorua, they weren’t nervous about whether or not the former royal family representatives were impressed with their “fancy steam box hāngi”. Their main concern was with the 180-odd kuia and kaumātua.

“Half of them said it was lovely, the other half said, ‘where’s the rest of it?'” recalls Karena.

It’s that type of raw honesty and accountability to the community that keeps manaakitanga evolving and relevant in our communities. It keeps generations striving towards high standards of hospitality.

Putting their own unique flavours forward, the sisters are working on a new cook book, entirely in te reo Māori, which is due to be published next year. The NZ Expo in Dubai is also on the cards, where they will again look to make their mark on the international market.

Back at home, with Kasey now a māmā, they’re both looking into broths and traditional kai such as dried fish and pipi for babies, “and old-school jerky things that we [Māori] would have had”, particularly for when they’re teething.

“I honestly think Māori in general as a people are naturally good with kai.. I think one of our innate skills is being able to feed people,” says Kasey.

“That manaakitanga is ingrained.”

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