E30 27 September 2024: General items:

Appointments and Awards:

Dave Samuels has been reappointed as the Secretary for Māori Development and Chief Executive of Te Puni Kōkiri for a further three years.
Hana Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke, the Member of Parliament for Hauraki-Waikato, has received an award as ‘Youth Politician of the Year’ (from the One Young World Summit in Canada).

Salient Māori New Items to 27 Mahuru 2024:

The Ministry of Justice and Stats NZ have released criminal offending data for the year ending 30 June 2024. This data shows just under 50,000 people were convicted of a crime during the year, of which 22,000 (44%) were Māori. We will review this data set in more detail next quarter (gang membership data is not collected, but ought to be).

Last month we noted the media statement from the Minister for Māori Development, Tama Potaka, advising of a partial merge of Te Puni Kōkiri and Te Arawhiti. (Te Arawhiti would continue to manage historic Tiriti settlements and Takutai Moana matters, with other functions transferred over to Te Puni Kōkiri.) We note the Cabinet paper linked to this proposal has now been proactively released, and in general terms it sets out the logic behind the structural changes. It also gives further information on the social, cultural and economic agenda of Minister Potaka for his portfolio. We will provide further details on that in Pānui next month. The documents are here:

Ngāti Kahungunu was profiled in the mainstream media last week over the delayed provision of, and lack of detail in, financial statements provided to iwi members. We will review the financial results of the iwi (if information is available) next quarter alongside other iwi entities.