Speech: Maori and Positive Ageing

As a way of preparing myself for coming to this hui, I was reading up about your patron: Dame Augusta Wallace.

As well as being patron of Age Concern New Zealand: He Manaakitanga Kaumatua Aotearoa Dame Augusta is someone who :

o was the first woman to be appointed a District Court judge;
o was former patron of Victim Support;
o was Presiding officer of the Kaipara Inquiry as part of her membership of the Waitangi Tribunal;
o is the Independent Chair of the Forum for Animal Health Industry Regulation of Advertising – FairAd;
o and that’s just some of the roles she occupies.

Dame Augusta is a walking, talking manifestation of that concept – if you want something done, ask a busy person to do it.

Indeed, she is the perfect poster girl for Age Concern – an organisation which is devoted to ensuring our elders can benefit from all the rights and quality of life.

I was really pleased to be able to come to your annual conference and to share my ideas about a subject dear to my heart, positive aging.

Indeed to the Maori Party, to be anything BUT positive about ageing would be the ultimate oxymoron.

Tangata whenua are not just positive about the aging process – we hold our elders in the utmost regard as our leaders, our mentors, our guides, our heroes and sheroes.

Perhaps a classic example on the wide-screen of this, was in the film, The WhaleRider, where Koro, known as Paka, played a vital role in caring for the mokopuna – but also, in grooming a chief for the next generation, the tribal leader who will take the people out of the darkness into the new world.

And although the international audience was smitten with the talents of the young Keisha Castle-Hughes, in our world, the quiet guidance and wisdom of Paka, played by Rawiri Paratene, was essential in helping her find her own pathway forward.

Our elders are essential to decision-making, to establishing protocols, to passing on knowledge. Their guidance is crucial for the survival of tribal mana, their responsibilities extend right across the whanau, as well as in many areas of community life.

The expectations that we hold of our super seniors is probably summed up in the phrase, ‘He tira kaumatua, tena te haere ra’ – meaning age travels slowly, but with surety.

This literally means that a travelling group of elders travels far – the strength and breadth of life experience proving to be an impressive foundation for our future.

It was this phrase which came to me when I thought about the sensational seven Maori women – mostly from Kai Tahu – who took on the Big Apple in 2005. These women, all in senior management positions, had led a fairly sedentary life for quite some years, and in some cases for decades.

This group, some of them having been challenged by the onset of conditions such as diabetes, breast cancer and a physically inactive lifestyle, decided to set themselves the ultimate dare – to dare to compete in the New York marathon.

These were women who had reached the heights of their careers – amongst them strategic managers in the Ministry of Education, a regional councillor, and a senior vice president of the Maori Women’s Welfare League; women who could have been whiling away their days, caring for their many mokopuna.

But instead they decided to feel the fear and act; to set off across the world and walk the New York Marathon, together as friends and supporters, driven by the goal of crossing the line in less than six hours.

That to me is positive aging.

Positive aging, Maori style, is represented in a couple of stunning fifty year old dancing queens like Georgina Beyer and Tina Cross.

Positive aging is my colleague, Dr Pita Sharples, old enough to receive the pension, but still jumping to the stage, as he has for over thirty years, in his love for kapa haka.

But positive aging is much more than marathons and razzle dazzle as amazing as that all is.

Today’s elders are being required to cope with new roles and responsibilities and quickly upskill in areas as diverse as carbon credits or school governance and management.

Frequently, the burden of representation in advancing resolution of Treaty Settlements, or taking the mandate of the people across local government, falls on the shoulders of our elderly.

And yet although our life expectancy has increased, so that now Maori are eight years behind the average life expectancy of non-Maori, there are still persistent health issues which compromise their general quality of life.

And so, we must restore to ourselves the notion of a community built on the concept of collective care. If our elderly whanaunga are to fulfil their people's hopes, they must be treated with the due respect, love and consistent support of those around them.

We must, as a society, learn the value of behaving collectively.

I have been thinking of a time, some years ago now, when my mother became unwell and I faced the test of collective care.

Although there were seven of us children living, I decided that I needed to give up work and do all that I could to help her make the vital transition into the next world.

I will never regret the decision.

I had not been raised by my mother, and so the opportunity to be with her, to share precious time together at the eve of her life, was priceless.

I was given the chance to learn so much more about my mother, to sleep by her on the couch at the marae, and to just relax in her company.

I remember that time so vividly.

During those last few months the Commonwealth Games were on, and so we became the armchair experts of Whangaehu - it was great fun.

And along the way, slowly, tentatively, I was able to create the connections which would help me to understand my own life journey through the eyes of my mother. Those conversations will remain with me forever.

At the time George and I had our own six children to care for. My husband having come from a large and very loving whanau himself was 100% supportive of the decision I took to leave our family home, to be close to Mum.

Our children too, willingly took on extra responsibilities to help out and support their father.

It was an incredible period of life and learning for me.

When she eventually passed on, I moved into her flat at the marae and our children slept in the wharepuni – the biggest bedroom in town.

We were all seeking the warmth and connection of Mum – her memories wrapped around us like a snug blanket.

That to me is what manaakitanga is all about – the gift that keeps on giving. In caring for Mum, in according her the respect she deserved, I received back one hundred fold – as did our whanau.

In caring for others, all parties are elevated – those being cared for and those doing the caring. The responsibility to care, builds unity through humility and the act of giving, so that everyone benefits.

I really love the way in which Age Concern has embraced the spirit of manaakitanga as part of your vision of an inclusive society where older people are respected, valued, supported and empowered.

Of course we all need the incentives to create an optimum environment, incentives such as :

o free high quality primary healthcare;
o superannuation being set at a level to provide for an equitable standard of living;
o removal of GST on basic food items and medical services including prescriptions;
o investment in whanau based and home based care so that our elders can remain in their own homes, if they choose so;
o resourcing of emergency services and opportunities for respite care;
o protection of the personal and property rights of people – as passed by law in the Protection of Personal Property Rights Amendment Act 2007; and so on.

These are important building blocks for ensuring the wellbeing, participation and appropriate support is provided for our elderly.

We absolutely believe that elders must receive an adequate, secure level of income so that they can continue to play such a vital role in our communities.

That is why we have argued for increasing super-annuation payments, and for lowering the age of entitlement to sixty years for groups whose life expectancy is lower than average.

The shorter life expectancy of some population groups has implications for the length of time that they can enjoy government benefits, especially superannuation.

Statistics show that Maori men are likely to receive only four years of support from super, while their non-Maori peers receive at least twelve. That’s a huge gap.

But while the issues of income, health, housing and isolation must be addressed, the greatest challenge in front of us all is to restore the capacity to care for each other, to care for the collective wealth of our elders.

One of the most shocking realisations I have had through the work of organisations such as your own, is to understand the phenomenon called elder abuse and neglect – the harmful physical, psychological, sexual, material/financial or social effects that some of our elders are suffering – most generally caused by the behaviour of another person whom they trust.

But I do not want to spend my time in analysing and grieving – as we should – the reality of the abuse, the neglect, the violence that has beset our community.

I want to devote my energies towards the restoration and revitalisation of our collective responsibilities towards manaakitanga, whanaungatanga, kaitiakitanga.

I want to think about the inspiration provided by Dame Augusta; the New York marathoners, the kuia and koroua in all of our homes and communities.

They are the ones who are spear-heading the way towards the new world.

They are leading and blazing a path for us all to follow, and we can and must walk that path with them.

That will truly be a positive future – it a challenge I know we can meet.