Friday 31 March 2023 | Rāmere, 31 Poutū-te-rangi 2023

This month, we’ve made some great progress in our mahi.

One of our notable achievement's this month has been to host the inaugural Te Wāhi Tiaki Tātou Governance Group meeting.

This saw us bring together our Governance Group to begin to familiarise themselves with the significant role they have to play in the future of Porirua. 

This month we also ramped up the pace with our community engagement and gathering the many voices of our diverse community.

Having the opportunity to kōrero with many people from across Porirua and gather their insights and feedback on our local health system has been invaluable. 

We intend to continue this engagement mahi into the earliest part of April and use these valuable and important insights to develop themes that will define our focus areas. 

We also recently launched a simple online survey to gather written insights from the community and we’ve been circulating it among our networks. 

You can read more about our engagement activity and how to share our survey with the people you serve, further on our e-pānui page. 

OUR FIRST GOVERNANCE GROUP HUI

On the evening of Thursday 16 March 2023 at Te Rūnanga o Toa Rangatira offices in Porirua, we hosted the first Te Wāhi Tiaki Tātou Governance Group hui. 

This hui was a great opportunity to kōrero about Te Wāhi Tiaki Tātou and bring our Governance Group up to speed on the work that we have been carrying out over the last few months. 

The Governance Group were also given the opportunity to hear from Sharlaine Chee, National Change Lead for the National Localities Office.

Sharlaine took the opportunity to clearly describe the intention of the Locality Prototype mahi at a national level, as well as outline the involvement of the Iwi Māori Partnership Board’s in this significant piece of work. 

L-R: Anita Taggart, Frances Kewena, Magee Maria Uluilelata, Edna Ungatea Tuitupou Havea, Michael Rongo, Barbara Vardey, Ranei Wineera-Parai. 

PROFILING OUR GOVERNANCE GROUP MEMBERS

INTRODUCING BARBARA VARDEY - REPRESENTATIVE FOR TŪ ORA COMPASS HEALTH

Barbara has lived and worked in Porirua for most of her life.

She started her nursing career working in Kenepuru Hospital. She then moved to Primary Care working across several practices but spent 11 years at Waitangirua Health Centre.

She has worked in Outreach, Schools, and Afterhours nursing all in the Porirua region. She moved into management and leadership roles while working in Tumai mo te Iwi PHO and progressed into more senior roles in Tu Ora Compass Health.

In 2022 she was seconded from Tū Ora to support the Ngati Toa Covid manaaki response: Tiaki Porirua, a successful collaboration in Porirua supporting our whanau and practices to keep our community well and safe.

She has been a member of committees at Kindergartens, Board of Trustees, Chaired Sports Clubs committees, Parent Association at Aotea, and lead SANDs groups. 

Barbara is currently in the role of Acting Pacific Director alongside her substantive role of Clinical Services Manager.

She has been responsible for looking after the Pacific Navigation Service, School Nursing Service, Immunisations, Rheumatic Fever, and Long-term conditions team.

She is interested in developing and promoting services for Pacific communities that are responsive, equitable and reflect the needs of our community.

INTRODUCING FRANCES KEWENE - REPRESENTATIVE FOR TANGATA WHAIKAHA/PEOPLE WITH A DISABILITY 

Kia ora, my name is Frances but am known as Fran. I grew up on the South Island of Aotearoa and recently moved to Porirua, Cannons Creek where I live with my partner.We live opposite his aiga who have lived in Porirua since the 70's.

My partner is a Viard graduate and a Porirua boy through and through. We have two children together, two boys (22 & 21). Our youngest son has a diagnosis of Autism and has no spoken words. His name is Ionatana Kewene-Masina (pictured with me).

I identify as: whanau haua (a family member of a person with a lived experience of disability), Māori (Waikato and Maniapoto) and British: and a cis-gender wahine Māori. I have gathered a number of skills over my life time and have worked in many different environments.

My current role is as a lecture in the School of Health at Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington. I am currently developing a theatre-based research methodology to explore what a good life is from the worldview of Māori mothers with a child who is takiwātanga (autistic).

Prior to being at Te Herenga Waka I was at the University of Otago, Medical School Dunedin, where I helped develop and implement the Hauora Māori medical curriculum.

I have a background in community-based public health (health promotion and health protection) and was trained as an actor at Te Kura Toi Whakaari New Zealand Drama School.

I helped to establish a small disability service in Dunedin called Aspire Kids Tamariki Matanāand I continue to provide input into the operations and governance of our not-for profit charity (as my youngest son still uses there support services).

I am also on the Board of Te Ao Marama Aotearoa (TAMA)https://www.tama.nz/

At the core of who I am is that: I am a mama, a creative, and a person who wants to understand how things work. In understanding how things work I can identify if and how those things can be improved for my son, for me, for my aiga, the community I live in, and my mokopuna yet to come.

GATHERING THE VOICES OF OUR COMMUNITY 

During the month of March we have spoken to a wide range of people including:

• Ora Toa Health Services practice managers
• Health providers
• Hapū mama groups in Porirua 
• Wesley Community Action
• Tāne and wahine who have been identified as needing extensive social support
• Rangatahi and young adults from Porirua. 

Our engagement activities to date have been very positive with people open and willing to share with us. The feedback and insights we have gathered so far is consistent with the many years of anecdotal feedback, historical survey results and research reports about the health needs of the Porirua community. 

While these initial findings show that we are heading in the right direction, we will continue with our engagement activities to ensure we gather more insights and information from our community. 

During March, Manatū Hauora (the Ministry of Health) also carried out an engagement session with the Pacific community of Porirua to gather insights and feedback on a range of health issues and opportunities. 

As a best practice approach to community engagement and to prevent “engagement fatigue” we are working with the Ministry of Health to access the information they’ve gathered to ensure it feeds into our mahi. 

In the earliest part of April, we will continue our engagement efforts with our diverse community, including:

• GPs and nurses from medical practices across Porirua
• Social housing tenants from Porirua
• Ngāti Toa iwi members
• Kaumātua and the elderly
• Tangata Whaikaha and people with a disability 
• Migrant and refugee communities
• The Rainbow community. 

We welcome the opportunity to kōrero to as many people from Porirua as we can.

If you want us to come to your place of work or community service to kōrero to you and your teams, or meet with the people you serve to gather their feedback and insights, please reach out to us at porirualocalities@ngatitoa.iwi.nz and we will be sure to accommodate you. 

TE WĀHI TIAKI TĀTOU SURVEY

We have a short and very simple online survey available to enable people to provide their insights and feedback to feed into the Porirua Locality Plan. 

Our survey can be completed at the following link - https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/NG5W8Q2

We encourage you to share the link to our survey with the people you serve as well as your friends and whānau who live in Porirua. All you need to do is copy and paste the link into an email, or your social media and share with your networks. 

If you also live in Porirua, we encourage you to complete this survey.  

Your feedback is important to us. If you have any questions, concerns or comments, please email us at porirualocalities@ngatitoa.iwi.nz