Council Staff for Marae

Mana (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 9, 27 October 1977, Page 7

Council Staff for Marae

Each year for the past four years a party of volunteer workers in Auckland Citizens Advice Bureaux has spent a weekend as guests of the people of a rural Maori community. The aim of these visits is to help increase understanding between people who have grown up with different cultural backgrounds, and to help city and country people understand each other’s attitudes and problems. Some city councillors and staff have taken part in these visits, and this year there was not enough room for the number of staff who wished to go. As a result it was suggested that the Community Development Section might try to have a visit arranged specially for councillors and staff. (The Deputy Mayor has also suggested that the Council might later host a return visit to Auckland by the people of ( a rural Maori community.)

The people of Maungatapu Marae, Tauranga, have now invited Auckland City Councillors and Council staff, with members of their families, to stay on the Marae for the weekend, 4 to 6, November. A complete programme of discussion, local visits and social activities has been arranged with the aim of introducing council staff to Maori life as seen and practised in a Marae setting. It will aslo show Maori involvement in the social industrial and political life of Tauranga. As well as being an enjoyable weekend this visit is aimed to help council staff understand more about the different attitudes and customs represented among the people they are employed to serve in Auckland; for many of these people come from places like Tauranga and have been brought up in the traditions of the people , they are visiting.