Flaxroots News

Mana (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 15, 23 February 1978, Page 4

Flaxroots News

Maori Affairs is having problems trying to place the young rural Maoris on the preemployment scheme. The economic crisis has dried up the usual job sources. The next group of 30 young women this time have already arrived without any answer to this problem * * * Ms Tara Werner of Kelburn has been awarded a study grant of $lOOO by the Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council. The grant is to assist with the costs of recording the waiata of the Ngati-Raukawa and Ngati Toa tribes. The tapes will be given to the tribes. Ms Werner graduated last year with an honours Arts degree in Maori music. She is of DutchIndonesian extraction. It seems a pity that there wasn’t one Maori available in the whole of N.Z. to do the job!! * * * Professor Metge and Dr Kinloch have found during research for a paper that in public situations pakehas take silence to mean agreement, whereas Maoris and Samoans use silence to show disagreement. At meetings when pakehas leave out or curtail greetings in order to “get down to real business” Maoris and Samoans misread the message as rejection or lack of interest. Maoris typically express gratitude in action, not words. In writing the paper they hope to improve communications between all parties involved. ' * * * The Kokako, a rare, almost flightless bird seems to be dying out. * * * Maori women are to be the subject of a study organised by the Maori Affairs Department with prompting by the Maori Womens’ Welfare League. * * * The Chief Ombudsman, G. R. Laking has been accused of shelving a report begun by Sir Guy Powles on the remanding of children in adult prisons. Sir

Guy’s investigation, unfinished before he retired, found that 320 children were held in remand in 1975. Nearly 60 per cent were Maoris or Polynesians, with the proportion rising each year. * * * Cherry Rameka (14) and Sharon Hawke (15) of Ngati Whatua have been refused Maori Education Foundation grants which would allow them to attend Queen Victoria High School in Parnell, on the grounds that the two students are local residents. School policy does not allow for local students to attend Queen Victoria, as there are several other local schools available for the girls to attend. The girls parents are disturbed as they believe, the girls are refused entry to a unique Maori girls boarding school in an area where Ngati Whatua people are tangata whenua, and also because of their parents political views, i.e. the stand at Bastion Point.