Speech
Pacific Champions of Change National Fono
I begin by greeting everyone in the languages of the realm of New Zealand, in English, Māori, Cook Island Māori, Niuean, Tokelauan and New Zealand Sign Language. Greetings, Kia Ora, Kia Orana, Fakalofa Lahi Atu, Taloha Ni and as it is the morning (Sign)
I then specifically greet you: Fa’amatuainu Tino Pereira, Chair of the Pacific Advisory Group to the Government Taskforce on Family Violence and your fellow advisory group members, most notably Your Honour Judge Ida Malosi and Ali’imuamua Sandra Alofivae, Families Commissioner; Gerard Vaughan, Chief Executive of the Alcohol Advisory Council of New Zealand; Su’a William Sio, member of Parliament; Distinguished Guests otherwise; Ladies and Gentlemen. And in the context of this morning’s gathering, may I add the greetings: Talofa lava; Malo e lelei, Ni sa bula vinaka, Kam na mauri, Halo Olgeta and Mi likum yu tumas.
Thank you for inviting me to Pacific Champions of Change National Fono on Stopping Violence. I have been asked to formally open the Fono and just before I do, I would like to take an opportunity to speak on the vexed topic of domestic violence.
In every New Zealand setting, whoever speaks ought to first establish a place to stand before the audience and with regard to the Pacific and to the matter before this summit, I am a New Zealander able to approach that from a number of angles.
While born in Auckland, my parents were born in Fiji and so by that means the Pacific is part of my ancestry. I grew up in the Auckland suburbs of Ponsonby and Glen Innes in the 1950s and 1960s as the first waves of migration from the Pacific Islands began to transform those areas. I have maintained my Pacific connections through my life and today have extended family members living in Fiji, Samoa, American Samoa and Hawai’i.
As Governor-General, I am the representative of New Zealand's Head of State for the wider Realm of New Zealand, which includes the self-governing states of Niue and the Cook Islands and the territory of Tokelau and hence my five formal greetings when beginning to speak a few moments ago. I do that on all public occasions in New Zealand. In my first year as Governor-General, came the opportunity to visit all three places and of emphasising that a Governor-General must serve them all.
New Zealand Governors-General have increasingly represented our nation to the rest of the world, and so I have also travelled widely in the Pacific, visiting Samoa and Tonga twice, including the State Funeral of His Highness Malietoa Tanumafili II and the coronation of His Majesty King Tupou V of Tonga. We have also had the pleasure of welcoming His Highness Tui Atua Tupua Tamasese Efi, the Head of State of Samoa to New Zealand with a State Welcome at Government House in Wellington. Additionally I have travelled in the Governor-General capacity to Papua New Guinea and to the Solomon Islands.
Turning to the issue of domestic violence, I speak as former lawyer, Judge and Ombudsman and now Governor-General. I do not claim to be an expert in the field. Domestic violence, like many societal ills, is not an area that can be addressed simply.
In the first 25 years of my career, as a lawyer, in prosecuting and defending alleged domestic violence cases, and later as a Judge, I saw, at least at second-hand, a number of awful ramifications of violence within the home. I sadly saw families torn apart by domestic violence—women assaulted, sometimes even killed. I came to know of children who, if they were not also assaulted, were traumatised by the violence they witnessed and came to fear their parents and particularly their fathers. In the unhappy circle that violence creates, there were also examples of children following in their parent's footsteps.
During those 25 lawyer and judge years I also witnessed the beginnings of a fundamental change in the way that the law and the authorities came to view domestic violence. When I began work as a lawyer in 1970, there were fewer domestic violence cases coming before the courts—not because there were fewer incidents but because, reflecting society's attitude to domestic violence, the Police were less likely to lay charges. Neighbours were less likely to call the Police, believing that matters within the home should stay in the home. If the police were called, the wrongdoers were often merely cautioned. The phrase of the time which went—"It's just another domestic"—effectively placed family violence into a lesser category.
The attitudes of that time were well described in one of the oral histories published last year by the Ministry of Social Development in the book, It’s Time We Started Telling These Stories. In Tremain’s story, he recalls growing up in Tauranga in the 1950s and early 1960s. His father was violent towards his wife and also to his children. Tremain spoke of his father in the following terms:
“[We] were all cousins in our street and no one was going to say anything to my father. Nobody put up their hand to say ‘it’s not okay, you are killing your family.’ We felt that nobody cared. There was no Women’s Refuge then. The police came and he told them ‘ you come on to my property and I’m going to kill you.’ And they wouldn’t.”
Social changes of the 1960s, including the advance of feminism, saw attitudes begin to change. In 1985, Parliament removed the defence of spousal immunity to a charge of sexual violation and tightened the conditions around consent. In the 1990s, the Police changed their policy towards domestic violence, consistently arresting alleged offenders rather than simply giving them a warning. In 1995, my last year as a fulltime judge, Parliament passed the Domestic Violence Act. This law established a wide definition of abuse that went beyond just physical violence to include sexual and psychological abuse.
The combination of these legal and policy changes has seen a significant increase in this kind of case coming before the courts. The New Zealand Police 2008-2009 Annual Report, for example, notes more than 36,000 domestic disputes being recorded in that financial year.
Legislative change and judicial action, however, is only part of the answer. In very much the same way that those who have an addiction need first to recognise that they have a problem, society also needs to recognise its own ills. I think there would be few, for example, who would not recall the effect that screening of the movie Once Were Warriors had on public discussion in 1995 on the topic of violence within the home.
Spurred on by media advocacy, including the Families Commission’s It's not OK campaign; there can be discerned a gradual hardening of attitudes regarding domestic violence. Neighbours and friends are no longer looking away when they see abuse but are instead taking action.
As an aside, I note that the It’s not OK campaign received the top award at the Institute of Public Administration New Zealand (IPANZ) Gen-i Public Sector Excellence Awards announced last week . Congratulations are due in this regard.
What this campaign and other research has shown is that domestic abuse in its many forms—physical and psychological—cannot be separated from other forms of abuse and violence. While men in New Zealand have a particular issue with violence, violence in a family setting can be perpetrated by anyone—grandparents, parents, aunties, uncles and siblings even.
Even so, many myths about domestic violence remain. One only has to read letters to the editor in newspapers or blogs on the internet or listen to talkback radio to hear a host of myths about domestic violence being regularly paraded. They include suggestions that only drunk or mentally ill men are violent. Others blame women for staying in abusive relationships or provoking the violence against them.
The reality is that while some who perpetrate domestic violence are drunks, many are not. Some abusers are mentally-ill, but many are not. Most of all, responsibility for abuse must lie with the person who is abusing others. No-one ever deserves to be abused, struck or beaten.
One myth that has proven particularly stubborn to shift has been that which suggests domestic violence occurs in certain sectors of society and not in others. It is often suggested that domestic violence is something that only occurs in poor neighbourhoods, or in Māori and Pacific families.
However, as at least one high-profile domestic violence case in recent times has shown, men who physically abuse their partners and children come from all occupations, classes, religions and ethnicities.
While domestic violence occurs in Māori, Pākehā, Asian and Pacific families, that does not mean that any “one-size-fits-all” approach is called for. There are some initiatives that must, of course, be applied through the whole country, such as the consistent approach the New Zealand Police takes to arresting and prosecuting those alleged to have committed violence in a domestic setting.
However, there are always opportunities for different communities—whether they be ethnic, cultural or religious—to address domestic violence within their own setting. In saying that, I do not suggest that there should ever be different standards applied to different ethnic groups. Domestic violence, whether one is Pākehā or Pasifika, Māori or Asian, is never right.
Cultural norms can never be used as an excuse for violence, whether that be within the family or elsewhere. To those who would argue otherwise, I would respond that the “tradition”—and I place the words in quotes—has either been twisted and misinterpreted or simply has no place in New Zealand society.
Using a supposed cultural norm as a what can be described as a kind of “fig leaf” for domestic violence does more than just disempower victims. It attempts to co-opt the wider cultural or ethnic group into condoning violence and debases that culture’s proud history and traditions and, as such, it brings shame on everyone.
However, acknowledging cultural, ethnic and religious differences allows those groups to bring to the table an understanding of how best to tackle domestic violence in that cultural setting. Approaching domestic violence in this way should hopefully ensure that Pacific solutions can be developed for Pacific issues.
In the case of Pacific peoples there needs to be a clearer understanding of their history in New Zealand as recent migrants, and the traditions and practices of their home islands. There needs also be an understanding of the difference between those who were born in the islands and those who were born here and the inevitable tensions for those who feel split between the ways of their parents and the ways of New Zealand. It means recognising the important place of the church and the links with home villages for all Pacific peoples.
Within each culture and ethnic group lies a storehouse of knowledge that can be brought to bear. There is knowledge of messages that speak best to Pacific people and involving their media, community groups and churches in that work. It means taking the time to listen and working with those groups to identify the best strategies to address this important issue. To use a Pacific metaphor, there is a need to spread the mat, open up and talk, as families and as communities.
Doing so also requires a recognition of the individual traditions of different island groups. In just the same way that attempting to pitch the same messages to Māori and Pākehā will likely miss both targets, it is equally vital to recognise that Samoans are not Tongans and that the people from Tokelau are not the same as those from the Cook Islands or Niue, or the Solomons.
However, if there is one tradition that links all the peoples of the Pacific, it is their heritage as explorers settling some of the last parts of the Earth to be settled by humanity. From Hawai’i in the north to Easter Island (Rapanui) in the east and New Zealand in the south, Polynesian explorers and their ancestors were navigating the vast areas of the Pacific long before Christopher Columbus set sail from Europe for the Americas.
That is a cultural tradition that not only links all the peoples of the Pacific, but which also speaks of peoples with a proud and noble heritage. These champions of change from another time should provide inspiration to the role models of today. In my view, those people who explored vast tracts of open ocean armed with just a knowledge of currents, migration of birds and the stars, can also find solutions to address domestic violence in their communities.
I understand this Fono to have been called with a clear directive. It is not an opportunity to wring hands and despair or point the finger and play what can be called “the blame and shame” game. The time for that has passed. Here now is an opportunity to start making plans to tackle domestic violence and I congratulate the organisers for taking that approach. Building on a series of community fono throughout New Zealand, this National Fono has the ability to set a clear path for positive action. To conclude, I quote again from Tremain’s story and his comments on how he became as abusive as his father and grandfather had been. He said so in the following words:
“They say violence begs violence—I could see the circle right in front of my face, and I could see that I had the opportunity of changing it.”
With that plea, to begin changing the cycle of violence in our society, and with some considerable reason for optimism for your forthcoming deliberations, it gives me much pleasure to declare this Fono open.
And on that note I will close in New Zealand’s first language Māori, by offering everyone greetings and wishing you all good health and fortitude in your endeavours. No reira, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, kia ora, kia kaha, tēnā koutou katoa.