Search

Somehow, I suspect that this isn't news: Suffrage Centennial Year is pretty much over. Come December 31st, this Cinderella Festival turns into a pumpkin, you might say. Many people have spoken and written about the year. Here are just a few of their…

Your Worship, Your Excellency the President of Ireland, Honourable Minister, gentlemen and ladies. We've rediscovered and reclaimed a lot of valuable history, this last year in New Zealand. We've remembered just how it came about that New Zealand was the…

Suffrage Centennial Year, as I'm sure you've noticed, has come in for some mockery. Necks have been observed to redden at the very idea of some of the events. But no matter. The Centennial has promoted greater awareness of the history of women in New…

Kia ora tatou. Good evening everyone. Rumour has it that I am to talk tonight about the role of the Governor-General. As a rule, of course, you shouldn't always believe what you hear. But to talk about something else would put the Friends of the Turnbull…

Mrs Buck, Mrs Shipley, Mr Norrish, Ms Ayers, teachers. I know I'm being anachronistic, but to adapt the first half of a famous quotation, gaining the franchise was indeed "one small step for women." It was not however, a giant leap for womankind. The…

Madam Mayor, Your Excellencies, gentlemen and ladies. "Pacific Island Women in Development" is a very large theme for a conference to have. There are questions it raises immediately. The first is, what is development? - what does successful development…

Graduands and partners, mums and dads, sisters and brothers, sons and daughters, teachers and, just to make sure no-one gets left out, ladies and gentlemen. As soon-to-be teachers, it's possible that you graduands here this afternoon have already mentally…

Graduands and partners, mums and dads, sisters and brothers, sons and daughters, teachers and, to make sure no-one gets left out, ladies and gentlemen. It's a risky business, asking for a keynote address at a graduation ceremony. After all, this sort of…

The poor old kiwi has had a bad press. When I looked up references to the kiwi, in addition to all those about the "inarticulate kiwi", invariably referring to the New Zealand male person, usually made by intellectual British females or sometimes males,…

One of my distinguished predecessors, the Viscount Cobham, finding himself in the position that I find myself in today, commenced his lecture with these words: "To be asked to give the Thomas Cawthron Memorial Lecture is a great honour, but it is an…

More years ago than I like to remember, I left school planning to be an English teacher. I didn't make it. There were a lot of things I planned to do that I didn't, but even more that I didn't plan on that I did. I spent the decade of my twenties…

Last year was the 75th anniversary of Gallipoli - that terrible battle of the First World War which New Zealanders will never forget. This year the 50th anniversary of the Battle for Crete in the Second World War will be marked by remembrance ceremonies.…

"He kororia ki te Atua He maungarongo ki runga i te mata o te whenua He whakaaro pai ki nga tangata katoa." No reira, tena koutou, tena koutou, tena koutou katoa. I have chosen these well-known words of Te Whiti o Rongomai, the prophet chief of Parihaka,…

Prime Minister, Chief Justice, Your Excellencies, Ministers of the Crown, Members of Parliament, Ladies and Gentlemen. Nga rangatira ma - Ngati Whatua, Tainui, Te Ati Awa E nga iwi, e nga mana, e nga reo Tena koutou, tena koutou, tena koutou katoa. As I…

In the 1960s when Jim Bolger was milking cows on the Kahui Road near Rahotu, Paul Reeves was shepherding his flock 10 miles to the north at Okato. The fact that tonight we are both sitting here in our respective positions suggests several things: there is…

Walter Bagehot's quaintly worded book on The English Constitution is still worth reading even though it first appeared in 1867. He sets the scene with the statement that "the Crown is, according to the saying, 'the fountain of honour' but the Treasury is…

As I stand here there are two Māori sayings or whakatauki ringing in my ears. One says he kuku ki te kainga he kaka ki te haere which means a pigeon at home but a parrot abroad. The other says ka kore ano e kitea he korero e noho ki raro and even more…

When we left Wellington we were told [the] temperature at Dunedin would be 11 degrees. When we were over Christchurch they said it was minus 2 degrees. When we got here, I thought is was about minus 40 degrees. I have two particular memories of All Saints…

From the top of this hill and on a clear day you can see the straits of the Dardanelles. Chunuk Bair they call this place. It means "a hill of war" and that is exactly what it was for the New Zealand troops who battled so hard to take and hold Chunuk Bair…

Your Excellency Mr Turgut Ozal, President of the Republic of Turkey, Your Excellency Mr Safa Giray, Minister of National Defence, the Honourable Muzaffer Ecemis, Governor of Canakkale, distinguished guests from many nations. On behalf of visiting Heads of…

In 1988 the Princess Royal stayed at Government House, Wellington. At dinner, a prominent Māori seated next to her said, "When I look into your eyes I see the reflection of your ancestor, Victoria, whose agent, Hobson, signed the Treaty in 1840." The…

It's worth saying, especially to lawyers, that the Treaty of Waitangi is not solely a legal document. Claudia Orange writes that "The role of the English missionaries determined that Ngapuhi in particular would understand the Treaty as a special kind of…

Michael King tells of a Moriori ancestor, Nunuku Whenua, who, sickened by bloodshed among his people, issued an injunction which by and large was obeyed: only fight till you draw blood, then stop. To ritualise aggression and to keep disputes within…

My task is to propose a toast to The Immortal Memory . I am honoured to have that privilege. What I want to do is to put that immortal memory into a New Zealand context, New Zealand as we were at the turn of the 19th Century and New Zealand as we are…

Alexander Turnbull nearly gave his collection to Victoria University College and that may not have been a bad idea. Instead he gave it to "his Majesty The King" to be the "nucleus of a New Zealand national collection", and that was an inspired choice. I…

Māori are a Pacific people who came to Aotearoa from their traditional homeland, Hawaiiki. Aotearoa is also called New Zealand by those who came from their traditional homeland, Great Britain, in the 19th Century. But it is a profound experience for a…

The first object of this College is to cultivate and maintain the highest principles of surgical practice and ethics. Obviously there is a close link between maintaining principles and ethics. There has long been an obligation that a doctor seek and…

Each year on the fourth Saturday in June the Taranaki tribes meet at Manukorihi Pa, Waitara, to observe Pomare Day. We gather inside the meeting house, Te Ikaroa a Maui, the great fish of Maui. The tekoteko at the apex is Maui himself, standing firmly…

I was in Rotorua on Saturday and only got to Auckland because a chartered Air NZ 737 carrying delegates to the Conference of Local Government managers and engineers paused here long enough to offload its passengers and take me on board. So this is an…

For a young left-handed Māori from a boys' school, studying in the library of this University in the early 1950s was very difficult. The place seemed to be full of Presbyterian divinity students and girls from Nga Tawa. That was disconcerting enough, but…

It is often said in this country that we are all one people. The Treaty of Waitangi offers us a very different model. It speaks of two peoples within one nation and spells out the rights and obligations they have towards each other. Over the space of all…

Once upon a time the public perception of an All Black might have been tough but a little dim. They tell the story of the All Black who thought witty repartee was the name of a Māori activist. Our current All Blacks are both talented and intelligent but…