From the President Paul Radich QC
It has been a time of real change, certainly in health, housing and travel. Our 20 DHBs are to be replaced by one national organisation, Health NZ, together with a new Māori Health Authority, the Government has announced a $3.8 billion housing acceleration fund to pay for infrastructure and a $1.2 billion fund for Kāinga Ora land purchases and, New Zealanders and Australians can once more enjoy quarantine-free travel between our countries on a flyer-beware basis. In other areas, notably climate change and international human rights, significant change is needed. More on that a little later. In the meantime, here at the New Zealand Bar Association, we have undertaken a number of changes ourselves. My monthly member updates have taken over detailing our numerous activities, so in this issue of At the Bar I am going to focus for the most part on our Council and one of our Committees in particular. Our Council and Committees A notable feature of our Council is the amount of work it undertakes. We meet every month – two meetings are kanohi ki te kanohi (in person), and the balance are held by Zoom. The meetings rotate between full day meetings, which deal with the Association’s accounts, business, governance and, on alternative months, policies, and half day meetings which proceed on a non-agenda/blue sky basis to focus on deliverables and initiatives. The Council’s meeting schedule and the level of work for its members places heavy, but professionally satisfying, demands on members. We owe them a real vote of thanks. A list of our Council members can be found on our website. Recently, the Council met in Wellington at the stunning new offices of our sponsor partner, MAS, with a sparkling Wellington Harbour as our backdrop. It was a pleasure to welcome MAS Chief Executive, Martin Stokes to the beginning of our meeting and to learn a little more about the way in which the 100 year old company was born in New Zealand, has grown with the country and the way in which it delivers a socially responsible service with an emphasis on professional groups. Martin’s pride in MAS’s approach and its journey is well justified. The primary purpose of the meeting was to confirm the creation and composition of our new committees and to develop achievable goals, or deliverables, for each of them. To ensure that our work is focused and that deliverables for our members are readily achieved, we have reduced the number of committees from 14 to six, including several sub-committees. The new committees are: • Advocacy – to promote access to justice and the rule of law and to submit on legislative developments • Te Ao Māori – to educate and inform the organisation and its members • Diversity and Inclusion – to embed gender equity and diversity initiatives and outcomes • Education – to deliver advocacy training, conferences and webinars • Membership and Wellbeing – to provide collegiality, support and benefits • Specialist Areas – to provide an umbrella for our Criminal Committee, Commercial Bar Committee and for the development of other specialist areas If you would like to know a little more about the committees and what they do, please look at our committees page on our website. I extend my sincere thanks to all of our members who have put up their hands to serve on these committees. They have all committed themselves to hard work, for the benefit of us all. I extend my thanks, also, to our outgoing committee members for their considerable contributions. Te Ao Māori Committee I want to focus on the role, and the work, of this committee in this column. I will discuss the work of our other committees in later offerings.
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