$120 million announcement for the Maori response to COVID19 welcomed by National Maori Authority

$120 million announcement for the Maori resposne to COVID19 welcomed by National Maori Authority

The Chair of the National Maori Authority, Matthew Tukaki, has welcomed the announcement of a new $120 million fund for the Maori response to COVID19. Tukaki has thanked Willie Jackson and Peeni Henare, as well as the Maori Caucus of the Government, for listening to Maori over the course of the last week and for getting this job done.

“Last weekend we all met and one of the key things the National Maori Authority put forward is the establishment of additional funding to enable and empower Maori organisations to – critical to that is this fund. We have a Maori workforce out there right now is this enables them to accelerate what they are doing – and then there will be the ongoing response.” Tukaki said

“We need to still do more though – that includes removing any more additional barriers experienced by our Maori providers as well as moving on the data needed to identify and contact whanau who are falling between the cracks. This will be critical to our reaching higher vaccination targets” Said Tukaki

Tukaki thanked Maori providers across the nation for the mahi they were doing, often in difficult circumstances and challenging environments:

“Our Maori providers have been doing a lot of the heavy lifting and they have literally been providing testing and vaccinations services to all New Zealanders, not just Maori. They have done the mahi in the most challenging environments and are just trying to get the job done. More support for them, for infrastructure and so on now clears the way for that final push to get our whanau vaccinated.” Tukaki said