Healthy Families Hui-a-Tau 2023 – Sharing, learning, connecting and elevating our region’s lived realities

Waiho i te toipoto, kaua i te toiroa. Let us keep close together, not wide apart.

In the final days of April, Healthy Families NZ held its annual national hui, entitled "Now & Beyond," which brought together 11 Healthy Families localities from across the country.  

The national hui was hosted by Healthy Families Te Ngira at Turangawaewae Marae in Ngaruawahia with the purpose for sites to learn, share and come away with tangible actions as the Healthy Families NZ health prevention and innovation movement enters its third phase. 

The final night of the national hui saw all teams present kaupapa from across the country, with Healthy Families East Cape team utilising the time to raise awareness of the lived reality of our communities and region that have been and still are affected by Cyclone Gabrielle. 

Attendees were given a firsthand account of the impact of the cyclone through a creative skit entitled "Survive the 35," an escape room style challenge which highlighted the barriers faced by our communities in the aftermath of the natural disaster.  

The skit was used to spark discussion around preventative solutions and how communities can better prepare for future disasters. 

Utilising the lived realities of six personas from both inside and outside the Tokomaru Bay community, participants in the room were invited to work together to devise real-time solutions to the challenges Te Tairāwhiti faced during the Cyclone: 

• A lack of access to medication and dialysis treatment  

• The impact on tangihanga 
• Non-potable water and no access to water 
• Telecommunications breakdown, and;  
• Damaged infrastructure  

“The team wanted to highlight the importance of community collaboration in disaster preparedness but also, they wanted to highlight the importance of prevention and innovative solutions at times like these, further delving into the tremendous role that Healthy Families plays in our wider ecosystem,” said Healthy Families East Cape Manager, Toni June, of the team’s performance. 

Healthy Families East Cape would like to mihi and acknowledge all of our Healthy Families NZ teams for allowing us the opportunity and privilege to share, connect and be privy to their most cherished mahi from across the country. 

Healthy Families East Cape would also like to mihi to Taiki e! Impact House, our pioneering community champions, for their guidance, partnerships and inspiration in providing us the innovation tools and techniques of “Fishbowl conversations” and “Unconferences” which were utilised as part of the Healthy Families NZ national hui. 

These tools not only allowed our sites to creatively discuss and idea-share around key focus areas of Healthy Families, but they allowed us to elevate conversations around the importance of Mātauranga Māori as a health prevention tool, healthy food and physical activity choices, and increasing mental health, resilience, and wellbeing. 

Taiki E! I rangatira mātou i a koutou. Te taea te whakahua i ngā kupu hōnore. Tēnā rawa atu koutou. 

Every kōrero, connection and time for kai was an opportunity for learning, sharing, creating whakapapa ties and igniting our commitment to continuing the kaupapa of health prevention and innovation, “now and beyond.” 
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Finally, Healthy Families East Cape would like to mihi to Healthy Families Te Ngira for their organisation and hospitality of the national hui, for bringing our teams home to Te Rohe Pōtae o Waikato Tainui. Te kainga o tā tātou Ariki Nui Kingi Tūheitia Pōtatau Te Wherowhero Te Tuawhitu e noho mai nei ki te ahurewa o āna mātua tūpuna. Ko koutou kei runga tōhaunui i rangatira ai te manaaki i te motu pae ki runga i a koutou. Tēnei ka mihi. 

Photographed National Healthy Families Hui-a-Tau 2023 attendees from our 11 Healthy Families localities.