1. Dame Tariana Turia was a New Zealand Maori rights activist and politician.
53 Facts About Tariana Turia
1. 2.
Tariana Turia was first elected to Parliament in 1996 as a representative of the Labour Party.
3.
Tariana Turia won the Te Tai Hauauru electorate in 2002 and broke from Labour in 2004, resigning from Parliament during the foreshore and seabed controversy.
4.
Tariana Turia retired as Maori Party co-leader and a member of Parliament at the general election in September 2014.
5.
Tariana Turia grew up in the small village of Putiki, on the Whanganui River, and was raised by a grandmother, whangai parents and aunties.
6.
Tariana Turia was educated at Wanganui Girls' College, and trained as a nurse.
7.
Tariana Turia married George Turia at Ratana Pa on 10 November 1962.
8.
Tariana Turia was a member of Parliament for the Labour Party from 12 October 1996 until her resignation on 17 May 2005.
9.
Tariana Turia was first elected as a list MP in the 1996 general election, ranked 20th on the party list.
10.
Tariana Turia had only joined the party shortly before her selection as a candidate, although she had been asked to stand in the past.
11.
Tariana Turia later described Labour leader Helen Clark's campaign opening speech as "not too much out of kilter" with her own views.
12.
When swearing her oath of allegiance in Parliament, Tariana Turia swore allegiance to the Treaty of Waitangi rather than the Queen.
13.
Tariana Turia received more criticism for her views when she said in 1997 that the Treaty of Waitangi was more important than the Ten Commandments.
14.
Tariana Turia clashed with some long-serving MPs in her party, including Mike Moore, over their different approaches to Maori development.
15.
Mahuta changed electorates for the 2002 election; Tariana Turia won selection in Te Tai Hauauru and the seat as an electorate-only candidate.
16.
Early in her time as a minister, Tariana Turia was warned by prime minister Helen Clark about opinions she voiced on the "holocaust" caused to Maori by colonisation and apologised in Parliament for her statements.
17.
In November 2000, Tariana Turia was additionally appointed as an associate minister in the corrections portfolio.
18.
Tariana Turia was scrutinised for a telephone call she made to the chief judge of the Maori Land Court about a case involving one of her iwi.
19.
Tariana Turia launched the Office for the Community and Voluntary Sector in September 2003.
20.
The hierarchy strongly implied that if Tariana Turia did not support Labour policy, she could not retain her ministerial roles.
21.
Tariana Turia's supporters saw Turia as having bravely defied her party in order to stand up for her principles.
22.
The Labour Party criticised Tariana Turia for putting the foreshore and seabed issue before the party's wider policies for Maori development, and said that she unreasonably focused on a single issue.
23.
Helen Clark said that Tariana Turia showed "an astonishing lack of perspective".
24.
Tariana Turia described the Te Tai Hauauru by-election of 10 July 2004 as a chance to test her mandate, and to ensure that she had the support of her voters, but doubts remained about the significance of the by-election, since none of the major parties put forward candidates.
25.
Tariana Turia voted against the Foreshore and Seabed Act 2004, which passed with Labour and New Zealand First's support in November 2004.
26.
Tariana Turia sat on the primary production committee from 13 August 2004 for the remainder of the term.
27.
Tariana Turia opposed the government's campaign to immunise children against meningococcal disease.
28.
At the 2005 general election, held on 17 September, Tariana Turia was re-elected in Te Tai Hauauru and three more Maori Party candidates won parliamentary seats: co-leader Sharples in Tamaki Makaurau, Hone Harawira in Te Tai Tokerau and Te Ururoa Flavell in Waiariki.
29.
Tariana Turia pledged to repeal the Foreshore and Seabed Act if her party was able to form a government but expressed a desire not to enter a coalition agreement with Labour.
30.
Tariana Turia delivered a keynote address at the ACT New Zealand party conference in March 2006.
31.
Tariana Turia was reappointed Minister for the Community and Voluntary Sector and became an associate minister in the health, social development, and employment portfolios.
32.
Tariana Turia was additionally appointed Minister for Disability Issues on 30 June 2009 and Minister for Whanau Ora on 8 April 2010.
33.
Tariana Turia supported the replacement legislation, the Marine and Coastal Area Act 2011, although she described it as "drafted by politics, rather than what is fair and moral" and the party's support for the bill led to Hone Harawira's resignation.
34.
The replacement legislation restored access to the courts enabling iwi and hapu to seek customary titles and Tariana Turia encouraged them to do so.
35.
Tariana Turia led the government's Smokefree 2025 policy which was launched in 2011 and included plain packaging and increased excise taxes for cigarettes.
36.
Tariana Turia moved that an anti-abortion Pacific Island doctor, Ate Moala, be appointed to the Committee.
37.
Tariana Turia confirmed in November 2013 that she would retire at the 2014 election.
38.
Tariana Turia gave her valedictory statement on 24 July 2014.
39.
Tariana Turia held various government appointments, particularly in Maori development and health.
40.
Tariana Turia supported the development of the Crown apology for actions at Parihaka as part of its Treaty of Waitangi claim settlement with Taranaki iwi in 2015.
41.
In 2016, health minister Jonathan Coleman appointed Tariana Turia to be a member of the Whanganui District Health Board.
42.
In 2017, Tariana Turia was appointed a representative of Te Awa Tupua, the legal identity of the Whanganui River after it was given legal personhood.
43.
Tariana Turia campaigned against the End of Life Choice Bill in 2019, saying that it would undermine whanau values.
44.
Tariana Turia endorsed Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, the Maori Party candidate, for the Te Tai Hauauru electorate in the 2020 general election.
45.
However, in the 2023 general election, Tariana Turia supported the National Party candidate, her relative Harete Hipango, over Ngarewa-Packer.
46.
In 2022, Tariana Turia drew media attention for her anti-vaccination views and opposition to mask mandates during the COVID-19 pandemic.
47.
On 17 February 2022, Tariana Turia accused prime minister Jacinda Ardern of having Nazi sympathies on Radio New Zealand, in an interview about the Sixth Labour Government's response to the 2022 Wellington anti-vaccination protests.
48.
Tariana Turia opined that she would rather see funding being given directly to whanau, iwi and hapu to allow them to manage their own health needs.
49.
Tariana Turia died at Whangaehu Marae, Whangaehu, on 3 January 2025, at the age of 80, after suffering a stroke.
50.
Tariana Turia attracted cross-party tributes from prime minister Christopher Luxon, former prime ministers John Key, Bill English and Chris Hipkins, former attorney-general Chris Finlayson and former United Future leader Peter Dunne, that focused on her "principled leadership" and bravery.
51.
Also in 2018, Tariana Turia received the Blake Medal at the annual Sir Peter Blake Leadership Awards.
52.
In 2023, Tariana Turia was conferred an honorary doctorate in Maori development by Te Whare Wananga o Awanuiarangi, in recognition of her "continuing dedication and service to her iwi, to Maori and to the community in a career that has been distinguished by unprecedented firsts over the last five decades".
53.
Tariana Turia's biography, Crossing the Floor, was written by her former chief of staff, Helen Leahy, and published by Huia in 2015.