March 21, 2023
League flags conditions of wāhine prisoners
The Maori Women Welfare League has raised the condition of women in New Zealand prisons with the United Nations.
Immediate past president of Prue Kapua says a 17-strong league delegation attended the recent UN Commission on the Status of Women in New York.
She says they’ve tried to raise the issues here, but women’s concerns get lost because of a focus on the much larger male prison population.
“Their needs are entirely different. The role they play in the whanau is entirely different. The effect that it has on tamariki is different. We tend to gloss over that, so I think if you raise that awareness, I guess your hope is that at some point the Government sits up,” Ms Kapua says.
She says human rights issues have an international perspective.