Ian McLlean with his new book on Sir Norman Perry and the Mahi Tahi movement in prisons.
Ian McLlean with his new book on Sir Norman Perry and the Mahi Tahi movement in prisons.
Rotorua author Ian McLean’s new book highlights Sir Norman Perry’s cultural breakthrough in New Zealand prisons.
Perry’s Mahi Tahi wānanga, started in 1995, improved Māori inmates’ behaviour and engagement.
McLean, a former National MP, wrote the book to recognise Perry’s unacknowledged contributions.
A cultural breakthrough in prisons said to have changed the lives of many Māori inmates has been acknowledged in a new book written by a former Rotorua politician.
Ian McLean has just released his new book, Norman Perry and Mahi Tahi – The Cultural Breakthrough in NZ Prisons, as a tribute to a “great man and great New Zealander”.
Sir Norman Perry was Pākehā but served with the Māori Battalion in World War II. He was wounded in Cassino, Italy before returning home and becoming a leader of the Presbyterian Church. Spending most of his life in Ōpōtiki, he was instrumental in forming the Māori Council and was knighted for services to the community and Māori. He died in 2006 aged 92.
Among his notable work, he set up the Mahi Tahi wānanga (forum) 30 years ago - a rehabilitation system still used today.
McLean is from Rotorua and was a National MP, winning four elections in the 1970s and 1980s in what was then known as the Tarawera electorate. McLean went on to chair the Earthquake Commission, taking on leading roles overseas and, in latter years, chairing the Rotorua Lakes Water Quality Society.
He said Perry was a mentor to him and he wanted to write the book because there was no record of the work he did.
“It is written because the cultural breakthrough in Corrections has not been recognised or reported,” McLean said.
What did Norman Perry do?
According to the book, Perry set up Mahi Tahi Akoranga Trust and invited McLean to be a trustee on the day he resigned from politics.
He was a protege of a great Māori leader, the late Sir Āpirana Ngata. Perry had a vision to help improve the lives of Māori inmates - described in the book as “one of the most imprisoned peoples in the world”, with devastating social consequences - by using a tīkanga Māori practice.
The first four-day wānanga was held at Mangaroa Prison near Hastings in October 1995 after Perry managed to persuade the prison boss to allow it without head office clearance.
McLean recalled in the book that Perry often told the story of how he told the prison boss: “We have both been in the army and we know what headquarters does with fresh ideas. Why not try it out and then tell head office how it worked?”
Sir Norman Perry with Lady Phyllis Perry after his investiture in 1977.
While set in the grounds of the prison, the wānanga took on traditional Māori protocol as if on a marae.
It was deemed a huge success as Māori inmates came out of their shells, and in the following years the wānanga were used throughout other prisons in New Zealand.
The book details how prison managers reported a marked improvement in inmates’ behaviour.
“Prison officers reported that participants started to come to terms with their offending, were more willing to co-operate with prison officers, and were less likely to be involved in incidents,” McLean wrote.
McLean told the Rotorua Daily Post while the idea might not seem new in rehabilitation circles today, few people knew it was Perry who started it in prisons 30 years ago.
A Corrections spokesman said Mahi Tahi Akoranga Trust delivered the Tīkanga Māori Motivational Programme “Te Ihu Waka” at Hawke’s Bay and Manawatu Prisons.
“The programme is designed to motivate participants to fully engage in rehabilitation programmes by supporting them to understand their cultural identity and encouraging them to embody the kaupapa and tīkanga of their tīpuna,” the spokesman said.
McLean grew up on a family farm on the Rangitaiki Plains near Whakatāne.
After graduating with a BA in mathematics at Auckland University, he farmed near Whakatāne until 1971.
From 1971 to 1978 he worked as an agricultural economist in Wellington, with two years away leading a Food and Argriculture Organisation and United Nations Development Programme project in Tanzania.
He was MP for the Tarawera electorate, winning four elections from 1978 to 1990, and chaired the Public Expenditure Committee for one Parliamentary term.
From 1991 to 1995 he chaired the Earthquake Commission, and after that was involved mostly with catastrophe insurance and reinsurance.
Under the World Bank, he helped set up catastrophe insurance schemes in Turkey and Romania and later chaired the Lakes Water Quality Society. He was honoured with a Queen’s Service Order in 1991 for public services.
His other books and articles include The Future for NZ Agriculture – Economic Strategies for the 1980s (1978) and Another Pioneering Use of DFA: New Zealand Earthquake Commission (2016).
Kelly Makiha is a senior journalist who has reported for the Rotorua Daily Post for more than 25 years, covering mainly police, court, human interest and social issues.
