Tureiti Moxon

Moxon was born in Wairoa, Hawkes Bay, in 1957, the daughter of Te Muera and Margaret Hawkins. Her iwi are Ngāti Pāhauwera, Ngāti Kahungunu and Kāi Tahu.^[2] She grew up on a farm in Mōhaka as one of 12 children, and described her family as "very Anglican". At age 12 she received a scholarship from the Māori Education Foundation to attend Hukarere Girls' College. When she left school she joined a song and dance troupe of 60 young people in India. She then trained in early childhood education and later in law at Waikato University. She worked as a lawyer in the area of Treaty of Waitangi claims and settlements.^[3]

Since 2002, Moxon has been the managing director of primary health provider Te Kōhao Health, a health, education, social and justice service provider in Hamilton servicing the wider Waikato region.^[4][2] She has grown it from 1,500 enrolled individual members to 8,400, and a staff of 234.^[2]

In September 2021, the interim Māori Health Authority was formed with Moxon as a board member.^[5]

Moxon is currently the managing director of Te Kōhao Health in Hamilton,^[4][2] chair of the National Urban Māori Authority (NUMA), and is a Chartered Fellow with the Institute of Directors.^[6]

In 2020, Moxon received the Te Tupu-ā-Rangi Award for Health and Science, for her dedication to improving the physical and mental wellbeing of New Zealanders at the Ngā Whetū o Matariki – Matariki Awards.^[7][8] Moxon was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by the University of Waikato in 2024 for her contribution to health particularly righting inequities and systemic bias in healthcare.^[9]

In 2005, she and others applied to the Waitangi Tribunal, challenging inequities suffered by Māori in the public health system and seeking access to health data.^[10][11] In 2019, in response to the claim, a Waitangi Tribunal report said the Crown was to set up a stand-alone Māori health agency, and consider compensation for failing to improve Māori health over the past 20 years. By failing to set up and run the primary health system in a way that reduced the gap between Maori and non-Maori health outcomes.^[12]

In 2012, Moxon was part of the Ngāti Pāhauwera negotiating team who settled their historical treaty claims with the Crown. She is a claimant in a number of claims before the Waitangi Tribunal in relation to health, Oranga Tamariki and ACC.^[4]

In 2021, Moxon called for the elimination of state care of children (tamariki) for not upholding Māori self-determination (tino rangatiratanga) over their families (whānau). She has said the Crown should consider compensating families who have been punished and traumatised by state intervention.^[13][14] Instead she called for Māori structures to provide the support to families where needed. In her capacity as NUMA chair she also said, "Given that 60 to 70 per cent of children in State care are Māori, National Urban Māori Authority continues to advocate that 60 to 70 per cent of the resources should go to Māori.^[15]

In November 2022, an independent panel was appointed by the Police Commissioner Andrew Coster, to investigate racism in the New Zealand Police, with Moxon as one of the panel members.^[16]