<&>Wellington Corpus of Spoken New Zealand English Version One <&>Copyright 1998 School of Linguistics & Applied Language Studies <&>Victoria University of Wellington <&>side one <&>0:20 kia ora don a very good morning to you koutou ka whakarongo mai nga tena ra koutou katoa the health research council in new zealand was set up under act in nineteen ninety it's the major organisation supporting health related research in new zealand it's <.>f responsible for dispensing an <.>ad voc administering government monies which are provided for this purpose and it acts as a national coordinating body for health research underneath the council are certain statutory committees of which one is the maori health committee <,> the maori health committee is <&>1:00 chaired by professor eru pomare professor pomare has te ati awa ngati kahungunu rongomai wahine rongo whakata and ngati toa tribal connections he's a member of the health research council dean and director of the pumanawa haora wellington school of medicine and professor pomare joins me on the line from wellington this morning eru pomare good morning good morning er you're the chairperson aren't you of the maori health committee of the er health research council of new zealand tut that's correct <.>c can you tell me something about the background of the research council itself inhales well the the research council will be er one of those many councils around that er most maori people have no idea er exists tut but in terms of er HEALTH research in new zealand it's the inhales it's the biggest single funder of er of research that we have um it used to be called the medical research council of new zealand up until about i think it was nineteen ninety when <&>2:00 the inhales when a new act was er was brought <&>pronounced bought into play er called the health research council act inhales and one of the reasons for er making a legislative change was that there was a feeling that more money needed to go out to support community research in other words the sort of public health research side of er things and there were other <&>pronounced as ather issues too which were felt important and hadn't been specifically addressed in the past and one of those was maori health inhales and the other was related to to ethics tut so what in fact happened was that a er a new er health research council was formed in in nineteen ninety basically to coordinate er health research in the in the country to initiate <&>3:00 develop research help people er wanting to do er research and also the government gives a a large amount er of money towards health research and the council has a major responsibility for distributing that that amounts to well something between fifteen and twenty million dollars er per year so that's quite a lot of money yes so <.>are are those areas of research er general research areas or are are there some very sort of specialist areas er involved eru tut well there are quite a lot of er specialist um areas involved but basically inhales um the council would fund um any research provided the the quality of the research was er er was up to scratch anything that related er to health and and some of the you know proposals that do come in you you know you have to stretch the imagination and say well what's that got to do with health mm but um er by <&>4:00 and large the the field which is covered is is very wide indeed so <.>th the role then of the maori health committee itself within the council what what are your primary objectives your your your primary roles as it <{><[>were <[>inhales well we've actually voc i mean the the health research council act as voc with <.>ha has got a role er for us and um it's a pretty broad one it says that the principal functions of the health er committee shall be to advise council on health research into issues that affect maori people so that just about you know covers anything <{1><[1>that you can er you can think of that you know that has health and it has research er related to it and in effect we've sort of felt our way along um er sort of trying to respond to er you know what er what has come from the <&>5:00 community itself in terms of er needs inhales i think the you know the two things that that really we've wanted to to get moving and er <.>i is to try and do something about er upskilling our our people in terms <{2><[2>of research you know not many of our people are actually in er have the have the skills er nor know where to you know to find those skills to try and help them and there's so much activity going on now in the health field there's a great need for for people to look at what they're doing um and to er you know to check out whether it's er you know what they're doing is is good to evaluate it because at the end of the day when when when it comes to funding people'll say well we gave you some money before for that particular project er was it worth it and it's the sort evaluation and research skills which er are required by our people to to do those sort of tasks very <&>6:00 important <[1>yes <[2>mhm do you then have to wait <.>f for members of the community or groups or individuals to come to the committee then with their proposals with their research proposals or or or does your committee go out and look for people already with skills who perhaps <{1><[1>can carry out <.>s er <{2><[2>research work <[1>yes <[2>yes inhales probably the i mean the the latter tut what we have is that the committee itself meets usually about three or four times er a year we have er two day meetings and we usually go to places not the main main centres but to places um er to <.>mao maori communities where we can have have our normal sort of business er meeting but we always combine it with a hui at the at the same time the last hui was down in um down in invercargill er but we've been been all over the show um er with the committee so <.>th <.>th <.>th <.>th council itself says oh you're the most expensive committee cos you keep travelling all over the place <&>7:00 but inhales actually we need to do that because er our people er don't know who we are what we're about that we in fact are able to help so that's one thing we do get out but <.>o obviously not as much as we'd er like to do the other is that we have a um maori um coordinator of research who is based in the health research council office itself in auckland chap called andrew er sporle te rarawa mi ngati apa and um clears throat his um task is to to respond to all the day to day needs that er our people may have in terms of providing information a about research er helping them to link with people who may be able to help with a particular area of expertise and we think that that's a very important um er function sort of like a BROKing function <{><[>really you know people come with something and and we can help get them to the right <&>8:00 people because at the end of the day that's where we're going to er you know <.>f find a lot of help for for our people <[>yes well as your committee has moved around from marae to marae eru what sort of proposals have come out of those huis voc <.>h <.>h has anything concrete actually developed within the research area well i think so i think one of the um the sort of things that've come out i mean people have been er amazed for a start that there is anything you know there is a body that can actually give away money that <{><[>sort of you know perks up people immediately there's a bit of money there how can we get our hands on it that's the sort of usually the first er question but actually as people think of it you know and they think of their own skills and they say well <.>at where can we learn about some of these things inhales and er so tut what some of the things that have come from the hui've have been been you know direct er requests of us to to hold HUI er around the country where <&>9:00 people can go to learn some of those skills even if it's something quite simple as how do you write an application er for for for some funding er and going on from that to designing er research proposals perhaps in a simple manner for a start but er er in a more complex er you know way later on so we've been spent quite a bit of time there've been quite a number of hui now er <.>i mainly in auckland er and wellington er relating to um trying to get our people up to speed with respect to making successful applications to the um er to our committee inhales now the other is there are have been specific projects which've been suggested and er er we've usually had to go through the stage of of helping er um you know get the <,> <&>10:00 proposals up to up to speed and they varied a lot from you know from one place to another and that probably is is um something that we shouldn't be surprised at mental health voc swallows been one area where er people've required er wanted er more to be um done inhales um the area of traditional um um medicines and er healing practices there've been several people who've wanted to inhales to to get some er research in that area under way inhales um <,> aids is a is a another area where we've had er you know people've wanted specifically wanted some work to be to be done in but probably the area where most help has been asked for is in the whole question of tribal health status people are very anxious to know at this point in time what sort of er problems there are within a particular um <&>11:00 iwi or hapu and er they want to know how they go about that and this has um relevance with respect to you know funding cos people giving giving money say er crown health enterprises or regional health authorities they say well why should we give you that money you know what is the problem there have you got any idea and er if you DO if we do give you the money are you going to to know if you there has been any <.>r you know good change as a result of that so that probably is the single <[>word yes area where we've had most um call on our on our funding which has come directly from the hui which we've had round the country inhales are there in fact different needs er <.>be between tribes eru are there yes there are there are i mean um what sorts um i think the you know in some some areas where where they've you know got tribal health status and and so forth um you know well <&>12:00 under under way they tended to focus then on on more specific er issues that er er that may be be affecting and they usually come down to specific <,> tut sort of er problems like er we want to concentrate on on asthma er you know in our area we've er that's something which is um or or it might be er you know family er violence or something like that is is a particular issue so there is there is quite a lot of variation um around the the country and um tut um you can't sort of generalise you know to you know as to what sort of projects if <{><[>you were setting priorities for instance er you know and you came out and said well a b and c are what we should be spending our money in inhales <.>n you know inhales what would happen would be that there'd be a whole lot of people say oh nah it's got no we we no don't want that that's er not relevant to us and er and so forth so it <&>13:00 is i think it is there is quite a bit of regional variation <[>mm an applicant then who comes to the maori health committee with <{1><[1>a with with a particular project requesting er some sort of help or some <{2><[2>sort of <.>fu funding particularly <.>d do they have to have some some form of formal qualification before they can even sort of approach the committee <[1>yes <[2>yes well no they don't i think that's one of the um one of the things which is a little bit DIFFerent to to the way in which um other people applying to the er health research council for <.>f funding tut um for instance we've got quite a number of of grants and awards which are different to to what the main council er gives out and our people are are you know quite entitled to to apply for er you know the normal grants out of the council itself some of them which er which er which you know can be quite large inhales well the sort of <&>14:00 things that we tut we want to try and do to get to people up and and running tut um is to to give small seeding grants these are sort of to help our people develop research er proposals and and the funding for that might er er be put towards the cost <.>in involved in seeking advice from experienced er researchers for instance or travelling to a particular place to to DO that research <{><[>word <[>that's <.>even that that's even before they actually begin the oh <{><[>yeah they tend to be <[>the the project itself yes they might have an idea <{><[>they might have an idea don't have to have any particular qualifications <.>w all we would say is that inhales they should at least be um er you know interested in health and and advantage in in having worked in the area and you know most people who're who are seeking grants have those those qualifications anyway tut but these are just some funding up to five thousand dollars to enable people to to get things <&>15:00 <.>start go to people find out what it's about and er and try and get themselves on the on the track now let's suppose that swallows they got er you know good advice and they're able to get a um a project er um er voc properly <.>s properly worked out inhales they may then want to put in an application for what we call a small grant er these are up to twenty five thousand dollars but at the moment we're we're trying to increase that to to fifty thousand dollars because your dollars don't go far these days <[>yes yes and um these are for what we call small research projects um usually of a year's er duration and er they're they're contestable and um we've er so that's the sort of next stage on and <{><[>then you know people who're successful in that may <&>16:00 get a you know get a good pilot under way and and finished and say at the end of it think oh gosh there are a number of other questions i want to do now or i want this to sort of develop into something bigger and er er put in for voc what i'd voc a health research council project grant er voc for which there's swallows really i shouldn't say no limit cos there obviously will be a limit but grants in the er you know order of er hundred two hundred thousand dollars are are the sort of average er grants er that are given out by the health research council at the present time we got many many grants that might go you know into the million million dollars <&>16:44 <[>mm