M ttou, , m k uri muri ake nei.
For us and our children after us.
Foreword
T his is the memoir of T Mark Solomon, as told by him. It is also intended to give a reader some insight into what makes T Mark such an effective leader but lets just say his actions often speak louder than his words.
He is known as a respected Mori leader, a forthright man, intelligent, unafraid to speak his mind, with a strong sense of justice. He is a man whom people will happily follow. T Mark has said himself: If people are doing things that I think are incorrect, I will stand up and challenge them.
T Mark has an extraordinary backstory, from foundry worker to leader of one of the largest and wealthiest iwi in New Zealand. He is a man with a good deal of influence on a national level.
Dame Naida Glavish, of Ngti Whtua, describes him as a brilliant leader and speaker. He also cares enough to address the issues that others wouldnt dare address, she says. For instance, Mark would speak strongly about domestic violence, whether that domestic violence is right under his nose or under someone elses.
A brief outline of his life follows. T Mark, who was born in tautahi Christchurch in 1954, married Maria (ne Howie) in 1974. It was, he reckons, a case of love at first sight. They raised four children and have a whngai or adopted son. The children dont feature in this book as T Mark agreed to tell his story as long as he didnt talk about his family.
He grew up in tautahi but the family spent as much time as possible at aro, a small coastal settlement 20 kilometres south of Kaikura, where his fathers parents had land. The death of his father, George, when Mark was only 12 had a major impact on his early life. George was only 39.
Mark spent the first part of his professional life as a foundryman, having previously worked in tautahi in a freezing works, on a shearing gang, and as a pua diver. Its hard to know what would have happened had he continued as a foundryman, but in 1995 he was elected to Te Rnanga o Ngi Tahu, the tribal council of Ngi Tahu, as the representative for Kaikura. It would change his life.
Ngi Tahu, the most commercially astute iwi in Aotearoa and the largest tribe of Te Waipounamu, has 18 representatives on its council, each elected by the iwis 18 papatipu rnanga or regional councils.
In 1995, Ngi Tahu was about to settle its Waitangi Tribunal claim with the Crown, ending seven generations of pursuit of justice after the Crown had reneged on land deals made by Ngi Tahu leaders and left the iwi impoverished. Three years later, in 1998, as the tribe embarked on a new future, T Mark was elected kaiwhakahaere of the iwi, just days before the Ngi Tahu Claims Settlement Act was to have its third and final reading in Parliament. It was the second major Waitangi Tribunal claim, behind Waikato Tainui, to be settled. T Mark was kaiwhakahaere of Ngi Tahu for 18 years, until 2016.
In 2005, he was instrumental in establishing the Iwi Chairs Forum, a group representing iwi from across New Zealand. The forum, which meets four times a year, was fired by T Marks belief that, together, Mori are unstoppable. As he saw it, every tribe in the country was trying to do the same thing. They were all trying to build a capital base, to look after the social and cultural needs of their people and to protect their respective areas. What he didnt understand was, if they were all doing the same thing, why were they doing it in isolation? The forum held its first meeting at Takahanga Marae in Kaikura, which T Marks uncle, Bill Solomon, helped build.
T Mark was a board member of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa from 2002 to 2007 and an original member of the Minister of Mori Affairs Mori Economic Taskforce, established in 2009. At that time, the Minister of Mori Affairs was Dr Pita Sharples and the taskforce had a budget of $4.5 million per annum to research and implement Mori economic development initiatives.
In 2011, he played a key role in setting up the Mori trades training initiative, He Toki ki te Rika, funded by Ngi Tahu, and he is the founding patron of He Toki. In 2012, he was named a Visionary Leader at the Deloitte and New Zealand Management magazine national business awards.
He became T Mark, or Sir Mark, in 2013, when he was made a Knight Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to Mori and business. In 2015, he received an honorary doctorate from Lincoln University, as Doctor of Natural Resources, and he was also appointed to the National Science Challenges governance boards for the Sustainable Seas and Deep South projects.
In 2016, he announced his resignation as the representative of Kaikura on the Ngi Tahu table and as kaiwhakahaere of Te Rnanga o Ngi Tahu. The same year, he was awarded a Kea World Class New Zealand Award. Since stepping down as kaiwhakahaere, he has been deputy chair and then acting chair of the Canterbury District Health Board. He chairs Te Ptahitanga o Te Waipounamu (the Whnau Ora commissioning agency for Te Waipounamu, which was set up by the nine iwi in the south), and he chairs the Mori Carbon Foundation, an organisation that plants trees on marginal land and trades in carbon credits.
He is a champion for T Pono: Te Mana Kaha o te Whnau, a pilot programme launched in 2017 by Te Ptahitanga o Te Waipounamu to explore ways of enabling stronger Mori responses to family harm and violence; he was a key driver in the establishment of, and is a signatory to, the Childrens Covenant, written by Judge Carolyn Henwood and launched in 2016. The Covenant commits to protecting children from violence, abuse, neglect and to provide a proper standard of living. It also promises to support their emotional and mental well-being, provide education and take childrens views into account.
T Mark has been approached by all this countrys main political parties but has resisted a career in national politics. He is constantly in demand as a speaker, and has been co-opted onto a number of government committees. He is usually reluctant to talk about himself. But he has an innate grasp of leadership mana whakatipu in a way that is extremely powerful. He believes that leaders must stride confidently between multiple cultures and be as comfortable on the global corporate stage as they are on the marae.
