Te Tumu Kāinga recently attended the National Māori Housing Conference 2025 in Waitangi.
The annual Conference is a pivotal gathering that brings together iwi, government, and community stakeholders to address housing challenges and drive innovative solutions.
This year Pou Urungi of Pupuke Property Aotearoa consultancy, Lewis England, who is also a director of Te Tumu Kāinga attended the conference and provided his insights on papakāinga development.
Check out our quick conference wrap-up Q&A with him, where he shares what he’s learned, his personal highlights, and the overall mood of the conference this year.
What has your involvement in the conference been?
I was involved as a panel member yesterday speaking about papakāinga development. It’s also just to be here to engage with our Māori community, as well as the indigenous communities of other countries that have come here and to learn about affordable housing.
What have you learned?
I’ve learned a lot about other indigenous communities. We’ve had speakers from Canada, Australia, and Hawaii, speaking about their affordable housing approaches and opportunities that they’ve managed to establish and maintain. That’s been a really big learning; how they approach housing outcomes for their people. There’s a lot of similarities, a lot of shared history and challenges.
It’s been good to wānanga with Māori and other indigenous communities about how we’re going about tackling these challenges.
What has been your personal highlight of the conference?
My personal highlight, setting foot here in Waitangi for the first time, and the weather’s been amazing. It’s just been beautiful. This morning, I was out on the moana. You’re definitely not jumping in the moana back in Taranaki, it’s too cold. So, very stoked to be here.
How would you describe the conference in three words?
I would say, uplifting, vibrant, and positive. Positivity. I think in a time where us, as Māori, have faced a number of challenges, there’s still a real sense of positivity.
It’s been uplifting to hear about how we’re still going about doing the mahi.
Everyone’s still out there trying to make progress and push things forward, regardless of the things that are happening around us, because it’s our own responsibility to get on and do it for our whānau.
Any final thoughts?
My message would be in this space of Māori Housing, that it’s important to get out there and get involved. Everyone has something to add. From our kaumatua, on our marae, or at our papakāinga, they’re always the ones that tell it how it is. Our tamariki, our mokopuna, they give us their own feedback in their own way.
I’d just encourage whānau to put your hand up and get involved in whether it be whenua, Māori, your papakāinga, your whānau blocks. Get involved. Help out, because it’s a collective thing. We need to progress together.