![]() ![]() ![]() "I'm taking that proposition into my own life actions and seeing how I am, and what it means to be a servant to the law, my people and all of Aotearoa. Are you a lawyer who is Māori, or are you a Māori lawyer?' "He said 'when you're becoming a lawyer, you should always ask yourself one question. McMaster said a quote that always stuck with him was from constitutional lawyer Moana Jackson, who visited Te Aute College while he was boarding there. "I was made aware of what it is to be a lawyer, and now that I am one I can 'yep, this is the type of person I've always wanted to be'." "Everyone back home planted these seeds in my mind, and when I went to Te Aute they pretty much became clarified. ![]() "They wanted me to be someone who would aspire to learn to be a servant for them eventually, and try and become some sort of community, family, iwi, hapu based person by going everywhere else and bringing as much as I could back home. After spending a year working at the meatworks in Waitotara in 2014, he attended the University of Otago on a scholarship before transferring to the University of Waikato to finish his education.Īt present he holds an LLB with majors in law and tikanga Māori, as well as a BA majoring in Māori and Pacific Development with a specialisation in creative writing. ![]() McMaster was at Te Aute College for five years, from 12 to 17, and he was dux in his final year. I found it very useful when I got to boarding school, because that was a strongly disciplined environment that required you to be respectful all the time." "It actually made me think smarter about how I could interact, in terms of asking about English literacy and social sciences. I got frustrated so many times, and I probably was pestering them with all my questions, but they classified me as a lost cause essentially. "I remember always asking questions to try and clarify what things meant, and I was always sent to detention for pestering staff. "After that I went to Rutherford Intermediate to improve my English, because I was fully immersed in te reo Māori up until then. "You can become a fully immersed te reo Māori lawyer, from kohanga to kura to wharekura to university to studying for the bar." "People need to understand that you don't just have the option of doing te reo Māori at uni, now you have the option of doing it for your professional legal studies to become a lawyer and be admitted. The English legal language is hard enough as it is, but I can tell you, the te reo Māori legal language is a whole lot harder. McMaster, with the support of his firm, became the first person in New Zealand to study to be admitted as a lawyer fully in te reo Māori. I love it and it's a great environment to be in." You learn so much, and you work with lawyers who are the best in what they specialise in. "I deal with water matters, Māori matters and local government matters, as well as climate change," McMaster said. McMaster was recently admitted to the bar in the High Court at Hamilton and is now working in the climate change practice at Simpson Grierson, one of the country's biggest law firms. Whanganui law graduate Tāwhiao McMaster is the first person to be admitted to the bar in a fully te reo Māori ceremony. Tāwhiao McMaster (sitting) with (from left) cousin Shannon Wroe, koro Roy McMaster, sister Te Amo McMaster-Davis, māmā Ebony McMaster and moving counsel Aidan Warren at the Hamilton High Court. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |