Women
Rape and Domestic Violence: Rates of reported violence against women were at historic high levels, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Ministry of Justice data shows there were 2,605 convictions for sexual offenses in 2018-19, up from 2,172 in 2009-10. According to a 2016 government report, one in three women reported having experienced physical or sexual violence or both by an intimate partner. The law criminalizes rape, including spousal rape. The maximum penalty is 20 years’ imprisonment; however, indefinite detention may occur in cases where the parole board, during its annual review, believes the prisoner poses a continuing threat to society.
Domestic violence is a criminal offense. Police were responsive to reports of domestic violence. The law provides victims with 10 days of paid domestic violence leave. The government partially funded women’s shelters, psychosocial services, rape crisis centers, sexual abuse counseling, family violence victim support networks, and violence prevention services. Victims’ programs include: a new crisis response plan for the 72 hours after a sexual assault; programs to reduce harmful sexual behavior, offending, and reoffending; programs focusing on adults who pose a risk to children; and services for male survivors of sexual abuse.
The E Tu Whanau program is a Maori-centered response, supported by government social services resources, to high levels of violence within Maori homes, which aims to increase protective factors and decrease risk factors for family violence.
Sexual Harassment: The law prohibits sexual harassment and provides civil penalties. Sexual contact induced by certain threats may also fall under the criminal code, with a maximum prison sentence of 14 years. In July the HRC released an updated guide on making a complaint about sexual harassment, which includes access to the HRC’s free, informal, and confidential service for questions or complaints about sexual harassment and unlawful discrimination. The HRC also published fact sheets on sexual harassment and made regular sexual harassment prevention training available to schools, businesses, and government departments.
Coercion in Population Control: There were no reports of coerced abortion or involuntary sterilization.
Discrimination: The law provides for the same legal status and rights for women and men, including under family, religious, personal status, labor, property, nationality, and inheritance laws. Although the law prohibits discrimination in employment and requires equal rates of pay for equal or similar work, academics and watchdog groups argue that the lack of pay transparency hinders pursuing pay discrimination claims.
Children
Birth Registration: Children born in the country attain citizenship if either parent is a citizen or legal permanent resident of the country. Children born outside the country attain citizenship if either parent is a citizen born in the country. The law requires notification of births by both parents as soon as “reasonably practicable,” deemed as being within two months of the child’s birth, and most births were registered within this period.
Child Abuse: A 2018 Auckland University of Technology report found that, by age 17, nearly one-quarter of children had at least one report submitted to child protection services, and almost 10 percent had been a victim of abuse or neglect, while 3 percent had gone into foster or other care. A disproportionately high number of reported cases of child abuse involved Maori children. The government promoted information sharing between the courts and health and child protection agencies to identify children at risk of abuse.
Early and Forced Marriage: The legal minimum age for marriage is 18 for both men and women, but persons between 16 and 18 may marry with family court approval. Marriages involving persons younger than 18 were rare. Watchdog groups believed that a small number of marriages of persons between 16 and 18 were forced by parents. To reduce these, the parliament passed a law in May 2018 requiring family court approval of marriages involving a person younger than 18.
Sexual Exploitation of Children: The law provides that any person who has a sexual connection with a person younger than age 16 is liable to a maximum prison sentence of 10 years. Further, the law makes it an offense punishable by seven years’ imprisonment to assist a person younger than 18 in providing commercial sexual services; to receive earnings from commercial sexual services provided by a person younger than 18; or to contract for commercial sexual services from, or be a client of, a person younger than 18. The law also makes it an offense to traffic in persons younger than 18 for sexual exploitation or for forced labor. The courts may prosecute citizens who commit child sex offenses overseas.
Government statistics reported 422 convictions in 2018-19 for sexual offenses against children younger than age 16, approximately the same number as a decade before.
The law prohibits child pornography and provides for a maximum 14 years’ imprisonment, as well as maximum individual and corporate fines of NZ$200,000 ($129,000) if a person produces, imports, supplies, distributes, possesses for supply, displays, or exhibits an objectionable publication. The Department of Internal Affairs Censorship Compliance Unit polices images of child sex abuse on the internet and prosecutes offenders.
Institutionalized Children: In 2018 Prime Minister Ardern announced the creation of a Royal Commission–the highest level of governmental inquiry–into the historical abuse of children in state care. The inquiry is expected to be completed by November 2023, later than originally intended due to its scope being expanded to include abuses in faith-based institutions. The Royal Commission is tasked with focusing on physical, sexual, and emotional abuse and neglect, as well as systemic bias based on race, gender, or sexual orientation during the period 1950-1999.
International Child Abductions: The country is a party to the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction. See the Department of State’s Annual Report on International Parental Child Abduction at https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/International-Parental-Child-Abduction/for-providers/legal-reports-and-data/reported-cases.html.
Anti-Semitism
The Jewish community numbered approximately 5,200, according to the 2018 census. While anti-Semitic incidents were rare, in March videos emerged of a man linking the Christchurch mosque shootings to Israeli intelligence and Zionist businesses at an antiracism rally in Auckland. The New Zealand Jewish Council said anti-Semitism was increasing, particularly online. In November the pro-Israel lobby group the Israel Institute of New Zealand (IINZ) reported that Prime Minister Ardern, along with three MPs from the coalition government-supporting Green Party, were members of a pro-Palestinian Facebook page, called Kia Ora Gaza, where anti-Semitic comments were rife. A spokesperson for Ardern said she had been added to the group “without her knowledge” and would remove herself forthwith. The IINZ criticized the Green MPs for not responding to the request to disassociate themselves from the group.
Social media reports described a New Zealand Sign Language sign–making a hook-nose gesture for the word Jew–as anti-Semitic and called for its removal.
Trafficking in Persons
See the Department of State’s Trafficking in Persons Report at https://www.state.gov/trafficking-in-persons-report/.
Persons with Disabilities
The law prohibits discrimination against persons with disabilities. The law prohibits the government from discriminating based on physical, sensory, intellectual, or mental disability, unless such discrimination can be “demonstrably justified.” The government effectively enforced applicable laws. Most school-age children with disabilities attended either separate or mainstream schools. The HRC’s 2018 report expressed concern that the Minimum Wage Exemption (MWE) system, which can be applied to workers who are significantly and demonstrably limited by a disability, is discriminatory. During the year, approximately 900 exemptions were in place, with 70 percent of them allowing wages of NZ$5.00 ($3.20) per hour and below. The government responded with a proposal to replace the MWE with a wage supplement to encourage employers to take on workers with disabilities.
The HRC and the government’s Office for Disability Issues worked to protect and promote the rights of persons with disabilities. In addition, both the HRC and the Mental Health Commission addressed mental disabilities in their antidiscrimination efforts.
Watchdog groups were concerned about compulsory assessments and treatments, and the use of seclusion and restrictive practices in medical facilities, especially those involved with mental-health services. Maori were significantly more likely to be subjected to these practices. The HRC has also expressed concern that courts may authorize the sterilization of intellectually disabled persons if they consider it to be in those persons best interest.
Approximately 20 percent of eligible voters had a disability and faced obstacles to exercising their electoral right. The Electoral Commission has a statutory obligation to administer the electoral system impartially and seeks to reduce barriers to participation by developing processes that enable citizens with disabilities to access electoral services fully.
National/Racial/Ethnic Minorities
Pacific Islanders (also known as Pasifika), who comprised 8.1 percent of the population in 2018, experienced some societal discrimination and had the highest rates of unemployment (8 percent) and lowest labor force participation (60 percent) of any demographic group. In late 2018 the HRC reported on significant ethnic pay gaps in the country’s public service that left Pasifika women paid 21 per cent lower than the average.
Several government ministries, such as the Ministry for Pacific Peoples and Ministry of Health, had programs to identify gaps in delivery of government services to Pacific Islanders and to promote their education, employment, entrepreneurship, culture, languages, and identity. The Office of Ethnic Affairs within the Department of Internal Affairs focused on improving dialogue and understanding about minority communities among the wider population.
Asians, who comprised 12 percent of the population, reported some societal discrimination.
On March 15, a racially and religiously motivated terrorist attacked the Al Noor Mosque and the Linwood Islamic center in Christchurch. The attacks, the country’s worst mass murder ever, killed 51 and injured 49 persons. All the victims were from ethnic minorities, and many observers noted the attack was indicative of anti-immigrant and Islamophobic sentiment in the country.
Indigenous People
Approximately 16.5 percent of the population claim descent from the indigenous Maori. The government bestows specific recognition and rights, enshrined in law, custom, and practice, to the indigenous Maori population. These derive from the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi, the country’s founding document, which guarantees autonomy, self-determination, sovereignty, and self-government to the Maori.
The law prohibits discrimination against the indigenous population, but there were disproportionately high numbers of Maori on unemployment and welfare rolls, in prison, among school dropouts and single-parent households, and with elevated infant mortality statistics.
To redress historic violations of the terms of the Treaty of Waitangi, a multi-year process (the Waitangi Tribunal) continued adjudicating claims by various Maori groups (iwi). In the nine months ending March 31, the government paid NZ$5.448 million ($3.510 million) as commercial and financial compensation to several indigenous Maori groups to settle their claims. The government continued active negotiations with almost all other iwi that made claims and were in various stages of the process. In July a Waitangi Tribunal report found that the government breached the Treaty of Waitangi by failing to address persistent Maori health inequities and by failing to fulfill other treaty guarantees, thereby validating the claims of many iwi.
Although Maori represented 16 percent of the country’s population, they comprised nearly 52 percent of the prison population and 43 percent of persons serving community-based sentences. In August the Department of Corrections launched Hokai Rangi, a five-year strategy that aims to cut the number of Maori in prison to 16 percent. The strategy aims to improve rehabilitation and reintegration outcomes. The department stated that the strategy was codesigned with the Maori community, and Maori-specific support is slated for every prison.
Acts of Violence, Discrimination, and Other Abuses Based on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity
The law does not criminalize consensual same-sex sexual conduct between adults. The law prohibits abuse, discrimination, and acts of violence based on sexual orientation and gender identity, and the government generally enforced the law. During the year, approximately 1.6 percent of discrimination complaints received by the HRC related to gender identity or sexual orientation. The UN Human Rights Commission observed an elevated risk of mental-health issues, suicide risk, and youth discrimination in the country’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender/transsexual, intersex, and queer/questioning population.