Tauranga men honoured at prestigious investiture ceremony

Governor-General Dame Patsy Reddy with Colin Bidois at today's investiture ceremony. Photo/supplied

Two Tauranga men have been formally honoured in Wellington for their incredible work within the local community.

Kaumatua Colin Bidois has today been made Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for his services to Maori and Alan Turner has been awarded the Queen's Service Medal for his services to bridge.

Bidois, 86, received the honour for his unflinching dedication to strengthening Maoridom, including leading the return of Mauao to tribal ownership.

Governor-General Dame Patsy Reddy with Alan Turner at today's investiture ceremony. Photo/supplied

Turner has spent much of his life playing and advocating the game of bridge.

When the men were first announced as recipients of the New Year Honours, we spoke to them as they found out. Below are the stories for both Bidois and Turner, as published at the time.

Colin Bidois: Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit

A man whose unflinching dedication to strengthen Maoridom, including leading the return of Mauao to tribal ownership, has been made an officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit.
Colin Bidois, 86, fulfilled the expectations of leadership laid on his shoulders relatively late in life when he returned to his turangawaewae after 57 years spent living away from Tauranga.
Etched in his memory soon after he returned to his Te Puna-based hapu, Pirirakau, were the words of the late Tipi Faulkner.
"You have been away for a long time, you have not done your ahi kaa. Now we will see what you are made of."
Bidois accepted the challenge to keep the home fires warm, and never looked back.
His years of working for the Maori Affairs Department, the timber industry and three terms as a Manukau City councillor provided the launching pad for a rapid rise in responsibilities centred around his chairmanship of Ngati Ranginui iwi and leading Pirirakau's Treaty settlement negotiating team.

Colin Bidois has been made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit (ONZM) in the New Year Honours List. Photo/file

Under his leadership from 1995 to 2005, Ngati Ranginui improved the delivery of social and health services to its people.
Bidois also represented his iwi in the three years of negotiations with the Government that led to the historic carving up of fishing quota among New Zealand iwi. Benefits were returned to the iwi through marae and education grants.
He said it was part of the mosaic that had strengthened the whole of Maoridom and brought some redress for the wrongful taking of land after the battles of Gate Pa and Te Ranga.
The culmination of Ngati Ranginui's Treaty negotiations, the Deed of Settlement in 2012, was a pivotal part of this mosaic.
Bidois said there was a certain amount of delight at the honour.
"But I realise that many people are behind what I achieved. It bounces back to them."
He spent the first four years of his childhood living in a rented cottage in Elizabeth St when his father, Hekenui, had a Depression-era job working on the Faulkner harbour ferries.
Their fortunes improved when Hekenui did a crash course training to be a police officer and was appointed to a sole-charge station in the Eastern Bay town of Te Whaiti.
It marked the start of 57 years living away from Tauranga for Bidois, including grabbing headlines when he wore a Roman toga to his inaugural meeting of the Manukau City Council because the debating chamber looked like Rome's Colosseum.
He befriended Winston Peters and provided a vital sounding board when the aspiring politician ran for National in the Auckland seat of Hunua in 1978 against Malcolm Douglas, the brother of Roger (Rogernomics) Douglas.
Douglas won but Peters spotted something amiss in the process. After consulting Bidois on his suspicions, he challenged the result and won an election petition in the High Court, overturning the election night result.
Bidois supported New Zealand First when Peters established the party prior to the 1993 election but after disagreeing with some policies switched his allegiance to the Maori Party.
Bidois returned to Tauranga at the age of 61 in 1992 and immersed himself in tribal and hapu issues. He was instrumental in establishing Runanganui O Tauranga Moana - a council of four iwi including Waitaha whose main task was to negotiate with the Crown and the council to return Mauao to iwi ownership.
He said it took seven years to negotiate a clean settlement for Mauao, one without the tags that had beset other returns of sacred mountains around New Zealand.
"It was a pleasing note to go out on ... it's been an interesting life," he said.
By John Cousins

Alan Turner: Queen's Service Medal

Alan Turner first learned to play bridge to make a quick buck.

He was a university student in his homeland, South Africa, and his cunning plan - inspired by seeing other students playing board and card games for cash - was an utter failure.

"It cost me a lot of money," he said with a laugh.

Alan Turner. Photo/file

Fortunately he went on to become one of the top players in his family's adopted country of New Zealand.
He reached the highest rank offered, Gold Grand Master, represented the country overseas and contributed many years to administering the game.
His services to "the game of bridge" have been recognised with a Queen's Service Medal in the 2017 New Year Honours.
Turner said he was "completely taken aback" when he read the notification letter from Government House.
"Nothing like this has ever happened before in my life."
Reflecting back on his 44 years of playing bridge, his most cherished achievement related to games in which he never touched a card.
In 2006 he captained the New Zealand women's team to a win at the Pacific Asia Bridge Federation Championship in Shanghai, China - a feat he understood no other Kiwi team has achieved.
Bridge even played a small part in how he met his wife, Judy, who was a legal secretary in the firm one of his bridge partners worked for.
"I looked over the top of the typewriters and thought 'Oh, I haven't seen her before'. I suddenly forgot about bridge for a while after that happened," he said.
by Samantha Motion