KEY POINTS:
A Maori children's advocate has spoken out about the high rates of domestic violence among Maori, even raising the spectre of the heroes of the Maori Battalion.
Anglican minister Dr Hone Kaa said the men's "brutal" return to family life after World War II was one of the
underlying reasons for horrific abuse rates.
Dr Kaa, who heads Te Kahui Mana Ririki, a new charitable trust to promote the wellbeing of young Maori, laid out the beginnings of a programme to combat rates that show Maori children are twice as likely to suffer abuse than other groups.
Dr Kaa called on Maori MPs to put aside party differences to work co-operatively on policy solutions.
Speaking of his own childhood, the 67-year-old said while growing up at Rangitukia on the East Coast, he saw much of the "short, sharp and painful" discipline meted out by returned servicemen from the Maori Battalion.
"I look back with some sadness on that period of my life, and reflect on what might have been if those men who returned from the theatre of war had received the help they needed to readjust to normal life.
"Much of the violence that the children of Rangitukia suffered was perpetrated on them by men who after three or four years overseas had known only how to kill or be killed.
"Adjustment for them was brutal."
The Maori Battalion was often at the forefront of fighting.
Dr Kaa said talking about history wasn't about dishing out excuses.
The advocacy group wasn't about blaming the past - it was about "owning" a problem and eliminating child abuse.
The tragic case of the Kahui twins' murder drove home the point, he said.
"Regardless of the verdict and who is guilty - it makes it more urgent to do something about the way people treat their children.
"Most of those who maltreat their children are caught in the web of poverty - what are we doing about that?"
But New Zealand First MP Pita Paraone, himself the son of a distinguished Maori Battalion leader respected throughout the country, said Dr Kaa was grossly overstating the case.
Child abuse at the hands of returning soldiers was never widespread.
There were many returned servicemen who led exemplary lives including Sir Henare Ngata and the late Sir James Henare.
To bring the memory of old soldiers into disrepute was wrong, he said.
"At the end of the day you bring up your own children essentially the way you were brought up. I think it wasn't as bad as that.
"If you're going to use that as an excuse, what's the excuse for today's young?
"I think you can look back, but don't make too much of looking back."
