What Happened in 2025?

2025 was a busy and impactful year for the International Action Hub - with key highlights including: 

• Organising the third Women at the Table on Climate Change event in May 2025, in partnership with the Council of International Development and UN Women Aotearoa New Zealand.  This was a hybrid event chaired by Madison Walker CEO UN Women NZ and Eva Hartshorn-Sanders, convenor of the International Action Hub of NCWNZ (we stepped in at the last minute as Nanaia Mahuta was attending the tangi of a close friend).  The focus of the third event was to understand a business, union and philanthropy approach to climate action (following two earlier events that had focused on government / politics and international frameworks, and NGO work).  Speakers included:
  • Cheryl Spain, CEO of the Gift Trust
  • Jo Tyndall, Director of the Environment Directorate, OECD
  • Elly Rosita Silaban, President of KSBSI (the Indonesian Workers’ Welfare Union) 
  • Ella Tunnicliffe-Glass, Senior Manager Sustainability Strategy, Fonterra
  • Katie Beith, Head of ESG at Forsyth Barr

You can watch the YouTube recording of this event here.

• Running the Online Safety Coalition, which has included:
  • Supporting the written and oral submissions, particularly on the stalking legislation and the Select Committee Inquiry into the harm young New Zealanders encounter online, and the roles that Government, business, and society should play in addressing those harms. You can read NCWNZ’s written submission to the Education and Workforce Committee (30 July 2025, download the .pdf file here).   
  • Speaking to external groups about online safety - such as at the launch of Tiaki’s new resource centre in Porirua.
  • Speaking to politicians about online safety and law reform options.
  • Eva spoke at the launch of Reuben Davidson, MP’s proposed Members’ Bill, which has adopted policy priorities and concepts from the Online Safety Coalition. This Bill is still in the ballot, but it could be progressed at any point if pulled from the Member’s Bill via the Lottery system or if over half of MPs in Parliament agreed to introduce the Bill.  

The majority of the Select Committee (referred to above) has also recommended policy priorities proposed by the Coalition - stronger in the case of the Labour Party members of the Committee.  You can read their final report released last year on the Amnesty International website, No Harmware.  Achieving bipartisan support is a significant milestone, but there’s a need to ensure that the government accepts the recommendations and turns this into law.  

We have also been supporting the development of a new campaign to encourage key MPs and Ministers to adopt these changes - focused on platform transparency and accountability.  Eva will email out an action item to branches and hubs, and you can read more and take action as individuals or organisations, using the No Harmware Action Toolkit available for download here.

• We organised two “Women, Technology, Privacy and Safety” webinars - focused on privacy issues with fertility/menstruation apps, and priority law reform. 
  
  
• Beryl Anderson has led a stellar effort on CEDAW and the NGO response.  This included coordinating and supporting the drafting of NCWNZ’s submission on CEDAW, and providing distant support to the presenters in Geneva.  Suzanne Manning and Beryl Anderson, accepted the invite to travel to the Cook Islands, where they attended the Cook Islands National Council of Women (CINCW) biennial meeting in Rarotonga on 3-5 March 2025: Uikaraurau: Konitara Vainetini o Te Kuki Airani.  On the final day, a CEDAW information gathering workshop was facilitated by Suzanne, Beryl and Ruta Pokura-Matai (the writer of the CINCW NGO report).
  
  
• We partnered with Philanthropy New Zealand to host a webinar where Jan Logie interviewed Dame Ranjna Patel about her work, philanthropy and life, following her recognition in the King’s Birthday Honours.  This event was Suman Kapoor’s idea and she also spoke at the event.  You can watch the recording of 'A Conversation with Dame Ranjna Patel,' on Youtube here.
  
  
• The hub has also been supporting the delegation at CSW69 and CSW70, particularly through Christine King’s work at Aotearoa Women’s Watch.
  
  
• We have also been supporting the development of a new National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security, including attending a meeting with NGOs at MFAT in 2025.
  
  
• Early in 2026, the Hub wrote a letter to the Prime Minister about the importance of supporting and strengthening the UN rather than joining Trump’s ad hoc Board of Peace. This effort was led by Megan Hutching with support from the hub, particularly Randolph Hollingsworth.   
  
  
• Submitting on the Ministry for Women’s Long-term Insights Briefing - Free to Lead.

So where to next in 2026?

As a NCWNZ Action Hub, we went through a strategic review process, which included a short survey to work out the areas the people enjoyed, thought we should prioritise, who we should work with and time availability.  We then discussed these results and current issues as a hub.  As a result, the Hub has decided to continue and extend many of the initiatives outlined above, including:

• Online safety coalition and associated work - including the campaign
• CEDAW - including a youth event this year in partnership with youth organisations (focused on raising awareness and the concluding observations).  We spoke to YWCA Wellington about this - so watch this space for more details.
• Raising awareness about how non-CEDAW international treaties impact on / intersect with the rights of women and girls - we've been taking turns writing articles in the Circular as part of this programme of work, this is capacity-building for the hub too.  You can read the latest article from Beryl on pay equity and international treaties in this issue of The Circular.
• Following on from our letter to the PM about the importance of supporting and strengthening the UN we are partnering with UN Women Aotearoa and the Council of International Development to hold a hybrid event on this topic on 29 April: Online and Wellington tickets available via Humanitix here.
• Supporting groups and mahi at CSW.
• Submitting on the final version of the Ministry for Women’s Long-term Insights Briefing - Free to Lead.
• Supporting the progress and implementation of the Women, Peace and Security Action Plan (MFAT).
• We are also looking at holding another event on foreign affairs issues with political spokespeople during the election period.

We’d love to have you join us in this mahi.  If you are a NCWNZ member and want to join the International Action Hub - reach out via [email protected]. 

To read more articles from The Circular (March-April 2026) issue 656, click on the tag below.