Sharon Shea MNZM has been announced as the permanent chair of the National Hauora Coalition Board (NHC), New Zealand’s largest Māori-led primary health organisation.
Shea, of Ngāti Ranginui, Ngāti Hauā, Ngāti Hine and Ngāti Hako, has served as the acting board chair for NHC since August this year and has more than 30 years of experience in Māori health, governance, strategy and health system leadership.
She describes her new role as “a privilege, but also a huge responsibility”.
“The opportunity is to bring together exceptional Māori leadership, clinical leadership, which is really important in hauora, and also strong community relationships,” she says.
“I’m really looking forward to focusing on enabling the National Hauora Coalition as a clear direction moving forward, and that we can support our people, but also demonstrate that we’re making a difference.”
Expectations for incoming government
With the New Zealand 2026 election underway, she told Te Ao Māori News that her expectation for the incoming government is for them to see Te Tiriti o Waitangi as an opportunity to work together for a common purpose to help address Māori health inequities.
“It’s a great testament too, in terms of its original intent and the way in which we anticipated working together as people.”
Shea says there are also opportunities for the government to support Māori provider expansion.
“We have the opportunity as kaupapa Māori organisations to deliver to all citizens, to deliver care to a high clinical and cultural standard. I think that’s really important because there is a lot of evidence out there to say that the effective delivery of clinical and cultural care is a huge determinant of outcomes and well-being, and we’re experts at that,” she says.
“Investing in workforce development for the future is really critical as well.”
Māori voices at the table
Shea also says it is important for Māori voices to be at the table when it comes to decision-making.
“If you strip it right back to basics, we know our communities, we know our people, we have lived and living experience of situations which are unfortunately impacting negatively on our people,” she says.
“We’ve got some amazing, globally renowned Māori leaders in this country and offshore. We’ve got all of these talents that we can bring to be in terms of being a solution maker, and I find that if our voices aren’t around the table decisions are made about us not with us, and that’s a problem because those types of decisions don’t enable long-term intergenerational solutions.”
Shea grew up in Mount Maunganui and studied at Auckland University, followed by Oxford University, where she did her master’s in comparative social policy and education. In 2019, she was awarded a New Zealand Order of Merit for services to Māori health and development.
Her work spans Māori and Indigenous health, data sovereignty, primary care and integrated models of care, system performance, research and governance.
NHC chief executive officer Rachel Brown says Shea brings exactly what NHC needs for its next chapter.
“As NHC sets its future strategy, Sharon brings an important connection to our whakapapa and history, deep knowledge of our current kaupapa, and a strong system-wide view of the future of Māori health and primary care,” says Brown.
NHC is a partner in the Whānau Ora commissioning entity, Te Rangitāmiro. Shea helped to establish NHC during its establishment by connecting Māori providers together.
