Your Hosts

Hosted by Go With Grace and North Haven Hospice, the 2025 hui is being made possible with support from our friends, Te Atawhai Aroha (hosts of the 2024 hui), Honohono Tātou Katoa and many others in our village.

Go With Grace

Go With Grace is a website offering gentle guidance, support, resources and peace of mind for those getting their affairs in order, caring for whānau, grieving or facing the loss of a loved one. It is also the home of Dying Matters Week, New Zealand’s national event held each year to connect people across Aotearoa to start conversations in a safe space, learn from local experts and seek support to get affairs in order and navigate grief or loss.

North Haven Hospice

North Haven Hospice is located in Whangārei and provides care for people of any age with any life-limiting condition or terminal illness to enjoy living every moment, making the most of the time they have left, however long that may be. They are a community charity with a special place in the hearts of Northlanders and a long-time supporter of compassionate communities.

Dr Warrick Jones, North Haven Hospice

Warrick will be speaking on day one of the hui about the palliative care landscape in New Zealand, including the role of hospices.

Dr. Warrick Jones is a Palliative Care Specialist and Medical Director at North Haven Hospice in Whangarei, New Zealand, specializing in end-of-life care and offering monthly patient clinics and palliative care advice to health professionals. He emphasizes the importance of holistic care, focusing on emotional, social, and spiritual aspects of end-of-life care, aiming to help people “die whole or complete”. He is passionate about improving the capacity and ability of healthcare professionals to care for the dying. 

Dr Carol McAllum, Honohono Tātou Katoa and Mercy Hospice

Carol will be speaking on Day One of the hui to help set the scene for Compassionate Communities, how this is approached in other countries and what the journey has been so far in Aotearoa.

Carol has worked for over four decades as a doctor. Her sixteen years in solo general practice in Coromandel and then in Ngunguru was as much about her learning to understand community as it was about her being there to serve. It was the best training for palliative medicine, which has been her chosen practice since the late 1990s. Carol has understood for a long time that medicine can do much for us, yet only so much. Her heart has always been to share understandings, to give people options so they can choose what’s most important for them. This is the heart of compassionate communities.

Sarah Dewes, Te Atawhai Aroha Compassionate Communities Rotorua Trust

Sarah will be speaking with Carol on Day One of the hui to help set the scene for Compassionate Communities, how this is approached in other countries and what the journey has been so far in Aotearoa. Sarah  is the kaiwhakahaere/ coordinator of Te Atawhai Aroha Compassionate Communities Rotorua Trust, working together to prepare family and community preparedness for death, loss and grief.

She  is a fifth generation New Zealander, of Irish and English heritage. Most of her adult life was living and working in Rotorua, raising 3 children. After 10 years away Sarah returned to Rotorua with Hazel (spaniel), and now considers this wonderful community home.

Sarah retired as a physiotherapist  to focus on empowering others to learn about end of life and death, and promote an option for natural burial, a cause close to her heart.She is always curious as to how we can be a better bridge between services, and those in the community who want to be of service within the area of end of life and death.

Dr Tess Moeke-Maxwell, PhD

Tess is speaking on Day Two of the hui on manaakitanga in the community at end of life. She is also facilitating a conversation on Assisted Dying – A Māori Perspective at the He Hui Ahurea: Cultural Perspectives & Conversations on Death and Dying on Saturday 24th May.

Tess Moeke-Maxwell is a descendant of Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki and Ngāti Porou. She is a Senior Research Fellow and co-director of the Te Ārai Palliative Care and End of Life Research Group at the School of Nursing, University of Auckland. Tess leads Kaupapa Māori “lived experience” qualitative research on behalf of Te Ārai’s Kāhui advisory group. Improving end-of-life, palliative care and Assisted Dying experiences for Māori whānau (family, including extended family) are her research interests.

Currently, she leads the Health Research Council funded ‘Waerea study’ on Māori whānau experiences using Assisted Dying services. Tess is an advisory member of the National Palliative Care Work Programme for Te Whatu Ora – Health New Zealand. In 2022, the Royal Society of NZ awarded Tess and Te Ārai Kāhui the NZ Health Research Council’s Te Tohu Rapuora Medal for research
excellence with Māori communities.

She was selected as one of New Zealand’s 100 Māori Leaders as part of the Henry Rongomau Bennett Foundation Leadership Strategy based on her contributions to Indigenous end-of-life care research. Tess and her team have produced a website to support Māori whānau caregivers and New Zealand health professionals.

Ben Lockie, St John Ambulance, Whangārei

Ben will be talking on day one in the afternoon about his life as a Paramedic, the personal toll it can take and how Hato Hone St John has evolved to provide the right support in a time of growing concern for the wellbeing of their people.

Ben Lockie has an extensive history working for Hato Hone St John as an Intensive Care Flight Paramedic and currently works as a District Operation Manager responsible for the delivery of the emergency ambulance service in Northland. Ben has 21 stations from Silverdale to Hauhora and 300 paid and volunteer staff working in some of the most underserved and high need communities in the country.

Prior to joining Hato Hone St John Ben was a medic in the NZ Army deploying to East Timor in 2001 and during the course of his career he has also worked for Australian company Aspen Medical as Flight Paramedic in East Timor and the Solomon Islands, and as the Service Manager for the department of Medicine and Renal service for the Northland District Health Board .

Ben is a passionate advocate for reducing the stigma associated with mental illness following a battle with severe PTSD in his early 30’s.  He tries to lead by example in providing a supportive and responsive environment for his team and leading in a way that makes people feel valued and appreciated in an environment that is often confronting and emotionally challenging.

A Graceful Undertaking

A Graceful Undertaking’ are opening their premises on Thursday afternoon to attendees as one of the experience options and will be facilitating the Whangārei Death Cafe on Saturday morning at the Hundertwasser Activity Centre.

Meet the team of women, see through the premises and ask anything.  A Graceful Undertaking specialises in natural (unembalmed) care, family engagement and supporting personal choices. We do what we do because it’s what we want for ourselves, we believe in transparency through open information sharing, social justice and disrupting the conventions.

Jo Samuel, A Graceful Undertaking

Jo will be speaking as part of the Day 2 programme about planning your farewell – knowing your rights, options and support services available to build the right village.

Jo and her colleagues, Jo Moselen and Jules Palmer, started A Graceful Undertaking from scratch in 2017 after several years of considering the idea, and many years of supporting family and friends with death and funerals.  A Graceful Undertaking was an idea that grew from a sense of dissatisfaction with what was available locally and the first hand knowledge that this did not meet the needs of the community that they were a part of.

Prior to that, Jo worked for many years in community based organisations, including in the disability sector and women’s refuge, often in management roles.  Jo has a passion for facilitating groups, ritual making and social justice, all things that are actively relevant in her current role.  The team at A Graceful Undertaking are constantly humbled by the families they work with, and deeply moved by every opportunity to walk beside those who chose to use their services.

Tanya Newman, North Haven Hospice

Tanya is speaking on Day Two of the hui. She will be sharing lessons learnt from Hospice patients and their families, about how to prepare for supported end of life care ahead of time.

Tanya Newman is the social worker kaimahi pāpori for North Haven Hospice Te Korowai Hūmarie. In her role, she works alongside people in their final months, weeks and days of life, their support people, and the bereaved.

Tanya’s skill in creative problem solving, therapeutic social work, advocacy, and linking big picture thinking to everyday detail, have been honed over two decades of social work practice, community facilitation and education, community development, and lecturing work. Tanya is a passionate narrative practitioner, who enjoys linking lives between the people she supports. She is currently extending her skills in co-authoring narrative documents with hospice patients, and has a particular commitment to supporting younger hospice patients who are parents and their children.

Joost de Bruin – Hundertwasser Arts Centre
Take a tour with Joost and experience Hundertwasser’s different approach to death and dying at Whangārei’s iconic Arts Centre on day one of the hui or as an option on Saturday 24th May.

Dr Joost de Bruin is Director of the Hundertwasser Art Centre in Whangārei and Adjunct Professor at the Stout Research Centre for New Zealand Studies at Te Herenga Waka – Victoria University of Wellington. He was previously President of Dutch Communities NZ. As a member of the Dutch Connection Trust, he was involved in the establishment of the Te Awahou Nieuwe Stroom cultural and community centre in Te Awahou/Foxton.

Elisabeth Price, Auckland University

Elisabeth is speaking on Day Two of the hui on how to kōrero about death with children and in schools. Elisabeth is an experienced and enthusiastic primary school teacher who has taught for over twenty years in the United Kingdom, Hong Kong, and here in Aotearoa New Zealand. Most recently, she was the deputy principal of an urban multicultural primary school in Tāmaki Makaurau-Auckland. Elisabeth is currently completing her doctoral studies through Waipapa Taumata Rau-The University of Auckland.

Her doctoral research is focusing on having age and stage of development appropriate classroom conversations about death and dying with primary aged students for an eventual time when they experience the death of a family member, friend, or pet; or when a friend of theirs experiences the death of someone close to them.

Mel and Ben Jackson

Ben and Mel Jackson are speaking on Day One of the hui, sharing their lived experience of the stillbirth of their son, Nalu, at 36 weeks. As parents who have walked the path of unexpected loss, Ben and Mel offer insight into the raw and disorienting impact of sudden death—how it echoes through family, whānau, and community.

Their story weaves together grief, love, and healing, touching on the challenges of holding space for sorrow while finding pathways toward connection, meaning, and remembrance. Through this experience “The Nalu Effect” has been born, they speak to the transformative potential of moving from grief to gratitude—honouring Nalu’s life as a taonga and the hidden gifts that can emerge in the wake of heartbreak.

Treza Gallogly, End of Life Doula Alliance Aotearoa (ELDAA)

Treza is speaking on day two of the hui about the role of end of life doulas, helping people build their own support villages towards end of life.

I am a trained End of Life Doula, providing services through my practice Swansong, mainly in Auckland but also working remotely with people anywhere.  Over the last 3 years I have been privileged to work with people advancing in age, living with terminal illness, or more long-term chronic illnesses – accompanying them on their journey and helping them prepare well for their death and afterwards, in order to live their best life leading up to that. 

I am also humbled to be Chair of the End of Life Doula Alliance of Aotearoa, established in 2024, to support the growth of the Doula profession, and to educate communities on how this role can improve the journey for those living with chronic or terminal illness, and their whanau.  Doulas provide non-medical, non-judgemental holistic care, by accompanying, educating, empowering, communicating and advocating for their clients.

Kiri Neumann, Toru Kākano

Our wellness tasters throughout the hui will be facilitated by Kiri with an opportunity in the afternoon of Day One to attend her session on self-healing techniques to support resilience in any compassionate role. This workshop offers practical tools to nurture wellbeing and sustain yourself in the care of others. Kiri is also generously sharing her lived experience of caring for a loved one with Alzheimers/Dementia.

Kiri has over 40 years experience in Kaimirimiri and Romiromi and facilitates Mirimiri workshops, Healing Circles, Self-healing Workshops, Breathwork and Movement Classes. She attended North Shore Paraphychology School, is a compassionate community builder, connector and Biofrequency Healing Practitioner.

Alison & Sue, Coastal Care Tutukaka

Alison and Sue will be speaking on day two in the morning sharing their experiences about leading a small community care group.

Coastal Care Tutukaka is a volunteer organisation trained by Hospice to give confidential, compassionate support to anyone in need in our area. We provide companionship and support, transport assistance, respite for caregivers and have a wide range of health equipment available for short term loan. Alison (10years) and Sue(8years) are pleased to represent the 24 volunteers and share their experiences.