Polyamorous trio ruled a family

National Party leader Christopher Luxon says he will have trouble putting together an ethnically diverse front bench because of the party’s poor election result.

Luxon is planning on unveiling a reshuffle of the

33-member National caucus on

Monday, with MPs getting new portfolios and new rankings.

Asked if he was looking to achieve some ethnic diversity with his front bench of 12 MPs, Luxon noted the caucus itself lacked ethnic diversity.

‘‘The reality is, when you look at our caucus today it’s not ethnically diverse, right, and that’s because we got a much poorer result in the last election than we had planned,’’ Luxon said.

National won 23 fewer seats in Parliament in 2020 than 2017 and was left with a far less ethnically diverse set of MPs. Indeed, the party is now overwhelmingly Pākehā, with just three MPs of Māori descent and one MP of Asian descent.

Luxon noted that the candidate list at the last election had been more diverse. ‘‘If you looked at our candidate list, you would have seen a very diverse set of candidates available.’’

The National MPs who survived the election were largely in safe seats, whose members have typically picked white candidates. Simon Bridges was the only successful non-white electorate MP, out of 23 National electorate MPs.

Luxon said the reshuffle would focus on matching people to their best jobs. ’’

Luxon’s predecessor Judith Collins commissioned a report on the election loss.

The report suggested National ‘‘develop a diversity plan’’ and update the process it used for candidate selection, in order to ‘‘bring in diverse and high-quality talent, regardless of the election result’’.

Collins dismissed the idea of quotas for diversity.

A 30-year-old woman says she feels like a ‘‘new person’’ after a hysterectomy she spent more than a year waiting for.

Sinead Hodder, of South Auckland, was in excruciating daily pain from what doctors told her was endometriosis.

After surgery four weeks ago, she was told it wasn’t endo, but adenomyosis, which occurs when endometrial tissue grows into the muscle of the uterus.

‘‘It’s endo’s ugly sister,’’ Hodder said. Despite being in recovery after having her uterus, fallopian tubes, right ovary and cervix removed, the Weymouth mother-ofthree said it was ‘‘amazing’’ to no longer be in constant pain. ‘‘If I do get pain – Panadol works! Who would have thought, it hasn’t worked for the past four years.’’

Before the surgery, Hodder was getting through the day on a cocktail of opioids and nerve blockers.

It’s the small things she’s enjoying. Cooking dinner in 40 minutes is a revelation – she used to have to start at 3pm to get dinner on the table by 6.30pm because she needed so many breaks.

Hodder has an 11-year-old daughter and 3-year-old twins. The pain started in August 2019 when she had a termination less than a year after giving birth to twins.

Two years prior, doctors had found endometriosis when she had surgery after a miscarriage.

A man and two women who were in a polyamorous relationship will have their battle over a $2 million property heard in the Family Court.

The Auckland trio lived at the property in Kumeū for 15 years.

After their relationship ended, they turned to the Family Court to determine how the property, which was jointly owned, should be divided.

However, the Family Court said it did not have the jurisdiction to determine the matter, as the Property (Relationships) Act did not apply to relationships of more than two people.

However, the Court of Appeal has

‘‘I’m able to do things with the kids I haven’t been able to do since they were born,’’ she said.

Jumping on the trampoline, visiting the now overturned that ruling.

It said the Family Court could determine claims regarding polyamorous relationships in the same way it determined claims from those who were married, in a civil union, or in a de facto relationship.

Lilach and Brett Paul married in February 1998. The following year, Lilach met Fiona Mead and in 2002, the three formed a polyamorous relationship.

In November of that year, the trio moved into a four-hectare property in Kumeū in Auckland’s northwest. The farm was purchased in Mead’s name for $533,000.

In 2017, it had a QV of $2.175 million. For the next 15 years, the trio lived together at the farm.

Throughout the relationship, Mead worked as a vet and Brett Paul established beach, going for bike rides, ‘‘having a dance party with my kids like we did last night . . . and I didn’t cry, because I wasn’t in pain’’.

‘‘I don’t even know what this life is, but I

Court of Appeal

a paintball business on the property.

The Pauls also had a lawn mowing business.

Soon after the trio moved into the property, they had a ceremony where the Pauls gave a ring to Mead.

In November 2017, Lilach Paul separated from her husband and Mead, and the following year Brett Paul and Mead separated. Mead still lives at the

Kumeū property.

In February 2019, Lilach Paul applied to the Family Court seeking a one-third share in the property due to the trio’s ‘‘committed relationship’’.

Mead objected, saying the relationship had been between three people and did not qualify as a de facto relationship.

In the recently released judgment, the Court of Appeal said the word ‘‘couple’’ in the Property (Relationships) Act might be seen as conveying a ‘‘flavour of exclusivity’’.

But there were clear contextual indications in the law’s wording that it was possible for two people to live together as a married couple at the same time one of them was in another committed relationship, the judgment said.

The court ruled there may be multiple qualifying relationships between two people to which the Act could apply.

The Family Court could determine claims regarding polyamorous relationships.