Our Governance

Members of the Governance Team meet with Secretary General of Amnesty International, Salil Shetty during his visit to New Zealand in October 2011. © Amnesty International

Amnesty International Aotearoa New Zealand is led at the national level by our Governance Team. 

Governance Team members are elected by our members at the Annual General Meeting and help set out our policy and strategic goals that guide our operations.

Governance Team Vacancies

An opening has recently become available on the Governance Team. Expressions of interest are now being sought to fill a co-opted position within the Team until the next Governance Team elections at the May 2012 Annual General Meeting. 

Click here for more information.

Governance Team Documents

As the AIANZ extranet is currently out of commission, we have no secure way of storing the minutes temporarily. Please email info@amnesty.org.nz for a copy of the minutes or for any queries about other documents which you may have had access to.

Question & Answer Space

If you would like to post a question to us about our governance activities, please send it to askthegt@amnesty.org.nz.  Questions posted to that email address will be replied to as soon as possible after receipt.  The Governance Team undertakes to respond to posted questions as soon as practicable and in any event no later than one month after the date of receipt.  Please note that we will not reply to anonymous questions, so please include your name (and Team (if any) if you wish).  

Meet the Governance Team

Helen Shorthouse, Chair

Helen has been a member of Amnesty International for 12 years. Her ‘enlightenment’ followed an OE where she became more aware of the inequalities around the world. While she knew about the world’s poverty she was angry about the lack of human rights some people had. She has always been fortunate enough to live in a free nation where she can voice her opinions and opposition and not be imprisoned, intimidated, disappeared or fearful and feels it is her responsibility to use this freedom to help others. She does this through her involvement at a grass-roots level with the Christchurch Regional Team as well as bringing her business experience to the Governance Team.

Natalie Baird, Acting Vice-Chair

Natalie Baird was elected to the Governance Team in May 2008. Natalie is currently a senior lecturer at the University of Canterbury’s School of Law. Her research interests lie in the areas of international human rights law, Pacific legal studies and constitutional law. Before becoming an academic, Natalie spent around ten years working in the New Zealand public service. This included four years at the Crown Law Office where she worked primarily on Treaty of Waitangi and international law issues, and three years in the Cabinet Office as a legal adviser on constitutional issues. Natalie also worked at the New Zealand Law Commission on the Commission’s project on custom and human rights in the Pacific. As well as being a member of Amnesty’s Governance Team, Natalie is also currently a trustee of the Christchurch Trade Aid shop trusts.

Iain Worsley, Treasurer

Iain is an accountant who has held senior financial management positions for the last 20 years, often in challenging and constrained environments, and most recently in the not-for-profit sector. He first joined Amnesty International while at university and global travel cemented his conviction that the freedom we enjoy brings with it the responsibility to promote and defend the human rights of people everywhere.

Angie Heffernan, Team Member

Angie Heffernan was co-opted onto the Governance Team in March 2011. She is a Fijian citizen who moved to New Zealand with her family in 2008. Angie has worked primarily in the NGO sector and has over 15 years experience working on environment, governance and human rights issues in the Pacific. She has mostly worked in the area of policy and legislative reform, and capacity building and training especially for civil society and the media on governance and human rights issues – specifically the understanding and promotion of ‘rights based approach to development and governance’. This is an issue and an area of work that she feels very strongly about in the Pacific. Angie is very positive about Amnesty International Aotearoa New Zealand’s current plans to explore and expand its work in advancing and protecting human rights in the Pacific. Angie has recently returned to university to study for a law degree. She is married to a wonderful Scotsman and they have a son and two daughters.

Elena Wrelton, Team Member

Elena has had a long history with Amnesty International, first becoming a member as a teenager in the UK. Since then she has been a member of the Massey University group, the Wellington Central group and is now an active member of the Wellington Regional Team. She has worked in both the non profit and government sector and holds a Master’s degree in Development studies. Previous work has included working for Global Focus Aotearoa, as editor of their international development magazine, project based work for a children’s charity in the UK and as a tour leader in Central America. Her Master’s thesis is focused on the work of a human rights organisation in the United States that was working in the development field.

 Catherine Iorns, Co-opted Team Member

Catherine Iorns Magallanes is a Senior Lecturer in Law at Victoria University of Wellington. Catherine has been teaching law for twenty years and in that time has focused mainly on human rights, Treaty of Waitangi issues, and environmental law. Her primary area of research and writing is in relation to indigenous rights, in domestic, comparative and international laws. She is currently a member of the International Law Association Committee on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, writing a commentary on the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and has assisted the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples with its recent Study on participation in decision-making. Catherine’s secondary area of teaching and research is environmental law. In the past she also focused particularly on women’s rights. Catherine grew up in a family which worked and campaigned for Amnesty in the 1970s. She has long been committed to its goals and is enthusiastic about the wider roles it has taken on more recently.

Please note, some of the above links direct you to our Extranet, and you must be a member of AIANZ to access them. To access the extranet, please go to https://intranet.amnesty.org.nz and click on Register a New account. Your registration will then be approved by our database team manually. This is a manual process, as we check your membership status before approval. Please use your name as your username to speed up this process. If you choose to use a nickname, we will have to confirm your identity (and membership details) with you before we can approve your registration. For all other technical enquiries, please contact webmaster@amnesty.org.nz .