Pacific families and communities were significantly affected by the Auckland-specific lockdown in August 2020. Media reporting on the spread of the virus prematurely exposed a Pacific family. This led to heightened and disproportionate scrutiny of Pacific families and communities, and racist comments in public discourses and social media. The Race Relations Commissioner highlighted that as Pacific people were vilified for contracting COVID-19 in the August outbreak, a Pākehā who contracted it in the March outbreak escaped that indignity.7 The Commission also highlighted the long-standing health inequity that was brought into sharp relief by the rate of Pacific infections in the August outbreak. COVID-19 and its impact on people who have had long-standing difficulties accessing affordable and timely health care, demonstrated the need for change.8 A pop-up COVID-19 testing centre in South Auckland. Photo courtesy of RNZ Pacific Pacific Peoples as economic migrants in Aotearoa New Zealand The most significant wave of Pacific peoples migration to Aotearoa New Zealand occurred between the early 1950s and the early 1990s. Aotearoa New Zealand required a supply of low-skilled workers to help service its booming manufacturing and primary production economy and sourced much of that labour from the Pacific Islands.9 Pacific peoples were then eagerly welcomed to Aotearoa New Zealand, predominantly from the Cook Islands, Niue and Tokelau (as citizens of Aotearoa New Zealand), Sāmoa, the Kingdom of Tonga and Fiji. In this period the term “Pacific Islanders” was created and which homogenised and grouped people from the different Pacific, mostly Polynesian, islands together. The description did not recognise the independence or individual identity of the island states or acknowledge Pacific peoples’ connections and histories to their separate homelands.10 7 8 9 10 11 12 Dawn Raids In Aotearoa New Zealand, Pacific peoples have suffered breaches of human rights. At the downturn of the New Zealand economy following the entry of the UK into the European Economic Committee (EEC) and the Gulf Oil Crisis of 1973, Pacific peoples were notoriously targeted in what became known as “The Dawn Raids” (1974–1976). Initiated by the 1972 Labour Government and intensified under the following National government, an unofficial taskforce oversaw raids on Pacific families’ homes to find overstayers and deport them.11 This taskforce also had the power to demand that any suspected illegal overstayers produce documentation to prove they were rightfully in Aotearoa New Zealand. The raids targeted mainly brown people, which meant that Māori, Niuean, Tokelauan and Cook Islands Māori people, who were already New Zealand citizens, were also stopped and investigated.12 https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/425061/meng-foon-racist-stereotypes-on-the-rise-in-the-age-of-covid-19. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/on-the-inside/425302/what-pacific-health-equity-must-look-like. Salesa, D. 2017. Island Time. New Zealand’s Pacific Futures. Wellington: Bridget Williams Books, p. 20. Ibid. NZ On Screen. 2005. Dawn Raids. Accessed at https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/dawn-raids-2005. New Zealand Herald (Auckland). “When Pacific Islanders Were Raided in their Beds.”. 7 March 2015. Accessed at https:// www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=1141307.9 7