NCW Naational council for women

NCW National Council for Women

If you have any comments or would like to raise any issues regarding NCW, please contact: District Fifteen NCW Co-ordinator

Click here to go to the NCW website.

Some questions and answers about Altrusa's membership:

Question: What is District Fifteen's responsibilities as a member of NCWNZ?

Answer: As a Nationally Organised Society, Altrusa is committed to having representation at a minimum of three NCWNZ branches. The representatives (also known as delegates) are expected to contribute to the debate on any issue raised at the Branch. In an ideal world, the NCWNZ Circular would arrive in time for the representative to take the Action Items to their local Nationally Organised Society branch for discussion and bring the collective wisdom of the NOS branch to the NCWNZ branch debate.

Question: What is a Nationally Organised Society?

Answer: A Nationally Organised Society or NOS, is one of over a 100 women organisations in New Zealand, which NCWNZ have as members. Altrusa is one of such NOS. Organisations similar to Altrusa are members along with religious, scouting, family/parenting and other organisations.

Question: Who in Altrusa can participate in the activities of NCWNZ?

Answer: Any member of Altrusa can become involved in any NCWNZ committee or activity. This is not limited to the Altrusa member who is the National Representative or the representative at a Branch. To hold office such as on the Board or as a Standing Committee Convener there are some requirements that are outlined in the constitution and bylaws, and are around the level of participation within NCWNZ, e.g., attending a National meeting, holding Branch office, or equivalent

within the NOS.

Question: What is a Standing Committee?

Answer: There are 11 Standing Committees: Consumer Affairs, Economics, Education, Employment, Environment, Family Affairs, Health, Justice and Law Reform, Public Issues, Social Issues and Parliamentary Watch Committee. These Committees disperse information to their committee members on relevant issues, mostly being bills, i.e., proposed new legislation. The Convener of the Committee collates the member's opinions on those issues / bills and produces a submission, which will generally be presented to the Select Committee at Parliament. Here is a link to some further information about Standing Committees: http://www.ncwnz.co.nz/framemenus/faction.htm.

Question: Can I become a Committee member?

Answer: Yes. Any member of an NOS can be on the Standing Committee's nucleus committee or be a corresponding member. Again, there are constitutional limits, the main one being only one corresponding member per NOS.

Question: How can Altrusa provide input to NCWNZ?

Answer: The NOS has two ways of inputting to NCWNZ activities: through its representative at Branches and through its input nationally. The expectation is that the NOS will co-ordinate any response that the NOS wishes to make to NCWNZ activities such as Action Items, so that NCWNZ receives only one response from the NOS nationally and not a response from each NOS Branch or individuals within the NOS.