Pauline joined the New Zealand Police in 1974.

She spent five years in Palmerston North before moving to Auckland, serving in Otahuhu and then at the airport. She spent a harrowing few months at Auckland hospital mortuary as part of the team tasked with the identification of victims of the Erebus disaster. Taking leave without pay Pauline spent some months in Australia. On her return to Police she was sent to Tauranga, where she spent the next five years.

By 1989, as a competent and experienced police officer, she was selected along with two other policewomen to join the team of 32 police members selected to go to Namibia. This was the first time New Zealand policewomen had served overseas.

In Namibia fierce fighting between the local police and guerrillas had threatened the United Nations (UN) mission. The New Zealand police were there in a peacekeeping capacity but that did not lessen the dangers of working there, where the possibility of military or guerrilla action was very high. Their principal task was to observe the work of the South West African Police and accompany them as they discharged their duties, as well as to attend all political meetings and rallies. Pauline found it interesting working with police of other nationalities especially noting their reaction to working with women. Of the 1500 international police there, only 18 were female.

The Namibian people were pleased to see the New Zealand contingent. Some 70% of the population was illiterate and many lived in poverty. Pauline said that people had so little that the police contingents would take fruit for the children when they visited settlements - a positive relationship building exercise.

Namibian Independence Day was declared on 21 March 1990 and ended one of the largest and most complex UN operations in the field. The three policewomen who participated in the exercise were posted to different areas and did not see much of each until the presentation of the United Nations medal. The women thought they had done a good job and that the experience would be a highlight of their careers.

Pauline Joblin joined the police in 1964 when institutional attitudes towards policewomen were beginning to improve. While some police saw women with their 'inferior strength' a liability, others were more accepting, observing that women did not shirk the more unpleasant tasks.

One dangerous and unpleasant task was acting as a decoy to catch abortionists. On one occasion Pauline, using an assumed name, arranged to get an abortion from a woman who was also running a legitimate business – a home for the elderly. She paid £25 in marked notes for the procedure and went to the window hoping to be seen by waiting detectives, while the woman collected the equipment. No-one was there.

When the woman returned Pauline asked to use the toilet and climbed out the window phoning the Takapuna police from a neighbouring house. A message was radioed to the unseen Criminal Investigation Branch who finally entered the home and arrested the woman almost an hour after Pauline had arrived at the address.

During the late 1970s Pauline was a Youth Aid officer and participated in the occupation of Bastion Point which occurred after the government wanted to sub-divide Ngāti Whātua land for private housing. Ngāti Whātua iwi occupied the land for several months.

Pauline was one of the 600 police officers forming a cordon around the camp after a Supreme Court injunction that the protesters leave the land. It took police all day to clear the camp site, making 222 arrests.

Pauline served for 23 years initially in both Wellington and Auckland and was awarded the Queen's Service Medal for her work as chair of the Police Benevolent Fund and for her time on the Centennial Trust Committee.

Marilyn Stobie began her service with the New Zealand Police in 1965 as a temporary constable, becoming permanent in 1967. She was posted to the Women’s Division at Auckland Central Police Station and the following year she was transferred to Otahuhu, where she was one of two policewomen. Her duties included enquiries and serving summonses, executing warrants and interviewing women victims of sexual violence for the Criminal Investigation Branch (CIB).

Marilyn married a policeman and left the police for seven years. In 1976 a week after re-applying she was posted to Rotorua then transferred to the surveillance team in Wellington, a post she found lonely as she wasn’t expected to communicate with other officers.

Following her time in Wellington, most of Marilyn’s police career was with the Hamilton CIB. She was involved in hostage negotiation, homicide clerk duties, prosecutions and was a medic for the Armed Offenders Squad. Although she qualified as a sergeant, Marilyn postponed taking the rank to stay with the CIB, a job she loved. She devoted a total of 12 years to criminal investigation.

In 1986 she was appointed Senior Sergeant Officer-in-Charge at Ngaruawahia, an unusual position for a woman then. She retired in 1989 and says that she loved every minute of her job.

Detective Carole Tipler served the New Zealand Police for 42 years until her retirement in 2014.

She joined in 1972 and she graduated first in her wing. After graduation she served in Lower Hutt, Auckland and Henderson, before returning to her home region of Taranaki.

Throughout her career with the Police Carole worked in a variety of areas, including crime prevention, records, personnel, Criminal Intelligence Section, traffic and as an Arms Officer. She also worked a Metropolitan Police Officer while living in England. Her ambition was to join the Criminal Investigation Branch (CIB) but was delayed by the Springbok Tour and becoming a mother. Twenty-five years after completing the induction course, she finally joined the CIB in 2003.

Carole retired from the New Zealand Police in 2014 and has since volunteered in Nepal at Kathmandu’s Pashupati Temple, which helps care for the elderly and helpless, and at a school in the Gorkha District, which was the centre of the earthquake that rocked Nepal in April 2015.

Robyn Brand joined the New Zealand Police in 1967. She had been in the Metropolitan Police in London for a year before she moved to New Zealand and joined the police.

Robyn was on duty during the Wahine disaster, spending over 12 hours in the morgue at night as the bodies were brought in. She says the processes have changed and developed so much since then, but on that night it was ‘fly by the seat of our pants stuff’. Most bodies were hard to identify. Staff worked continuously through the night and were on shift the following night. There was no counselling for police staff after tragic events.

Looking back Robyn says, “It’s always made me proud that I helped people. I have a strong sense of right and wrong and believed I needed to stand up for the society we could be. Joining the police helped me do that. It’s what I knew after working for the Met in London.”

In 1968 Robyn became pregnant with her first child and had to leave the police. She had two more children and she focused on them, before going into various part-time jobs. When the family moved to Tauranga she became a real estate agent.

Two of her children joined NZ Police. Her daughter Alison is an Inspector in Counties Manukau, and one of her sons is a Detective Sergeant in the North Shore, Auckland. Robyn’s husband was also a policeman for 38 years. She has seven grandchildren, six of whom are girls. Robyn wonders if one of them will become a police officer one day.

Robyn says the young women in police today are amazing and the New Zealand public is so lucky to have them.

Dorothy joined the Police in 1963, one of four women out of 100 trainees. After coming second in her Wing she was posted to Auckland and joined the Women’s Division under Betty Bennett.

She first moved into the Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) to fill a temporary vacancy. She enjoyed working there but was unable to stay because the unit had their quota of 3 women already.

Dorothy was the first woman to be transferred to a suburban station, in Newmarket, but found there wasn’t a lot to do there. She managed to get transferred back to CIB in 1970, and was then promoted into the Uniform Branch as a Sergeant then a Senior Sergeant. At that time there was no training for these roles.

In 1973 she was appointed Officer in Charge (O/C) Youth Aid Section but left the Police when she had her first child in 1975.

She admires how women joining the Police today are able to do all the physical training required to be a Police Officer, as it wasn’t nearly so demanding in her day.

Donna joined the New Zealand Police in 1991. After graduating from Police College, she started her career in the General Duties Branch in Porirua, then, the Criminal Investigations Branch (CIB) in 1997.

After Donna qualified as a detective, she joined the Organised Crime Unit (OCU) in 2001. Mike Oxnam and Andrea Jopling were her mentors at the CIB, and she believed she was very fortunate to have been mentored by them.

After a few years with the OCU Donna was promoted to detective sergeant and deployed to the Solomon Islands, as Team Leader National Investigations, based in Honiara. Donna was also part of a United Nations deployment to Timor-Leste (East Timor). After roles in general duties and intelligence, she became the Community Policing Team Leader of Becora substation in Dili.

Following her overseas deployments Donna was promoted to detective senior sergeant, and she became Crime Strategy Manager. In early 2014, Donna was promoted to Inspector in the Professional Standards group.

Donna had a close-knit group of friends in and out of the Police and she spent her time with them, in a sporting capacity and socially. They liked to cycle, swim, and go to the gym together, challenging themselves and having a lot of laughs along the way. She competed in several half-ironman competitions, challenging herself to overcome her fear of swimming in open water.

Inspector Donna Howard was diagnosed with cancer in 2017, and despite a brave fight, passed away in January 2018.

Donna served with passion and commitment for 27 years.

At the time she passed away she was the Wairarapa Area Commander, a position she took up in early 2016.

She will be fondly remembered by her colleagues as a dedicated and well-respected police officer who made a substantial contribution to her local community and the New Zealand Police.

In 1973 a shortage of police in Auckland prompted a desperate mayor, Sir Dove-Myer Robinson, to find more staff to combat the high crime rate. Government approval resulted in the training of Wing 120 at an old teachers’ college in Ardmore, South Auckland.

Ali Stevenson was one of 13 women recruited to this wing. Inspector Bill Shanks was commandant, and he affectionately dubbed the new female trainees as his ‘Dolly Belles’.

Ali enjoyed her time at Police College. Close to the college was a bar at the nearby military camp, which was like forbidden fruit to the recruits because they weren’t allowed to leave campus during the weeknights.

One night, Ali recalls, a group of drunk male recruits decided to pull the fire alarm as a prank, but they didn’t realise the alarm went straight through to the Papakura Fire Station. Ten minutes later three fire trucks turned up looking for a fire. When the commandant woke he apologised to the firemen for the false alarm and dragged all the recruits out in their pyjamas to reprimand them.  It became evident the next day that none of the women had been involved, so only the men were punished.

When Ali completed her training, she was sent to Auckland Central Police Station under the supervision of Sergeant Ross Meurant. Ali’s first police duty was on the late shift, walking up and down Karangahape Road, which opened her eyes to the seamier side of life. After a misunderstanding with the owner of a strip club, who Ali had thought was a friendly business owner, an amused Sergeant Meurant gave Ali a rundown of the seedier businesses in the area. Ali recalls his lesson as ‘a 101 on Dens of Iniquity’.

Ali featured in the news when she first wore the newly issued trousers while on duty at the races. She hadn’t worn the jacket as well so got in a bit of trouble when she returned to the station.

Ali later became a Radio Operator for the South Auckland District based at Auckland Central, then worked in the CIB reception for a few months before retiring in 1987 after 14 years of service.

Prior to joining the New Zealand Police in 1962 Valerie Redshaw was in the London Metropolitan Police. Posted to the Women’s Division at Auckland Central she served there until she married.

After marrying, Valeria left Police to have children and taught at various schools in Otago and the Bay of Plenty. She attempted to re-join the police in the mid-1970s but was told the police did not employ women with children.

In 1984 she became an Education Officer at the Royal New Zealand Police College, with the responsibility for training youth aid officers and recruits and contributing to senior and commissioned officer courses. For a subsequent seven years she designed curricula for all police training, and was seconded for two and a half years to the New Zealand Customs Service as their National Manager Training and Development.

Keen to advance the status of policewomen and promote training, she was the police representative on several public sector bodies including the EEO Advisory Group, the Public Sector Training Organisation and the Government Committee for Suffrage Centennial Year. She also served on the academic board of the Open Polytechnic of New Zealand.

In 1991 she was given the task of organising the celebration of 50 years of women in policing. This inspired her to document women’s history in the service. Her book, Tact and Tenacity, was published in 2007.

In 1993, Valerie, was awarded the Suffrage Centennial Medal for services to policewomen and in 2007 she was made a member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to education. Post policing, Valerie contributed to the development of the Border Service in East Timor receiving the East Timor and New Zealand Operational Service Medals. A Justice of the Peace for 40 years she ended her working career spending six years with the Royal Federation of New Zealand Justices’ Associations as their Education Officer.

She regrets not being able to return to operational policing in the 1970s after she had her children, or in the 1980s because of age restrictions, but is pleased to have been able to contribute to changes in policy that have improved conditions for other policewomen.