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Saturday, October 22, 2022

Breaking Views Update: Week of 16.10.22







Saturday October 22, 2022 

News:
Co-governance new reality says Mahuta

The Minister for Local Government, Nanaia Mahuta, says the benefits of the Three Waters proposals will far outweigh any disadvantages.

Ms Mahuta says some of the opposition seemed to be driven not about economics or effectiveness but racist tropes about co-governance.

“People who are often commenting on co-governance really don’t want Maori sitting around the table but this is the new reality of improved decision-making,” she says.

Minister Mahuta says Maori will bring a much-needed emphasis on long-term sustainability to water management – which is good for all New Zealanders.....
See full article HERE

Research reveals Māori on the back foot in retirement years
They are supposed to be the golden years, but new research has highlighted the difficult reality Māori face heading into retirement.

A set of four papers released by Te Ara Ahunga Ora Retirement Commission have revealed the widespread social and economic disparities Māori face during retirement.

The in-depth research found the impacts of colonisation, land theft and inequality had caused ongoing hardship for tangata whenua in their later years.....
See full article HERE

Māori pay gap closes
The Māori pay gap in public service is now the lowest ever.

It’s 50 years since the passing of the Equal Pay Act, and the latest release of public service workforce data shows a record low gender pay gap of 7.7 percent.

The Maori pay gap has fallen from has fallen to 6.5 percent from 8.3 percent over the past year.....
See full article HERE

Expert reaction: Health inequities between Māori and non-Māori adults cost NZ$863.3 million per year
Māori health inequity directly costs the health system $39.9 million per year, according to a new Indigenous-led study. When researchers added indirect costs of $823.4 million from lost years of life and lost wages, which were mostly borne directly by Māori whānau, the overall cost skyrocketed to over $863.3 million.

Māori significantly under-utilised primary care, creating an annual saving to the health system of $49.4 million per year.

The authors point out that these are conservative estimates, and say that the 'cost of doing nothing' about health inequity is predominantly borne by Indigenous communities and society - less than 5% of the cost is borne by the health system.....
See full article HERE

Waikato-Tainui and Ngāi Tahu receive Treaty Settlement adjustment
An adjustment payment has been made to Waikato-Tainui and Ngāi Tahu under the relativity mechanisms in their 1995 and 1997 Treaty of Waitangi settlements.

The payments have been guided by the awards of previous arbitrations, and have reduced the number of future arbitration hearings required to resolve remaining disputes.

Waikato-Tainui and Ngāi Tahu have each received $1.625 million as a negotiated resolution of a range of disputes concerning the relativity mechanism payments made in 2012 and 2017.....
See full article HERE

Māori blocked from waipiro decisions
An independent health researcher says the major power imbalance in alcohol decision-making between the booze industry and Maori could be considered a breach of the Treaty of Waitangi.

“Pretty much our current alcohol legislation completely fails to enable any meaningful participation of Maori in alcohol decisions within their rohe and it is also completely inept for achieving equity so it really does need to be changed substantially to become treaty consistent,” Ms Maynard says.....
See full article HERE

Tūhoe's governing authority begins removing, burning huts in Te Urewera
More than a dozen back country huts in Te Urewera have been dismantled and the timber burnt as the Tūhoe iwi authority moves ahead with its controversial plan to remove huts in the former National Park.

Some huts would be replaced by bespoke, “fit-for-purpose” structures, providing a base for workers and better access and facilities for visitors, TUT said. However, no details of the replacement buildings have been released yet, and it’s unclear how many new huts would be built......
See full article HERE  

This Breaking Views Update monitors race relations in the media on a weekly basis. New material is added regularly. If you would like to send Letters to the Editor in response to any of these articles, most media addresses can be found HERE

Friday October 21, 2022 

News: 
Real Estate NZ translates property agreements into te reo Māori, Samoan, Tongan, Hindi, Korean, Chinese 
The Real Estate Authority (REA) has released updated consumer guides on the property buying and selling process in seven languages - including te reo Māori.

REA chief executive/registrar Belinda Moffat says English is not the first language for many of their consumers, in which Māori make up roughly 23 per cent.

According to a recent consumer survey, it showed 23 per cent of respondents who had bought their first home in the past 12 months were Māori.

The REA has been working hard to demonstrate that they value te reo Māori as a taonga, according to Moffat who says that the language is used in her team's own internal work and increasingly throughout their external communications with New Zealanders and their sector as well......
See full article HERE

Pukekohe racism doco ideal fit for history lessons
Producer Reikura Kaahi hopes her documentary No Māori Allowed will be used when schools take on the new history curriculum next year.

The doco about racial separatism in Pukekohe in the mid-twentieth century screened on Whakaata Māori last night......
See full article HERE

Changes planned to improve Aotearoa New Zealand’s mortality review function
The embedding of existing Te Tiriti o Waitangi and pro-equity guidelines also varies across committees.

‘One of the main reasons for the transformation is to address inequities in Māori mortality rates. The significant current inequities in Māori mortality rates are unacceptable and cannot be ignored. We need to include a strong and unfettered Māori voice in this transformation and the future national mortality review function....
See full article HERE

More Māori youth achieving higher, but systemic change still needed - report
More Māori rangatahi are achieving highly in education than three years ago, but systemic change is still needed, new data shows.

Almost 50% of rangatahi Māori left high school with NCEA level three in 2021, compared with 35% in 2018.

The number of Māori aged between 19 and 25 without qualifications has also “drastically dropped” by 18% from 2018 to 2021.....
See full article HERE


Wednesday October 19, 2022 

News: 
Co-governance progress astounds Jones 
New Zealand First MP Shane Jones says the Labour Government and especially its Māori caucus have lost sight of what ordinary Māori need.

“If these new institutions go broke it’s the taxpayers that will have to stand up but sadly the taxpayers don’t have exclusive authority at a governance level – 50 percent of it has been outsourced to Ngaitahu and Tainui and I can assure you they will never put their money where their mouth is or they will never put their (hands) into their own pockets so why on earth are you giving them any influence beyond those of an ordinary taxpayer to set the direction of these new water behemoths,” Mr Jones says.....
See full article HERE

Call for more Maori in local govt
The Bicultural Committee of Auckland diocese’s Justice and Peace Commission supports requirements in a bill before Parliament to require territorial authorities that don’t have Maori wards or constituencies to consider Maori representation every six years.

But the bicultural committee believes the bill does not go far enough to ensure appropriate representation of Maori on local councils.

The bicultural committee made these points in a submission on the Local Government Electoral Legislation Bill, which is currently before Parliament’s Governance and Administration select committee......
See full article HERE

Auckland's first wāhine Māori councillor wants mana whenua to have more say
Auckland's first wāhine Māori councillor says she will encourage a change to let mana whenua have voting powers.

Leoni said the council should introduce Māori wards and mana whenua should be part of decision-making.

"I acknowledge mana whenua here and the voice that they need to have at the council table too, so they have voting rights with the committees but not at governing boards," Leoni said.....
See full article HERE

Tikanga still subordinate in law
Carwyn Jones from Te Wananga o Raukawa’s Māori laws and philosophy programme says the case may be of limited use for Maori.

“The concern that I have really is that they are still subordinating tikanga really to the common law, they’re still saying we will take tikanga into account but it will be a common law that will determine how tikanga will apply and what weight it will be given,” he says.

Dr Jones says a truly bi-cultural legal system needs the kind of constitutional transformation advocated for by the late Moana Jackson.....
See full article HERE

Propaganda:
How Māori scientists are helping Hauraki Gulf recover from crisis 

Tuesday October 18, 2022 

News: 
Calls for second chief executive and Māori co-governance at mega-polytech Te Pūkenga 
Te Pūkenga has come under fire for its use of Māori motifs and values that are not reflected in its structure, with some calling for a second chief executive to be appointed and the introduction of co-governance.

Another person called for a change at parliamentary level so “Cabinet can appoint two chief executives”, while someone else said not having Māori at chief executive level is “an imbalance in mana”.

The proposed structure will see Te Pūkenga split into four regions – North, East, South and West – but it was claimed the East and West regions did not align with traditional iwi-Māori groupings.....
See full article HERE

Treaty: Three voices address three issues
The Crown, Tangata Whenua and the Church will be coming together at Baycourt on October 31 to discuss how the Te Tiriti o Waitangi influence co-governance, Three Waters and the redevelopment of Tauranga’s city centre.

“What position on the Treaty does the Crown hold that results in their Three Waters proposal? What position do iwi hold that has them pushing for co-governance? What position does the Church hold that motivates them to give land back to iwi?

“People won’t understand co-governance unless they better understand what underpins the logic of co-governance,” says Alistair......
See full article HERE

Concern over safety, cost of fixing earthquake-prone marae buildings
There's concern for the future of many marae buildings, with 70 percent of them likely to be considered earthquake-prone within the next 20 years.

One expert is worried many people are unaware of the risk, while others are worried about how upgrades will be paid for.

There are about 1300 marae across the motu, with many of the buildings on them more than half a century old......
See full article HERE

Articles:
Message to the PM – by Dr Muriel Newman.

The biggest winners from Election 2022 – Frank Newman.

Graham Adams: Three Waters - Voters don’t know the half of it

Propaganda:
Tikanga and the audacity of enlightenment

Considering our true founding document 

Monday October 17, 2022 

News: 
Hundreds sign on for forum 'looking at education with a Māori lens' 
An education symposium hosted by iwi in Whakatū Nelson next week aims to address racism in schools and promote excellence for Māori students.

It's aimed at teachers, whānau and anyone with an interest in inspiring excellence for Māori students and influencing change in the education sector.

"Our school system is set up in a way that it doesn't really acknowledge the effects of historical colonial violence, all the horrible ways that our colonial history has dislocated Māori from land and culture.".....
See full article HERE

Iwi extends health care to Pākehā
“Our first priority is Māori, but the wellbeing of the whole community is important”, says Poutini Waiora’s Westport team leader, Dianna McLean.

The organisation has contracts for services from community mental health to truancy and its staff are a mix of Māori and Pākehā.

“We don’t turn people away just because they’re not Māori. We have a percentage allowance for non-Māori in our budgets and mainstream services right now are chocka.”.....
See full article HERE

Articles:
Mike Butler: Pre-colonisation, warts and all

Caleb Anderson: Why tribalism is so dangerous

Ross Meurant: Fundamental Flaw

A.E. Thompson: See What’s Happening in our New Health System 

This Breaking Views Update monitors race relations in the media on a weekly basis. New material is added regularly. If you would like to send Letters to the Editor in response to any of these articles, most media addresses can be found HERE

8 comments:

Ray S said...

"Our first priority is Māori"
"We will not turn people away because they are not Maori," but we will if we want to.(my words)
She didn't say that but it will be the outcome of a separate health system.
With a european name like McLean, her ethnicity is probably 90% Irish.

Robert Arthur said...

17th Nelson. As I am interested in maori education would they let me in to the seminar (with a recorder)? Would provide me with material for months.Is the enrolment fee the same for vanillas? The main disincentive is the risk of a stroke due astronomic blood pressure.

Robert Arthur said...

re 18th Te Pukenga could avoid the demand for co governance by dropping all the referemces to maori twaddle when the perceived anomoly would cease to be.

Robert Arthur said...

re 21st. I am surprised at the disproportionate sales to maori. With the glut of apartments and increasing availability of cosy state rentals, many private buyers are sure to lose equity. I suppose the Waitangi Tribunal will find systematic targeting of maori to take the fall, although I suspect most will, unlike others, be protected from personal equity loss by some means..
And programmes like No Maori Allowed only create trouble. The circumstances of the time are not explained and not imagined by the young. I recall rural maori houses in Hawkes Bay in the 1940s. Window openings covered by sacks. Children running about naked.Many rural workers of all types lived in shed like buildings. As with quite a few others, many maori houses would have had no running hot water. Persons attending the theatre in their sunday best, as many then did, did not wish to be seated alongside someone who may not have had a bath for weeks, wore clothes they manually worked in all week, and no underclothes. The situation analogous to homeless in many libraries now, but there can keep distance. Landlords, based on bitter experiences, also discriminated and the bitten still do not accept all comers.

Anonymous said...

REA is a govt body funded by taxes. i can understand translation into maori since it is an official language (as long as they keep english version free of manglish). i don't understand why translation into other languages are funded by the public. if someone is in NZ and does not understand a document in english, i would like to know how they managed to reach any place in this country!

Anonymous said...

Mahuta is starting to sound like hitler in the 1930s, with her increasingly bold rhetoric that maori are the superior race and that the rest of us must accept this or be called racists
Unreal that is is happening in nz, isn't it.

Robert Arthur said...

re 22nd. Mahuta is correct when she presumes the main worry about 3 Waters is the co governance aspect. 50/50 co governance is effectively maori control because the maori act as a bloc and, for a variety of self interest reasons, including avoidance of cancellation, at least one other invariably sides with.
As for retirement maori are in an enviable position. There are usually numerous children to share support and provide company, innumerable grandchildren..All potential joys many consider beyond money value. Many persons have a strong desire to help others. In extended maori families there is usually ample scope. Often no estate and no lack of options for. Another worry avoided.
Removal of huts would seem to be a safety issue. It seems to smack of the mana seeking stick it to the colonists attitude apparently adopted by the Tupuna Maunga Authority and by mana whenua with their effectively ongoing rahui in the Waitakeres. The Auckland Council in the Wiatakeres, and DOC, overlook that basic conditions form a large part of memorable wilderness experiences. Formal formed tracks and motel like huts hugely compromise the experience.

*** said...

What is going on in NZ is shocking and deeply distressing - race-based legislation to entrench racial superiority and provide superior rights for one racial group over others. In this day and age, it is simply astounding that this is happening. Have we learned nothing from history?

Race-based measures to provide one racial group superior rights over others (as in NZ’s co-governance) is a massive disaster in the making. The only historic examples on the NZ scale that spring to mind are Nazi Germany (the superiority of Aryans) and apartheid Afrikaners (superiority of South African whites). India’s caste system up until 1947 could perhaps also be an example. Nazi Germans and apartheid Afrikaners were rightly ostracised and hated by the rest of the world. This is NZ’s future. Sadly, NZ has gone beyond the point of no-return down the black hole of racial superiority. It will require massive effort and drama to reverse.

I remember in the darkest days of South Africa’s apartheid when certain races were prevented by law from performing some jobs. Every week I read of more and more influential and powerful jobs being setup in NZ, reserved exclusively for those of Maori race only. They are jobs requiring decisions which impact all races.

New Zealanders need to tear themselves away from the sports channel, and ponder their bleak future. You will be the pariahs of the world alongside Nazi Germans, apartheid Afrikaners and those who discriminated against Indian untouchables. The world has never tolerated race-based legislation to award superior rights to one racial group over others. Your future and that of your descendants will entail ostracization, hatred and sanction from the rest of the world for generations to come. Your descendants will despair how you sat back and allowed this to happen.