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Friday, October 18, 2024

Graeme Reeves: The Treaty Principle’s Bill or the Constitutional Principles Bill or neither?

In his blog of 14 October 2024 Professor Robert MacCulloch, in discussing the Treaty Principles Bill suggested that the bill be renamed the “Constitutional Principles Bill”. He suggested that it should simply map out the fundamental values all Kiwis hold dear avoiding the futile treaty interpretation and mind reading game.

If only it were that simple.

New Zealand already has a well-developed set of constitutional principles which have been formulated over a period of about 900 years, starting with the Magna Carta in 1215, the Bill of Rights Act 1688, the New Zealand Constitution Act 1852, the Bill of Rights Act 1990 and the Human Rights Act 1993, all of which have contributed to New Zealand being the oldest continuous successful democracy in the world.

Put simply, the combination of the above enactments established the three pillars of a democratic system of governance.

1. The disbursement of power from an authoritarian head of state including the separation of the church from the state i.e. a “secular” society and not a “sectarian” society, to the elected representatives of the people.

2. The establishment of the Rule of law including both the civil law and the criminal codes, and most importantly the creation and protection of private property rights which provides the foundation for a capitalist economy.

3. The equality of all citizens under the law.

Under this system Parliament is the supreme Law making agency receiving its Mandate from the people in free and fair general elections.

What has muddied the waters was not the signing of the very simple Treaty of Waitangi document in 1840, but the subsequent introduction into New Zealand legislation of references to the Treaty of Waitangi and its Principles since the passing of the Waitangi Tribunal act 1975 and the tortured attempts to articulate the principles of that very simple document.

The situation was further exacerbated in 1986 by the lands case which arose from a provision in the State-Owned Enterprises Act 1986, which required the Crown to register memorials against titles owned by the Crown being transferred to the new SOE entities to protect those assets for future Treaty settlements.

Somewhat ambitiously, Justice Robin Cooke took it upon himself to indulge in some obita dicta reflecting his views on the meaning of the Treaty Principles.

However misguided, he may have been, he did not for one moment suggest in the Lands case and in the subsequent Coal case and in his extrajudicial musings in Rotorua in 1990 that the Treaty or its Principles created an equal partnership between Maori and the Crown. He made it clear that the right to govern remained firmly with the elected Parliament of New Zealand.

A more recent and interesting development took place on the morning of 15 October on talkback ZB when the Prime Minister of New Zealand when referring to the Solicitor General’s guidelines for prosecutors in which Maori were to be given preferential treatment to avoid convictions under the criminal code stated that the law should be “colourblind”

Colourblindness is consistent with the Constitutional framework referred to above.

Colourblindness’ is the theme of the recently published Coleman Hughes book, The End of Race Politics -Arguments for a Colorblind America”

Hughes coins a new category of actors in the racist narrative, the neoracist. To be distinguished from the anti-racist.

He writes that the neoracism narrative demands that we implement policies that rebalance the way resources are distributed wherever possible. We need to give people of colour preferential treatment. This is the only way for our society to move beyond its chequered racial past and to defeat white supremacy.

Hughes response to, what he calls this seductive narrative, is as follows: it depends on several harmful myths and fallacies , including, the disparity fallacy, the myth of undoing the past and the racial ad hominem, which is the most pernicious in that,” it states that you can dismiss any claims about race and racism that white people make simply because they are white”.

He asserts that, “Neoracists don’t want racial peace, but endless ideological war. When we see neoracisim for what it is -racism in anti-racist clothing-we see why neoracists fail to support colorblind policies that would eliminate racism, and why they reject the colorblind principles that motivated the civil rights movement.”

While New Zealand’s journey is different from the American journey, I contend that we can see the behaviours referred to by Hughes exhibited by the Waitangi Tribunal and the Maori and other activists who have vested interests in keeping the racist narrative alive.

They are the neoracists.

The question is then how we, as a nation, move forward as a united country where rights and obligations are not determined by race but by citizenship and in accordance with our constitutional heritage, where all of the rights and obligations afforded us as citizens of a free democratic society as referred to above are not adulterated by the neoracist agenda.

Is it a concise statement of the principles of the Treaty Principles or is it simply that Parliament legislates the removal of all reference to the Treaty and its Principles to firmly establish that all of the citizens of this country are equal under the law.

If we don’t and continue to try to solve socio-economic disparities purely on race and not need then we are, in my opinion, on a slippery slope.

Graeme Reeves is a lawyer and former National MP.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

The most important thing is to keep it out of the schools. Right now they are teaching the next generation that their way is the right way and as a result this type of thinking is passed on to the next generation. They know this, that is why they did it.

Anonymous said...

I opt for the complete removal of all reference to the Treaty and its Principles, close the door and move on - oh and on the subject of equality of treatment, tax the currently exempt Maori entities. PM Luxon wants to balance the books, that would be a big contributor to fixing that issue too.

Peter said...

You'll have no disagreement from me, Graeme. Anyone who thinks differently (IMHO) is either snout deep in one of the many associated gravy trains, or is by and large deluded and ignorant of our history, and/or has been subverted by false narratives.

Unless it's addressed as an imperative, that slope will become more like a precipice.

Anonymous said...

The 1852 Constitutional Act was repealed by the (coup d état) Constitution Act 1986.

As a leading Constitutional Lawyer has stated, “It is true the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975 and all the other statutes, which give explicit recognition to the treaty are not entrenched. They can be swept away by a simple majority in parliament”.

New Zealand, as of 1987, is a free-standing (un)constitutional monarchy whose parliament has unlimited sovereign power. As such, this should be the only option if the corporate state is serious about stopping the apartheid, racist, divisive slippery slope to hell.

The “Principles bill’ is a corporate state red herring, and will not address the real cause that goes back to 1975.

Mark Hanley said...

I agree with Anon 1. School learning must be free of political interference.

The Charter School model will make it much harder for the next Labour government to propogandise the curriculum, and will make it harder for the next Labour government to produce a new wave of uneducated gang recruits by letting brown kids bunk School..... again.

Don said...

Graeme proposes the excellent step of removing all reference to the Treaty and establishing equality for all citizens. Having read dozens of opinions about the Treaty with so much repetition in it all I have developed an allergy to reading about it. I think Winston feels the same in his view that NZ first will not support the Act bill because there is nothing about principles in the Treaty therefore why waste time on it. The Act bill is a good idea but if accepted will establish that principles are a part of the Treaty, which they are demonstrably not. There is a Catch 22 here that deserves to be revealed.