NZCPR Newsletter: Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Dear NZCPR Reader,

It’s been a busy year for the NZCPR. We have achieved a great deal - but only thanks to your support.

Our mission to inform public opinion, influence decision-makers and help to shape the future direction of New Zealand has never been more important.

So, as we look forward to 2025, our plea to each and every one of our readers, is that if you have found any value whatsoever in our newsletters, our website, our campaigns, or our social media platforms – our Breaking Views blog, our NZCPR Facebook Group, or X – then please support our Christmas fundraiser so we can continue to work hard for you next year.

And please remember, every single contribution counts, so please - please - support our 2025 NZCPR Fundraiser by clicking HERE.

This year the NZCPR’s Treaty book campaign achieved its goal of delivering over a million copies of the explanation of the original meaning of the Maori version of the Treaty of Waitangi written by one of New Zealand’s greatest Maori leaders into Kiwi homes. Sir Apirana Ngata wrote his brilliant explanation in 1922 - long before the separatists began reinterpreting and weaponizing the Treaty. He clearly pointed out that Maori ceded sovereignty to the Crown, and there was no Treaty partnership.

By making the booklet available for the cost of printing and postage, we are continuing to distribute thousands more copies all around New Zealand. And in response to the gushing news story  that a heavily biased re-interpretation of the Treaty has been delivered to all High Schools in New Zealand, in the new year – if we gain sufficient support to continue our work - we will send each school Sir Apirana’s book in order to counter the propaganda and set the record straight.

Our second long-running campaign, which is to represent the public interest and prevent a tribal takeover of New Zealand’s coastline, has now exposed major political activism within our judiciary - including the Supreme Court.

To understand the significance of this new development, it’s important to remember that when National formed a government with the Maori Party and opened up the coast up for tribal claims in 2011, they promised New Zealanders no more than 10 percent of the coastline in remote areas would end up under tribal control.

They set the test for a Customary Marine Title high: as well as holding their claimed area according to tikanga or Maori custom, applicants had to have held it exclusively and continuously since 1840.

The problems arose when the Judiciary decided to prioritise ‘tikanga’ and essentially ignore everything else. That meant the key property rights test of whether a claimed area was held “exclusively” by one applicant group who prevented others from using it, was reinterpreted under tikanga to mean it could be ‘shared’ by everyone. That led to the new concept of “shared exclusivity” being introduced into the law by Judges, so no-one missed out. 

As a result, instead of dozens of competing and overlapping opportunistic claims for the same area of coastline being ruled out because they couldn’t comply with the ‘exclusivity’ requirement, High Court Judges ruled them all in under “shared exclusivity”, effectively opening the door for the entire coastline to pass into tribal control. 

As a result of that development, we challenged the decision to the Court of Appeal, asking them to rule that the law should be interpreted as Parliament intended. They ignored our submission and instead made matters worse by presuming all claimants had title to the coast - unless proved otherwise! So, we appealed to the Supreme Court.

Unfortunately, the activist Judges presiding over our highest court rejected our argument that the law should be taken literally to mean what it says. Instead, they opted to ignore Parliament’s intentions and progress their destructive agenda to embed tikanga throughout the justice system, by issuing what has been described as a ‘pronouncement’ that “tikanga” must be at the heart of all coastal claim determinations.

It is no coincidence that their 89-page partial “judgement”, released just seventeen days after a complicated eight-day hearing, was timed to pre-empt the enactment of the Government’s Bill to strengthen the Marine and Coastal Area Act to deliver what Parliament intended.

The Justices of the Supreme Court achieved their aim. The Government’s Bill, which was meant to be passed by Christmas, has now been put on hold, pending advice from Crown Law about the implications of the Supreme Court’s ruling.

Supporters of Maori sovereignty, who want to see tribal groups control New Zealand’s coastline are busy telling the Coalition that the Supreme Court ruling means the Bill is now no longer needed. Nothing could be further from the truth! The Bill needs to go ahead - and the Supreme Court needs to be reined in.

Since Crown Law promotes itself as a good ‘Treaty Partner’, we are concerned the advice they provide to the Government may be biased, and so, in the public interest, we have secured independent legal advice to share with Government decision-makers.

The reality is that New Zealand now stands at a crossroads. If the Coalition abandons or waters-down their Bill, almost all of our coastline will end up controlled by multiple competing tribal groups. That would be a disaster for the future of our country.

This coastal claims campaign has been a major part of the NZCPR’s work programme for some years. It is complex, costly and appears to be never-ending. We are the only public interest group acting in the court proceedings. If we cannot continue to fight this in the courts, the legal battle will be lost and the coastline will fall into tribal hands.

Sadly, the battle for control of our coastline is symptomatic of the wider threat New Zealand is now facing. 

The tribal takeover, unleashed by the Ardern-Hipkins Labour Government, has not been defeated. The framework established to deliver He Puapua - to replace democracy with tribal rule by 2040 – remains largely in place and is being used to advance their agenda.

Separatists now have a controlling influence in most State Services, in local government, the media, and the Judiciary. They continue to brainwash our children and sabotage the Coalition.

Optics is a key part of their strategy – they want the public to see them as legitimate Treaty Partners.

That’s why activists ensure the Maori language dominates over English whenever possible in placenames, the names of government departments, and other official communications - in spite of the Coalition pledge to prioritise English.

They’ve also hit on the highly effective tactic of “gifting” Maori names to organisations, which invariably adopt them rather than refusing and risking causing offense.

There are echoes of George Orwell in all of this: “If you control the language, you control the mind.”

In fact, a former Maori Party co-leader, Marama Fox, said as much when she explained the Maori language was the key to Maori control of New Zealand: “People look at things differently once they’ve acquired te reo. The Maori world view is different… The language unlocks our thinking.”

She claimed it was all “plotted out… for a Maori sovereignty party to share government”. Their plan involves replacing our Westminster model of Parliamentary democracy with a “unique form of governance that would favour Maori customs, principles and values … it’s a radical vision… but if we believe in it, then we need to march towards it.”

And march towards it they did - with He Puapua!

The Ardern Government was a gift from heaven for the Maori sovereignty movement. During that first term He Puapua remained secret. The Office of Maori Crown Relations was established in partnership with tribal leaders to work “under the radar”.

Then, when Covid delivered Labour an outright majority in Parliament, caution went out the window and, without any mandate whatsoever from New Zealanders, the tribal takeover began in earnest.

Three Waters was designed to pass control of fresh water to tribal leaders.

They wanted control of health, but since that was impossible in a decentralised system, the health boards were disestablished in the middle of the pandemic so centralised control of health could pass to Maori. It was no time at all before an apartheid system emerged, which prioritised healthcare on the basis of race instead of clinical need.

The mainstream media was captured through the $55 million Public Interest Journalism Fund, which required recipients to promote the Treaty partnership lie - ensuring a pro-sovereignty bias right up until the scheme ends in 2026.

The takeover didn’t stop at central government, local government was also captured, not only through Maori seats, but also through advisory boards established to give the representatives of multi-million tribal business corporations the same pay and voting rights as democratically elected councillors.

The Coalition Government was elected on the promise of reversing these changes, and they wasted no time in canning Three Waters, abolishing the Maori Health Authority, restoring Maori ward petition rights, and instructing government departments to prioritise services on the basis of need, not race.

But while most of those measures were successful, the Coalition doesn’t appear to be aware that the tribal juggernaut is still rolling on.

Having conquered State institutions and local government, tribalism is now corrupting the private sector: even though the Treaty was an agreement between Maori and the Crown, private organisations up and down the country are being coerced into including the Treaty in their constitutions and surrendering to tribal indoctrination – under threat of accusations of racism if they refuse.

At the heart of the Maori sovereignty activism are the Maori seats. This power base is now being weaponized to undermine democracy.

That’s why we need to convince the Coalition to hold an inquiry into the Maori seats, culminating in a nation-wide referendum on whether they should be retained or abolished.

Such a referendum is long overdue. The 1986 Royal Commission on the Electoral System warned that if MMP was introduced and the Maori seats were not abolished they would lead to a disproportionate over-representation of Maori in Parliament.

And that’s the situation we have faced for some years now. In spite of Maori making up only 14 percent of the voting-age population at the last election, they hold 28 percent of the seats in Parliament. And if the Maori Party were to succeed in their goal of securing 20 Maori seats and the balance of power, almost 40 percent of MPs would likely be Maori.

With growing concerns over the increasingly discriminatory impact the radicalised Maori seats are now having on society, if we receive sufficient support to continue operating in 2025, we will make pushing for an inquiry and a referendum an urgent priority.

Let’s also be clear - by this time next year, with an election just around the corner, unless the Coalition is in a far stronger position than they are now, there’s a very real risk they will become a one-term government.

And if that were to eventuate, heaven help us all. The country would be at the mercy of a radicalised Labour Government in coalition with the extremist Greens and an increasingly subversive Maori Party.

That truly alarming prospect reminds me of the Hemmingway quote asking how you go bankrupt: “Gradually, then suddenly.” That also applies to the collapse of democracy.

Whether we like it or not, what was a gradual shift towards tribal rule is now advancing rapidly. We can either turn a blind eye or step up to stop it.  

That’s the battle the NZCPR will engage in - if we have your backing.

Please support our 2025 NZCPR Fundraiser by clicking HERE - and if you don’t like website forms the direct donation details for internet banking are: New Zealand Centre for Political Research Ltd - 12-3099-0833814-00

 

Thank you for your wonderful generosity over the years - and for believing in us.

On behalf of the New Zealand Centre for Political Research I would like to wish you and your family a very Merry Christmas and a happy and healthy New Year!

Warmest regards,

Dr Muriel Newman

 

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Dr Muriel Newman established the New Zealand Centre for Political Research as a public policy think tank in 2005 after nine years as a Member of Parliament. The NZCPR website is HERE. We also run this Breaking Views Blog and our NZCPR Facebook Group HERE.