Barrie Davis: No Marx for Sir Geoffrey

It is commonplace to say that the Treaty of Waitangi is New Zealand’s founding document and several prominent persons, including David Seymour and Ruth Richardson, have recently done so in posts on Breaking Views. However, the Treaty makes no mention of founding a country.

Professor Paul Moon has recently published Founding Documents of Aotearoa New Zealand: 50 Moments that Formed the Country. I suspect the point he is making is that there was not one single document such as the Treaty which founded New Zealand.

But we can go further than that, because some documents were far more influential than others. That which stands out is the New Zealand Constitution Act 1852 and there were others including Hobson’s Proclamations which had more to do with founding the country than the Treaty, which was a prerequisite.

Hence, the Treaty may only be called foundational.

That is my view, but as I said there have been many others who say the Treaty is the founding document of New Zealand. So much so, that I have begun to doubt my own cognitive abilities. David Seymour, in particular, seems to me to be a highly rational person and, as the author of the Treaty Principles Bill, he has closely read these documents.

So, I have re-read the Treaty, I have re-read the alternative documents and I have re-read the supporting documents, such as Normanby’s instructions to Hobson. In doing so, I have wondered if I am incapable of understanding language; surely these prominent citizens cannot all be wrong.

But I still cannot escape what seems to me to be an inescapable fact, that the Treaty does not provide for founding a country. Had the British stopped with the Treaty, there would have been no nation.

This is of great and genuine concern to me. If you think I have made a mistake, I would count it as a favour if you would point it out in the Comments section below.

But is this not what propaganda is all about? A fallacy is repeated often enough so that the population accept it as a fact? If that is so, then I am participating a dystopian nightmare.

There is another, more important example: The claim that “The Treaty established a relationship akin to a partnership between Crown and Maori” (Robin Cooke).

Again, I have repeatedly read the Treaty and the relevant documentation and not only does the Treaty not include the word ‘partnership’ or any of its synonyms, but there is nothing that implies a partnership. There is the Article 1 kawanatanga of Queen Victoria, the Article 2 rangatiratanga of the Chiefs and all the people of New Zealand (including Europeans), and the Article 3 equal rights and duties of British law. The speeches the Chiefs made on 5 February show they understood that kawanatanga trumps rangatiratanga, similar to the Magna Carta. Hence, no partnership.

That is simple and coherent and not even in the I. H. Kawharu back-translation is there a hint of a partnership. (Cf. The Maori Magna Carta: New Zealand Law and the Treaty of Waitangi by Paul McHugh, 1991; Ch. 1 II “The Problem of Interpretation: The Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi’,” pp 3-9.) The concocted tension between kawanatanga and rangatiratanga is not present when they are placed in a ‘Magna Carta’ relationship of King John and his Barons. I conclude that partnership in the Treaty of Waitangi is a contrivance of the Waitangi Tribunal intended to provide special rights to Maoris. There is no partnership, or so I keep telling myself.

I have previously found that when the cognitive dissonance gets above a certain threshold, the answer unexpectedly appears. In this case it was in a quote from Adam Smith in an article by Rob Campbell in The Post on Friday morning:

“A criminal is a person with predatory instincts who has not sufficient capital to form a corporation. Most government is by the rich for the rich. Government comprises a large part of the organised injustice in any society, ancient or modern. Civil government, insofar as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defence of the rich against the poor, and for the defence of those who have property against those who have none.” (Adam Smith)

That seems to me to be the case. For Maori, ownership of property, particularly land, was the essence of rangatiratanga sovereignty. For Queen Victoria, who was sovereign over a quarter of the earth’s surface and a quarter of its population, a higher power is indicated: For the government of a country such as England or New Zealand, sovereignty is possession of the country and the power to govern the owners of land, which land the sovereign does not own.

So, the rangatiratanga of the Chiefs (and all the people of New Zealand, including Europeans) is subject to the kawanatanga of the Crown. Hence, I am being manipulated by my own representative Parliament to believe that the sovereignty of New Zealand is with my representative Parliament in a partnership with a group of Maori ‘chiefs’ (who are really corporate CEOs).

I am quite obviously being lied to, cheated and propagandized on a grand scale, yet the Executive, the courts, the academics and the media continue to tell me that there is partnership in the Treaty.

That is because our past and present Prime Ministers refuse to accept that power originates in We the people. It is brought about by our labour and what we produce, for which we receive payment. We charge a government with governing our country and so that they may do so we give them the authority to tax us and to make our laws. That is to say, we vest our sovereignty in the Crown in Parliament. To find where sovereignty comes from, just follow the money back to We the people.

You would think if the government make constitutional arrangements and laws which we do not desire, that we would withdraw our sovereignty and stop paying tax. But they have also constituted a judiciary which cannot be dismissed to develop and administer a set of rules for all aspects of society, including paying tax. They have also instituted a police force and an army which Parliament and the judiciary have demonstrated they will use against us if we do not follow their rules.

They also continually develop the rules to further restrict our behaviour.

Sir Geoffrey Palmer has recently proposed a dozen changes to the functioning of our Parliament which he says, “could help avert a decline in democracy in New Zealand and improve public confidence in our core democratic institutions.” (Here)

Or it may not: Rob Campbell further writes in his 10 January article:

“Many are tricked by the forms of change which appear to enhance human rights to act freely in theory but carry great risks of exploitation based on existing and intensifying inequity between property rights. This is the very threat which Adam Smith saw so clearly.”

I wrote a comment to Sir Geoffrey’s ‘reforming Parliament’ article saying, “I don't want any of Sir Geoffrey's proposed changes. I just want one: the ability for We the people to require Parliament to give us a referendum.”

In 2016 Sir Geoffrey with Dr Andrew Butler published A Constitution for Aotearoa New Zealand in which they propose a written, codified ‘Constitution Aotearoa’ that sets out the fundamental rules and principles under which New Zealand is to be governed. In it they propose “to incorporate the Treaty [in Maori and English] within Constitution Aotearoa to make its status clear and certain … the courts will continue to have the power to give effect to it on a case by case basis … the courts and tribunals have the power to request an opinion from the Waitangi Tribunal …” (p. 146).

Moreover, the Constitution Aotearoa may not be amended except by a supermajority (75%) vote in parliament or by a referendum by New Zealand voters (p. 75). So, the Waitangi Tribunal and the courts, but not our representative Parliament, would be controlling the country on the basis of a Treaty based partnership which they would continue to develop and in which ‘the Treaty is always speaking’.

We are presently learning the hard way what a referendum means. It is a mechanism used by the authorities which appears to provide democratic power to the people but is actually used by the Government to control us. It means that the Government progressively control more and more of our lives.

Sir Geoffrey wants to impose his will on Aotearoa for ever.

The Treaty Principles Bill has already received 300,000 submissions from the public; the previous record was 100,000. That is proof enough that New Zealand needs a referendum on this issue. It is an arrogant abuse of power for the Government to make the decision. A referendum is the proper way for a democracy to resolve it.

But is New Zealand a democracy or a dystopian nightmare?

Barrie Davis is a retired telecommunications engineer, holds a PhD in the psychology of Christian beliefs, and can often be found gnashing his teeth reading The Post outside Floyd’s cafe at Island Bay.