The claim that Māori rights are “under serious threat” relies almost entirely on two assertions: that Māori-specific institutions and funding streams are inherently protective of Māori wellbeing, and that scaling them back constitutes discrimination. Neither claim withstands scrutiny.
Disestablishing the Māori Health Authority did not remove healthcare from Māori. Māori remain fully entitled to publicly funded health services - exactly as all New Zealanders are. What changed was the rejection of a parallel bureaucracy organised by ethnicity rather than need. Universal provision is not racism; it is the foundation of a liberal democracy.
Likewise, funding reprioritisation is being misrepresented as “cuts to Māori”. The Government has not abolished Māori language, culture, education, or housing. It has questioned whether ring-fenced ethnic programmes - many with weak accountability and mixed outcomes - are the best way to improve results. Pointing to persistent disparities while defending decades of targeted spending is an argument against the status quo, not for it.
The invocation of the United Nations adds drama, not clarity. UN committees do not govern New Zealand, nor do they determine the constitutional meaning of Te Tiriti. Their reports are advisory, often informed by activist submissions, and routinely criticised for treating race-based policy as a human right rather than a political choice. New Zealand remains one of the world’s most generous funders of Indigenous programmes - by any objective measure.
Most telling is the repeated conflation of Treaty partnership with permanent political veto. Te Tiriti guaranteed equal rights under the Crown, not separate systems of governance indefinitely insulated from democratic review. Re-examining how the so-called Treaty principles (1974/1986-87*) are applied in law is not “erasure”; it is constitutional housekeeping long overdue.
New Zealand is not at a crossroads between justice and betrayal. It is navigating a necessary correction - away from race-based administration and toward equal citizenship, transparency, and outcomes that actually work.
Disagreement is not oppression. Accountability is not hostility. The Crown’s obligation is to govern for all New Zealanders - not to preserve separatist institutions.
* https://sites.google.com/site/treaty4dummies/home/treaty-principles
Geoff Parker is a passionate advocate for equal rights and a colour blind society.
Likewise, funding reprioritisation is being misrepresented as “cuts to Māori”. The Government has not abolished Māori language, culture, education, or housing. It has questioned whether ring-fenced ethnic programmes - many with weak accountability and mixed outcomes - are the best way to improve results. Pointing to persistent disparities while defending decades of targeted spending is an argument against the status quo, not for it.
The invocation of the United Nations adds drama, not clarity. UN committees do not govern New Zealand, nor do they determine the constitutional meaning of Te Tiriti. Their reports are advisory, often informed by activist submissions, and routinely criticised for treating race-based policy as a human right rather than a political choice. New Zealand remains one of the world’s most generous funders of Indigenous programmes - by any objective measure.
Most telling is the repeated conflation of Treaty partnership with permanent political veto. Te Tiriti guaranteed equal rights under the Crown, not separate systems of governance indefinitely insulated from democratic review. Re-examining how the so-called Treaty principles (1974/1986-87*) are applied in law is not “erasure”; it is constitutional housekeeping long overdue.
New Zealand is not at a crossroads between justice and betrayal. It is navigating a necessary correction - away from race-based administration and toward equal citizenship, transparency, and outcomes that actually work.
Disagreement is not oppression. Accountability is not hostility. The Crown’s obligation is to govern for all New Zealanders - not to preserve separatist institutions.
* https://sites.google.com/site/treaty4dummies/home/treaty-principles
Geoff Parker is a passionate advocate for equal rights and a colour blind society.
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