This is the heading on a press statement issued by Lady Tureiti Moxon referring to the Government’s decision to change the wording in the Pae Ora (Healthy Futures) Act from “give effect to” Te Tiriti principles to merely “take into account” those principles.
She claims this “weakens Treaty obligations in health legislation” and represents “the total annihilation of te Tiriti in the health system”.
What on Earth is she talking about?
The press statement went on to suggest that the change in wording in legislation “will lead to avoidable suffering and preventable early death for Maori who already die seven years earlier than any other cohort in the population”.
“It is not an abstract constitutional debate”, she said. “It is about whether Maori live longer, healthier lives or whether governments continue making decisions that knowingly harm our people”.
This is an outrageous statement, and were I the Minister of Health I would be tempted to sue her for implying that the Government is, or will be after the wording change, “[continuing to make] decisions that knowingly harm our people”.
Of course, there is absolutely no reason why health legislation should refer to the Treaty, or te Tiriti, at all. It is a modern fashion.
The Treaty, whether in English or in te reo Maori, is an extremely simple document: it involved the chiefs agreeing to cede sovereignty to the Queen in perpetuity; in return, the chiefs were guaranteed the continued ownership of all their property; and all New Zealanders were to have equal rights.
In New Zealand, we don’t have a written constitution but those basic principles remain central to our unwritten constitution. The Queen, or now the King, is our Head of State; we all have the right to own property (although the state has steadily qualified that right for all New Zealanders, Maori and non-Maori); and we are equal under the law.
There is absolutely no need to “give effect to” or “take into account” the Treaty in either language, or in any legislation, except perhaps to assert that all New Zealanders, no matter when they or their ancestors arrived on these shores, have equal rights.
Yes, on average Maori life expectancy is a little short of the average life expectancy of European New Zealanders, though it is vastly better than it was in 1840, and the gap is no doubt largely explained by life style choices around smoking and diet.
The life expectancy of Asian New Zealanders is a couple of years longer than that of other New Zealanders, and nobody is seriously suggesting that that is because the New Zealand state discriminates in favour of Asians.
The Government is absolutely right to look carefully at references to the Treaty of Waitangi in legislation, and in my view most of those references should be removed entirely.
But we would all be better off if we had an agreed understanding of what the Treaty actually provided, and for that reason it was a tragedy that Parliament threw out, without any serious consideration, the Treaty Principles Bill promoted by the ACT Party.
At some point, we will need to agree what the Treaty meant, and what it did not mean. Until we have agreed that, we will endlessly be debating rather silly arguments of the kind advanced by Lady Moxon.
And it will become more and more meaningless as we continue to marry across ethnic lines. Lady Moxon’s mother was Margaret Hawkins, so it is at least possible that Lady Moxon herself has both Maori and European ancestors.
“It is not an abstract constitutional debate”, she said. “It is about whether Maori live longer, healthier lives or whether governments continue making decisions that knowingly harm our people”.
This is an outrageous statement, and were I the Minister of Health I would be tempted to sue her for implying that the Government is, or will be after the wording change, “[continuing to make] decisions that knowingly harm our people”.
Of course, there is absolutely no reason why health legislation should refer to the Treaty, or te Tiriti, at all. It is a modern fashion.
The Treaty, whether in English or in te reo Maori, is an extremely simple document: it involved the chiefs agreeing to cede sovereignty to the Queen in perpetuity; in return, the chiefs were guaranteed the continued ownership of all their property; and all New Zealanders were to have equal rights.
In New Zealand, we don’t have a written constitution but those basic principles remain central to our unwritten constitution. The Queen, or now the King, is our Head of State; we all have the right to own property (although the state has steadily qualified that right for all New Zealanders, Maori and non-Maori); and we are equal under the law.
There is absolutely no need to “give effect to” or “take into account” the Treaty in either language, or in any legislation, except perhaps to assert that all New Zealanders, no matter when they or their ancestors arrived on these shores, have equal rights.
Yes, on average Maori life expectancy is a little short of the average life expectancy of European New Zealanders, though it is vastly better than it was in 1840, and the gap is no doubt largely explained by life style choices around smoking and diet.
The life expectancy of Asian New Zealanders is a couple of years longer than that of other New Zealanders, and nobody is seriously suggesting that that is because the New Zealand state discriminates in favour of Asians.
The Government is absolutely right to look carefully at references to the Treaty of Waitangi in legislation, and in my view most of those references should be removed entirely.
But we would all be better off if we had an agreed understanding of what the Treaty actually provided, and for that reason it was a tragedy that Parliament threw out, without any serious consideration, the Treaty Principles Bill promoted by the ACT Party.
At some point, we will need to agree what the Treaty meant, and what it did not mean. Until we have agreed that, we will endlessly be debating rather silly arguments of the kind advanced by Lady Moxon.
And it will become more and more meaningless as we continue to marry across ethnic lines. Lady Moxon’s mother was Margaret Hawkins, so it is at least possible that Lady Moxon herself has both Maori and European ancestors.
Dr Don Brash, Former Governor of the Reserve Bank and Leader of the New Zealand National Party from 2003 to 2006 and ACT in 2011. This article was sourced HERE
15 comments:
Don, you are absolutely right, it was a very big mistake this govt did not consider the treaty principles bill. I think a tragedy.
This issue is costing the country billions of dollars in wasted time and effort and it achieves absolutely NOTHING. I say again NOTHING
Long overdue to sort it out, Its clear national either are scared of the subject or believe it is not a serious problem. Perhaps a bit of both, but if they bothered to talk to normal NZers Im sure they will find it is a big issue that concerns most of us.
And yes, most definitely a lawsuit is in order, that might get them to tone things down a little
Has Don started saying the quiet part loud - “marry across ethnic lines”?? This guy isn’t talking like any kind of New Zealander I know.
I want someone to tell me what " [govt] decisions ... knowingly harm [Maori]."
It's not the govt's fault that so many Maoris CHOOSE (a word marxofascists deny as their conceptual framework is based on all problems of group A being caused by 'oppression' by group B) a lifestyle that leads to early morbidity and death. Now, let's have some EVIDENCE (a decidedly non-woke word) for this damning assertion accusing us as it does of genocidal policies and practices. This is serious! PUT UP OR SHUT UP!
Who is Barend’s ask directed at? We need to get them here
Yelling is a weak substitute for reasoned debate. We learnt that in high school.
I was quoting Tureiti Moxon (see para 5 in the article).
Come on ACT Party , reinforce the public view that when National scuttled the Treaty Principles Bill , National disenfranchised themselves from serious public support.
NZ needs the Coalition , but NZ does not need this Maori interruption by misinformed comment and disinformation aimed at division of NZ.
To Prime Minister Luxon , reallocate some parliamentary time for the Treaty Principles Bill retrospective second reading or extend a session to debate the Bill or just plainly state he was wrong and the NZ nation needed the certainty of the principles passed by Parliament .
I believe all debate about the closeness of the 2026 election would evaporate and a surge of support for the coalition would usurp all left wing negativity.
Dr Brash is correct. Both “give effect to” and “take into account” are a foot in the door and yet another incremental step to Maori sovereignty. The whole lot needs to be removed and not just tinkered with. I look forward to that as a promise in the runup to the election.
I jest, of course. They will continue to feed us ambiguous promises and manipulate us as they did at the last election, because we have nowhere else to go. Irrespective of who you vote for, you will get the same result. It's a setup and a scam, called democracy.
It looks like, over just a few decades, that the rotting parchment of ‘The Treaty’ has somehow been converted, through some mysterious Maori magic, into a very long and seriously strong crowbar, now being used to lever out all sorts of entirely unjustified special benefits for some ‘elite’ part-Maori special groups. If our present govt does not rapidly recover from its semi-comatose state and confiscate the crowbar, an electoral hammer will surely be the weapon the rest of us will deploy in just a few months.
With all that is happening in British based Commonwealth Countries (now), that when they were established, that The Rule of Law would be based on - Westminster Govt (as had prevailed from the year "dot") and that Laws established therein, would be based on British Law (with adaption) and that "fore lock tugging" would be to the 'person' who sat upon the Royal Throne, that those Commonwealth Countries "bowed before", sought visitations by/from and accepted Royal Honours as bestowed - Now wish that they had sat and created a "Constitution for their respective Countries, that may have "fore stalled" problems in the forth coming Years.
Me thinks, if YES, then NZ would not be facing 'the back lash" from radical Maori, whose 'claims' are not based on fact but more on fiction, which has Maori Taonga & Mythical being as part of that 'folk lore'.
What Lady Moxon needs to "remember", that prior to the 7th February 1840 - that medicine in the Maori domain would have been tribal and that following this date they would have seen the establishment of "white man" medicine, that over the pursuing years they would have been able to access (except for those who stilled believed in Tribal Mythology on medicine) - thus prolonging theirs lives, with exception to those who took to smoking the "white man" magic stick (ciggies) which thus curtailed their longevity.
Oh and to the "many" you would be surprised just how many times, in modern days, that Maori have 'abused' the privilege on modern medicine - just ask any nurse who worked in a Hospital from the 1960's on.
Just like America (and UK) what we see "leaving a University" is not the son or daughter that went in, they when they leave - are more radicalized - this includes those from Maoridom - who have been taught that what they thought, is not what they want, thus they must pursue their real needs at the expense of anyone/everyone else, and also at that person's financial expense.
"We don't mind, you don't matter".
I can't help wondering how many lives Western medicine in 1840 saved or prolonged. This was before Semmelweis - surgeons used to go from patient to patient without washing their hands in between. It was a time when heavy metals in both elemental and ionic form (mercury, lead, arsenic) featured heavily in prescriptions. The decline in death rates from the mid-18thC had a great deal more to do with sanitation than with medicine.
I would question the reliability of the stats based on ethnic self determination. People can say they want about their ethnicity and change it anytime. The rate of increase in life expectancy is highest for MÄori in the last 20 years. Is this because they have better lives (contrary to what we hear all the time) or is it the diminishing proportion of MÄori blood in people who identify as such?
Barend, agree completely.
The improvement in sanitation referred to above did indeed save lives but it came about because of an understanding of how disease was caused and transmitted and that was a medical advance.
Hm, Anon 1259, it was not until the late 19thC that the cause and transmission of disease were understood. The favourite causes of illness were imbalances of the 'humours' (the 4 essential body fluids) and 'miasmas' - vapours that brought about illness.
In Dutch, malaria was, until historically recently, called "moerasziekte" - "swamp disease". It's not that far off the mark but they overlooked the role of mosquitoes :-))
It took the Germ Theory and Pasteur to bring about a true understanding of the mechanisms of disease.
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