Bob Edlin: Sovereignty and The Treaty.....

.....the Maori Party aims to nobble Parliament while ACT wants to rid NZ of the Waitangi Tribunal

The Māori Party intends undermining the sovereignty of Parliament – if it can muster the support to implement such a policy – by establishing a “Tiriti Commission” empowered to stall or challenge Government policies and bills presented to Parliament.

Furthermore, it would establish a $220 million fund for “Māori-led constitutional transformation” discussions and working groups.

Dr Michael Bassett: The Treaty or Te Tiriti? It Matters.....

If you are watching the bizarre goings on at Waitangi, keep an eye out for which politicians use the term “The Treaty”, and which refer to what was signed on 6 February 1840 as “Te Tiriti”. The Treaty is the term that was used originally, and it described a three-clause document that ceded sovereignty over New Zealand for ever to Queen Victoria. In return, the Queen guaranteed Maori chiefs control over their lands and “taonga”, and in the third clause guaranteed Maori the same “rights and duties” as were enjoyed at that time by Englishmen. The Treaty of Waitangi is the name by which the document was known for more than 150 years.

Dr Michael Bassett: Chris Bishop and Simon Watts are correct

When I first heard of their plans to do away with regional councils and replace them with boards of mayors I thought the timing rather odd. After all, we have just had local elections, and telling the newly-elected they are redundant seemed needlessly insulting. But it quickly became clear that these were proposals, and not some sort of ministerial coup d’etat. Chris Bishop and Simon Watts seem to be proposing to use the next three years to fine-tune their ideas. The goal is laudable: to remove an expensive layer of authority from local government that is no longer necessary, thereby reducing costs for ratepayers.

Dr Michael Bassett: Whose Auckland Festival

As I was looking over the programme for next March’s Auckland Arts Festival I was struck by the large number of events with a Maori theme. Open the cover and the introduction is headed Toitu Te Reo with a large piece of text in Maori. Then Ihi. Wehi. Mana featuring a group of Maori adorned with stick-on chin tattoos. Then He Manu Tioriori follows with a further long burst in Te Reo. Then ONO with Moana & the Tribe, featuring another column of Te Reo. And there’s a “free” Whanau Day for the citizens of Tamaki Makaurau!

Dr Michael Bassett: Labour's smart alecky CGT

At first sight, Labour’s Capital Gains Tax looks like the CGT you have when you don’t have one. So many exemptions, so slow to appear, such a fuss and bother setting up the taxation mechanism, and producing so little revenue, you wonder why bother at all.

Dr Michael Bassett: Duplicity in the modern world

We have entered a new world where few things are on the level. Nowhere is this more obvious than in Dictatorland. Vladimir Putin’s forces brazenly invaded Ukraine in 2022, breaking a vital stipulation in the United Nations Charter to which Russia signed up at the end of World War Two. It specifies that no sovereign state shall invade another. In 2022 Putin knew that Russia’s veto at the UN would prevent any united action against Russia so long as his delegates weren’t temporarily absent from the Security Council, as they had been in 1950 when North Korea invaded South Korea, thus triggering the Korean War.

Dr Michael Bassett: Our lack-lustre mainstream media

Have you noticed the growing irritation with our mainstream media? Last week Radio NZ was under scrutiny with suggestions it was biased, and statistics showed its listeners were departing in droves. TV3’s main news announcer has been doubling as the weather girl, albeit after a quick change of costume. While its news during weekdays is as good, or bad as ever, it becomes almost non-existent at the weekends. TV One lumbers on, anchored by the redoubtable Simon Dallow, but rumours circulate about his possible departure.

Dr Michael Bassett: Wellington - What's wrong with it?

On Monday 28 July there was a strange story in the New Zealand Herald about advice that had been given to the Attorney-General, Judith Collins, by her officers. They had told their minister that the Justice minister’s intended changes to the electoral legislation banning enrolment during the 13 days before an election when early voting gets underway, breaches the Bill of Rights Act. Weird! Most particularly because it tells us that whoever gave that advice to the Minister clearly had little or no knowledge of the history of the rules that cover enrolment and voting in New Zealand.

Dr Michael Bassett: Much hangs on how you vote on 12th October

Only a little more than two months to go until local body elections. Always, triennially, on the second Saturday in October. And there is so much hanging on the outcome this time. As voters, we need to hold existing councillors and their would-be successors to account on a range of issues. Rates of course, which these days seem always to run ahead of inflation, are the key issue. Extra slow completion of council work projects meaning endless orange cones, is another. Extravagant decisions which too many councils have already made, or are planning to make, need to be questioned. Too many people are saying they feel alienated from their local councils and won’t vote. This is dangerous. All candidates should be cross-questioned. It’s that time when we get the one chance in every three years to say truth to power: LISTEN TO US!

Dr Michael Bassett: Poverty - The modern man-made monster

Are you, like me, getting sick and tired of the endless stories in the Mainstream Media about poverty, with self-appointed “experts” arguing for more money to be spent on the problems they describe? They show no signs of understanding the serious nature of the country’s fiscal deficit. Worse, the journalists reporting these “experts” fail to examine the fact that many of the complainants they quote simply farm the poor and rely on their continued existence for their own personal incomes.

Dr Michael Bassett: Maori Party thumbs its nose at Democracy

Have you noticed how contemptuous the Maori Party’s MPs are of democracy? After all, people who self-designate themselves as Maori are only 17% of the population. And amongst them, only a small proportion vote for the Maori Party. The brutal reality is that much higher numbers of Maori support Labour, while the Greens, Act, New Zealand First and National also had many Maori supporters at the last election.

Dr Michael Bassett: Te Partly Maori vs Commensense

These days, when reading statements from Te Partly Maori it’s often hard to trust one’s eyesight. A few days ago, Hana-Rawhiti Maipi Clarke who faces suspension from the House for participating in the haka against David Seymour in opposition to his Treaty Principles Bill, was reported to be proposing legislation that would require MPs to learn about the Treaty and uphold its principles. What’s that again? Uphold its principles? She had a chance earlier in the year, but she ripped up her fellow Maori Seymour’s Bill rather than contribute to the debate, or make submissions on it. But TPM dances to its own music, and only its own, it seems. Why won’t she tell us what she has been reading that led her to disagree with Seymour? And, why won’t she and her colleagues engage in activities that really could improve Maori lives?

Dr Michael Bassett: Make your local elections meaningful

Now that candidates are gearing up to contest the coming local elections on 11 October, it’s time to ask them serious questions before you vote. The cost of local government has been rising steeply; ratepayers are being treated like milch cows. What are the candidates prepared to do to control costs? In particular, are they prepared to run a slide rule over staff numbers at the council they are standing for? Are they sure that they couldn’t make the council work with fewer employees who, collectively, are the greatest cost every council has to carry? If they aren’t prepared to do that, then threaten not to vote for them.

Dr Michael Bassett: Wish-Lists and reality

Every day our mainstream media carry claims for extra government money for a variety of causes. The journalists reporting them show little interest in analysing the worthiness of the demands. Many are distressingly self-serving such as calls for higher wages, more holidays, or expensive personal health care.

Dr Michael Bassett: Academic arrogance

In Newsroom on 6 March Dame Anne Salmond made a fool of herself when she lectured Richard Prebble about the two versions of the Treaty of Waitangi. She grandly informed him that Maori signed the version written in Maori, and proceeded to give us her take on what those words meant when translated into English.

Dr Michael Bassett: Maori, welfare and tikanga

If you are like me and constantly surprised by what constitutes tikanga, you might have noticed an article in the weekend papers about a Maori woman “with limited means”, separated from her late husband, who sought funeral costs from the taxpayer to cover the costs of his funeral. The Ministry of Social Development agreed to pay for the casket and expenses involved in getting it to the burial ground. However, it drew the line at paying another $1,026 towards food for the mourners.

Dr Michael Bassett: Reforming the Waitangi Tribunal

So loud are the squeals from the likes of Debbie Ngarewa-Packer against the new appointments to the Waitangi Tribunal that I can only assume that Minister Tama Potaka has got things right. And that the new members are likely to shake the organisation into some sort of compliance with its mission that was set out in legislation fifty years ago. Decades of misbehaviour since the Tribunal was established in 1975 where a series of leaders have allowed the organisation to become a state-funded plaything for Maori radicals will hopefully come to an end. With luck, the minister will go a step further and trim the Tribunal’s legislation so that it doesn’t slip back into the manifold sins of recent years.

Dr Michael Bassett: Waitangi Day Looms

Spare a thought for what our national day was meant to be, compared with what it has become. Before 1973 a small ceremony took place at Waitangi each 6 February to commemorate the signing of the Treaty. Only Northland had a holiday. Then Norman Kirk promised during the 1972 election campaign to establish a national holiday. The New Zealand Day Act passed through Parliament the following year. Kirk was adamant that henceforth the day should be called New Zealand Day. It was for all New Zealanders to celebrate our different identities and a sense of nationhood that brought us together. It was to be a day for everyone, irrespective of race or cultural background.

Guest Post: Maori Party threats

A copy of the following letter was forwarded to Michael Bassett. Deputy PM, Winston Peters has also tweeted a copy of the letter saying:

"It seems the Maori Party have sent this letter to all companies who have applied for fast track consideration.

If true, they have shown what extremist economic morons they are and how little they value the future of our country.

Dr Michael Bassett: Beware of 'Te Tiriti' nonsense.

Last week there was a TV interview with a lawyer called Roimata Smail and someone from The Women’s Bookshop. The gist of the TV story was that together they were circulating to all schools a small booklet called “Understanding Te Tiriti: A Handbook of basic facts about Te Tiriti o Waitangi”. The booklet confirms what any knowledgeable person should know by now: anything that uses the term “Te Tiriti” is likely to be bullshit, pure and unadulterated. It’s the recently manufactured version of the Treaty of Waitangi, not the one that was actually signed in 1840.