David Farrar: Industry bodies should not compel Treaty worship

Hobson’s Pledge report:

Janet is a dedicated real estate agent with more than 30 years experience, but the Real Estate Authority is threatening to cancel her licence for five years. Why? Because Janet is taking a principled stance in refusing to complete an online training course instructing real estate agents on te reo Māori, tikanga, and the Treaty of Waitangi.

Heather Du Plessis-Allan: Mandatory Culture Lessons at Real Estate Agents Was Wrong

The case of the real estate agent being forced to do a Māori culture and tikanga course or lose her job is a case of bad judgment by the Real Estate Authority.

Estate agents have to do courses to retain their licenses. 

10 hours of training a year... mostly they can pick which topics they do  

But a couple are compulsory for everyone.  

And one of them – there's only two compulsory - and one of them was the Māori culture and tikanga course.

Don Brash: The new government has one helluva a task in front of it: Compulsory indoctrination is unworthy of professional bodies

The other day, I became aware of another example of the way in which the last Government tried to embed its own narrow interpretation of the Treaty of Waitangi into every aspect of New Zealand life.

This one involves the Real Estate Authority. Like many similar bodies, it encourages its authorized agents to get regular updates about the laws and regulations affecting their profession. In this case, real estate agents are required to do 10 hours of study on a variety of issues, theoretically relevant to the real estate industry.