David Farrar: Winding back Treaty references

Paul Goldsmith announced:

The Government has agreed to amend 19 pieces of legislation to ensure references to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi are clear and consistent, Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith says.

“Over the last 30 or 40 years, Parliament has made all sorts of references to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi. Sometimes it’s ‘honour’, or ‘have regard to’, or ‘give effect to’, or ‘take into account’. We need to create some consistency here, in the interests of increasing certainty and supporting compliance. A core foundation of our success as a nation is predictability in the law. …

Roger Partridge: Climate Clinic Aotearoa v Minister of Energy and Resources.....

The anatomy of usurpation: Climate Clinic Aotearoa v Minister of Energy and Resources

Imagine Parliament passes a Schools Act “to promote the establishment of schools for the benefit of New Zealand.” Parliament is careful. It specifies exactly what the Minister must consider before approving a new school: the operator’s financial capability, site safety, compliance history, and consultation with local iwi. There is no general discretion. There are no open-ended criteria.

A proposal comes before the Minister. She works through the statutory criteria. The operator is financially sound. The site is safe. The compliance history is clean. Local iwi have been consulted. She approves the school.

Peter Bassett: Effecting Treaty principles into immigration: When Footnotes Decide the Verdict

Modern activist legal writing has a sound of its own: the rustle of footnotes doing work they were never meant to do. Elizabeth Rabiyan’s essay claiming that New Zealand immigration law has “failed to give effect to Te Tiriti o Waitangi” is a near-perfect specimen.

Geoff Parker: Wai 1040 Isn’t History - It’s Politics Backdated

The Waitangi Tribunal’s Wai 1040 inquiry is presented as a long-overdue correction to New Zealand’s constitutional history. Its central claim is stark: that Māori never ceded sovereignty in 1840, and that the Crown has governed without legitimate authority ever since.

That claim may be influential in contemporary politics, but it does not withstand historical scrutiny.

Bob Edlin: Treaty principles, unelected Māori with voting rights and a letter of resignation....

Treaty principles, unelected Māori with voting rights and a letter of resignation – what would Mandela make of this?

PoO was somewhat bemused to learn that Napier mayor Richard McGrath’s executive assistant had quit her job, saying she could no longer work for him due to his “disregard for Treaty principles”.

According to Stuff:

Jenny Ruth: Open letter to Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith

Minister of Justice

P.Goldsmith@ministers.govt.nz

OPEN LETTER

Dear Mr Goldsmith

I’m writing to complain about my treatment, and the treatment of Helen Joyce, a former finance editor and international editor at The Economist, at the hands of the Human Rights Review Tribunal (HRRT).

Bob Edlin: High Court ruling in quarry case calls for consenting panels to apply “a Treaty lens”....

High Court ruling in quarry case calls for consenting panels to apply “a Treaty lens” and be careful to consider iwi CAARs

On the Breaking Views blog today, Steven Gaskell draws attention to the Waitangi Tribunal’s decision that the Government’s review of Treaty clauses in 23 laws is a breach of the Treaty itself.

According to Gaskell, the tribunal is saying nobody may tamper with “the sacred text” – or rather, “the sacred principles of a text that never actually mentioned any principles in the first place”.

Judy Gill: Teaching Children to Think — or Teaching Them What to Think?

New Zealand: Indoctrination in the Classroom

From early childhood onwards, New Zealand children are not being taught to question. They are being taught to accept.

Three powerful narratives dominate their schooling:

Centrist: Draft code tells councils to share power with iwi

“Open to working with mana whenua partners in the design and delivery of their work programmes.”

A new draft Code of Conduct would require every councillor in New Zealand to respect Treaty principles, including a duty to work with mana whenua “in the design and delivery” of council programmes.

Critics say it quietly forces co-governance through the back door.

John McLean: Aoteainertia

New Zealand is not in the swim. It’s swimmy, barely able to tread water. The Second Law of Thermodynamics has cuckooed the once-plucky and productive settler nest of New Zealand. Entropy is endemic. There’s little but directionless disorder.

New Zealand is in desperate need of abundant, well-directed energy, both electrical and psychological.

JC: Where Are the Principles in the Treaty?

It’s a good question because the answer is, as Winston Peters says, there aren’t any. There are only articles. Three of them. Principles have a very different meaning to articles when it comes to official documents and treaties. As far as I can conclude, the principles were introduced in the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975. They are also embedded in the minds of activists to try and back up their false narrative that the Treaty has obligations that have to be fulfilled in areas where it clearly doesn’t.

Insights From Social Media

Brian Kennedy writes > WHY a karakia to open a new highway ?

WHY Stone Age Maori myth, beliefs, customs and voodoo witchcraft ?

WHY not a blessing by a Catholic priest or an Anglican vicar ?

What extra special relevance do our part-maori citizens have to a new highway ?

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?

Natasha Hamilton-Hart: Design principles for constitutional hijack......

Design principles for constitutional hijack – or how we got those Treaty principles in the first place

The ‘principles of the Treaty of Waitangi/te Tiriti o Waitangi’ have arrived on the political stage. A smallish political party has got a bill before parliament in an attempt to define the principles. Opponents pushed back with street protests, mostly hostile media coverage and parliamentary theatre. The message from opponents is loud and clear: the Treaty principles are untouchable by ordinary citizens.

Professor Robert MacCulloch: Mr Prime Minister: Lead, Goddammit.....

Mr Prime Minister: Lead, Goddammit. Address the Nation in this time of Crisis. Tell us: Are there Treaty Principles? If so, are they part of NZ's Constitution?

An extraordinary exchange took place on The Platform Radio Station between host Sean Plunket and Deputy PM Winston Peters, who said there's no such thing as Treaty Principles. However, Labour and Greens not only believe there are Principles, but they form part of the "constitutional framework of this nation", to quote MP Willie Jackson. As for NZ's legal profession, it has entered the political fray, in the form of the Kings Counsels, siding with Labour.

Professor Robert MacCulloch: Dame Whina Cooper's hīkoi was for change.....

Dame Whina Cooper's hīkoi was for change. This week's hīkoi was for keeping the status quo, the opposite of what the NZ Herald claims.

Today the NZ Herald's front page headline blared, "Hīkoi to Parliament: Tens of thousands energized for change after protest against Treaty Principles Bill .. The time for change is here". How Orwellian. This week's march was a march for the status quo. Its a protest against ACT's Treaty Principles Bill, which seeks to define in legislation what are those principles.

Dr Michael John Schmidt: Māori privilege and media paradox.

It’s ironic that TV1, RNZ, and similar media outlets so strongly support the current hīkoi process opposing David Seymour’s call for a discussion of the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi – so much for the impartial and investigative press. These mainstream media organisations face severe economic challenges: TV1 lost $85 million in 2023, and RNZ lost $1.4 million.(1, 2) Meanwhile, the Māori groups they champion are thriving, despite these groups portraying themselves as marginalised, disadvantaged and at risk of ‘losing rights’.

Aaron Spencer: The problem with Principles

“All this turmoil, because of a single word?” This may be the bemused reaction of some future scholar engaged in reviewing the course of New Zealand history as it occurred in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The word in question being, of course, ‘principles’.

Or, to be specific; ‘Principles’ - with a capital P.

Gary Judd KC: Treaty is a bald agreement, anchored in its time and place

What [democratic government] cannot do is acknowledge the existence of a separate sovereignty. As soon as it does that, it isn’t a democracy. We can have a democratic form of government or we can have indigenous sovereignty. They can’t coexist and we can’t have them both….

The treaty itself contains no principles which can usefully guide government or courts.

The Helen Clark government took office 10 November 1999 with Clark as Prime Minister and Michael Cullen as Minister of Finance.

Gary Judd: Where Are the Treaty Principles Written Down?

Gary Judd KC clarifies the situation around the ‘treaty principles’ to Sean Plunket on The Platform - a must listen video

Click to view video