John Robertson: New Zealand’s Apartheid - Rebranded and Ready for the World

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to New Zealand 2.0: land of the long white cloud, kiwifruit, and apartheid. Oh, sorry, I mean co-governance. That’s the shiny, politically palatable term slapped on this grotesque social experiment where your rights depend on your bloodline, not your backbone. 

Once upon a time, Kiwis prided themselves on equality, unity, and fair play. But now? We’ve traded egalitarianism for a racial caste system that would make 1980s South Africa blush. The government’s genius idea? To divide a nation of five million into two camps: those with ancestral connections to a canoe and everyone else who has the misfortune of existing in the wrong lineage.

Damien Grant: The shaky claims and untested ideology underpinning Three Waters

I am not philosophically opposed to co-governance and I disagree with David Seymour’s campaign to have a referendum on the issue.

If Māori have a right to be treated as partners and are entitled under the Treaty to enjoy co-governance over an asset, then this right cannot be extinguished because the majority of non-Māori who make up the electorate declare it so.

Equally, if this right does not exist, then imposing it without obtaining the consent of those whose rights are being over-ridden is wrong.

When it comes to the Three Water reforms, it is subordinating the rights of ratepayers to the interests of local iwi, and doing so without consent or compensation.

Bob Edlin: Water and the co-governing numbers caper in which 68,000 Ngai Tahu might carry the same clout as 750,000 South Islanders

The news media hastened to air Ngai Tahu’s prompt rebuttal of Opposition leader Judith Collins claim that the Government would be giving the tribe an ownership stake in the South Island’s water and water assets.

It has not been so hasty to clearly explain the implications of what Ngai Tahu does want.

Collins referred to a document which – she said – meant South Island water services would be co-owned by Ngai Tahu and the Government.

Not so, was the prompt and tart rebuttal from the tribe and from central and local government leaders.

Co-governance maybe, co-ownership no.

But what does co-governance mean for the administrative structure?

At first blush, vital questions of democratic governance and accountability are raised.

Gerry Eckhoff: Fresh Water

On Waitangi Day next year the Prime Minister is to announce that the responsibility for the governance of fresh water in NZ will soon be a shared responsibility between appointed Iwi and elected Regional Councils. 

Currently, Regional Councils administer the fresh water resource through NZ. This single action will lead to the adulteration of the process of representative democracy within NZ.

After some years of consultation with high level Iwi leaders such as Sir Temu te Heuheu and Sir Mark Solomon, the Prime Minister will allow what he calls the rights and interests of Iwi in fresh water to go out for “public consultation”. This process will end where it starts -  with co governance of fresh water as already agreed to between Mr Key and representatives of Iwi. 

Mike Butler: Deeds, half-truths, water rights

Waters, rivers, lakes, and streams were included in the sale and purchase of the Upper Waikato on September 15, 1864, as well as trees, minerals, and all appertaining to the land or beneath the surface, according to the deed that is freely available on a Victoria University of Wellington website. Ownership of water is the latest “gimme” demanded by the New Zealand Maori Council and was at the root of the Maori legal challenge to the government's partial asset sale that was heard at the High Court in Wellington this week.

Justice Ronald Young reserved his decision, on Wednesday, on the challenge by the New Zealand Maori Council and Waikato River tribes at the end of a three-day hearing in the High Court in Wellington, saying he would have a ruling by Christmas. The Maori Council and river tribes argued partial privatisation of energy companies Mighty River Power, Meridian, Genesis Energy and Solid Energy would compromise Maori water interests and could affect Treaty of Waitangi claims.