Everything you missed from day five of the Treaty principles bill hearings, when the Justice Committee heard eight hours of submissions.
Read our recaps of the previous hearings here.
It was another work from home day for the Justice Committee, the only people in Room 3 being security guards, committee technicians and a lowly Spinoff reporter. Many submissions heard today were by individual submitters, with fewer big names than in the first four hearings. First up was Moko Tepania, Far North mayor, and Babe Kapa, the district’s Māori ward councillor, who submitted against the bill on behalf of the council.
Tepania said the bill “absolutely sabotaged” relationships between the council and iwi and would pit iwi and hapū against each other, with more mana given to group who have made Treaty settlements over those who haven’t, which will have a negative knock-on effect for economic growth in the region. “We’ll always be the poor little cousin in the Far North,” Tepania said.
Poata Watene of Tuu Oho Mai Services, a Waikato kaupapa Māori family violence specialist service, said te Tiriti was “fundamental” to ensuring their service provided meaningful care and pathways out of violence through tino rangatiratanga and mana motuhake. The Māori Women’s Welfare League’s Hope Tupara also submitted against, saying the bill was driven by personal ideology. “This is akin to getting a two-for-one deal,” she said – one bill to encompass two different Treaties.
“Nice to be here – not really,” was how Hilda Halkyard-Harawira opened her submission against the bill for kura kaupapa support group Te Wānanga o Te Rangi Āniwaniwa. “My friends and I have been saying the same thing for years – we just want to be Māori in our daily lives,” she said. “Our culture is simple and complex, but it’s also our strength.” She agreed Māori do receive different treatment compared to tauiwi – “it’s called racism”.
Craig Nisbet, owner of housing developer Cohasset Group, spoke in favour of the bill, saying he had many Māori friends who also backed the bill and cited issues with resource consent as a motivator for his support. His submission was followed by Daniel Proctor (Ngāi Tāmanuhiri, Ngāti Uepohatu, and Ngāti Porou) of Te Kōhanga Reo National Trust, who said the bill would continue a “shameless colonial legacy of assimilation”.
Palmerston North city councillor Brent Barrett criticised the bill as a “gross abuse of power” which is “more akin to betrayal and treason than to any legitimate legislative process”. Barrett called for an apology to Māori and King Charles (for “overreach[ing] and demean[ing] the monarch’s legacy”), as well as a statement from the prime minister to acknowledge the bill was “too high a price to pay” for political leadership.
Reality Check Radio’s Peter Williams supported the bill, saying it was up to voters and electors to define what the principles of the Treaty were. Justice Committee member and Te Pāti Māori MP Tākuta Ferris shook his head when Williams called himself “tangata whenua”, and told Williams he was representative of the “massive knowledge gap” about the Treaty.
The Public Service Association’s Te Whatu Ora reps Virgil Iraia, Diana Mancer and Allan Francis spoke against the bill, which Mancer said would be a “step back” for health equity. Francis said the bill diminished the tino rangatiratanga guaranteed to Māori in te Tiriti, which would undo progress being made in the sector to address disproportionate health outcomes for Māori.
People for Palestine spokesperson Yasmine Serhan highlighted the little-known “fourth article” of te Tiriti – the promise of religious freedom that William Hobson gave to rangatira at the first Treaty signing – as a key protection for Muslim New Zealanders. She said the bill was an attempt to “force assimilation of Maori and erase their ethnic identity, just as Zionists tried to do to us as Palestinian people”.
Ripeka Lessels and Beverly Te Huia, in two separate submissions, both approached tears as they spoke about their mothers being beaten at school for speaking te reo Māori. Rob Smith and Simon O’Neill, also in two separate submissions, both argued against the bill because “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”.
Former Green MP Catherine Delahunty highlighted the word “tino”, which is commonly translated as “absolute”. The text of te Tiriti promises Māori tino rangatiratanga (absolute chieftainship) but only promises the Crown kawanatanga (governance), not tino kawanatanga (absolute governance). “It’s a limited governance that was allowed,” she said.
Sir Collin Tukuitonga, speaking for the New Zealand College of Public Health Medicine, said the bill was “a flawed solution to a problem that doesn’t exist” and “misrepresents and distorts the articles of the Treaty”.
Ngā Maia Trust’s Crete Cherrington made her presence known. “Ngā Maia has come before you to put a pou in the ground and say ‘stop the madness’.” She drew on her years as a midwife in Te Tai Tokerau where she had seen first-hand declines in Māori health. “The persistent inequity is unacceptable,” she said.
John Perham complained that Māori “were “degrading modern Pākehā as unwelcome invaders”, claiming they were aiming to take control over parliament and reign exclusively over New Zealand by 2040. As he concluded his speech, chair Duncan Webb informed him they had no time for questions. Rawiri Waititi chimed in: “What a pity. Get well soon John.” Another supporter of the bill, John Porter, said New Zealand was split into two halves, and “one of the halves believes they hold a separate status and an elevated status based on ancestry”.
The day’s final submitter, Hineātea Alexander, offered two possible future scenarios for Aotearoa. The first was one of “fear-mongering and division that will further break down the diverse communities I am a part of… in this situation, we all lose”. The second scenario was one “where people in positions of power have strengthened the role te Tiriti in decision-making to ensure a positive and inclusive future for every single person living in Aotearoa”.