By Chris Trotter*
When the United Kingdom next goes to the polls, the Scottish National Party (SNP) will struggle to retain office. Currently, the Labour Party has a better-than-even chance of reclaiming its crown as Scotland’s electoral darling. After 17 years as the dominant force in Scottish politics, the SNP is running neck-and-neck with Labour. The reason: it allowed itself to get seriously out of step with its voters.
The Scots are a well-educated and progressive people, but they drew the line at backing a premier, and a party, that saw nothing wrong with incarcerating a convicted rapist in Cornton Vale women’s prison on the grounds that she had subsequently self-identified as a woman.
Though the Premier, Nicola Sturgeon, responding to public outrage, removed the rapist, Isla Bryson, from Cornton Vale, the damage was done. According to The Guardian, Sturgeon’s predecessor (and political mentor) Alex Salmond accused her of “throwing away” the hope of Scottish independence (the SNP’s raison d’être) for the sake of controversial gender recognition reforms.
Things went from bad to worse for the SNP when, following Sturgeon’s resignation, she and her husband became the focus of a police investigation, and the SNP membership opted to reject the socially conservative candidate for Premier, Kate Forbes, in favour of the woke Humza Yousaf.
One instance of challenging the voters’ values might be forgiven – but two? It may, or may not, be relevant that the SNP’s fall from grace occurred while it was in coalition with the Scottish Greens.
Why allow a party currently polling at around 2-3 percent push you into backing reforms that most voters do not support? Why risk incurring the wrath of the electorate by allowing the perception to grow that the tail is wagging the dog? These questions are not restricted to the Scottish situation. There are people here in New Zealand asking very similar questions in relation to Act’s Treaty Principles Bill.
Not the least of these inquirers is Dame Anne Salmond who, in an uncharacteristically tetchy post for the Newsroom website, observes: “The process surrounding the Treaty Principles bill is a farce. With 8.6 percent of the vote at the last election, Act has no democratic mandate to advance a referendum on Te Tiriti.”
A perplexing observation which, on its face, suggests that even to “advance” the idea of a referendum (to resolve an otherwise irresolvable public issue) a political party must first secure 50 percent +1 of the Party Vote.
As that National Party gadfly, Liam Hehir, observed on X (formerly Twitter) :
“Does Dame Anne Salmond have self-awareness enough to realise she is arguing against MMP and in favour of FPP? Is there an acknowledgement that you can’t construct a system where the Greens and TPM are allowed to ‘distort’ things but NZF and ACT are not?”
We shall come back to Hehir’s question presently. But, before we do, the pithy response of lawyer, and go-to guy on electoral matters, Graeme Edgeler, to Dame Anne’s commentary is worth citing:
“It seems like Anne Salmond is proposing a 15% threshold for MMP?”
Why 15 percent? Because, ever since the introduction of MMP 28 years ago, no minor party has ever secured more than 13.35 percent of the Party Vote (NZ First in 1996.) Hence Hehir’s quip about Dame Anne calling for the reintroduction of the First-Past-The-Post electoral system.
But, a return to the old system would not resolve the problem that lies at the heart of Dame Anne’s rather intemperate post. This, stripped of all its distracting rhetoric, boils down to one, key, question: how does one prevent the wrong sort of people, by which, presumably, Dame Anne means “right-wing” sort of people, from gaining access to the most important platform in the land – the House of Representatives?
The answer, as Hehir points out in his tweet, is that you can’t – not without abandoning democracy altogether. If left-wing voters, and Dames, are willing to accept the right of a party receiving 11.6 percent of the Party Vote, let alone one attracting just 3.08 percent, to materially shape the policy agenda of a Labour-led coalition government, then they must also accept the reality of Act and NZ First shaping the policy agenda of Christopher Luxon’s National Party-led coalition.
The problem is: “abandoning democracy” is exactly what a growing proportion of what passes for the Left in 2024 wants to do. Only by getting rid of democracy’s open-ended promises can the “correct” ideas be assured of winning through. Hence, the woke majority of the SNP membership’s refusal to acknowledge that the gender recognition reforms that they and the Scottish Greens were advancing would only end up sending a majority of Scottish voters in the direction of less radical electoral alternatives.
We see the same ideological intransigence at work within the American Left. The radical wing of the Democratic Party simply refuses to accept that a clear majority of Americans have grown alarmed and dismayed at the number of migrants making their way into the United States. No matter how damaging their opposition to closing the US-Mexican border might be to the Democratic Party’s electoral fortunes: no matter how many voters the Left’s uncompromising zealotry is driving into the wide-open arms of Donald Trump; their position is correct – and must prevail.
That same unshakable conviction that they are right, and must prevail, is especially evident in the New Zealand Left’s insistence that the Treaty principles identified by Te Iwi Māori, the Waitangi Tribunal, the Judiciary, the Public Service and Academia are the only ones that count. That a majority of the population might feel uncomfortable with the current, “official”, interpretation of te Tiriti simply does not signify. Under no circumstances can the ill-informed views of poorly-educated New Zealanders be permitted to decide the issue.
Hence the demands from left-wing (and even some right-wing) political commentators for Luxon and the National Party to put their feet down and insist that the Treaty Principles Bill not proceed. Presumably, they are of the view that Act’s David Seymour, and NZ First’s Winston Peters, lack the grit to challenge Luxon. Such people are guilty of, to paraphrase J.R.R. Tolkien, weighing all things to a nicety in the scales of their own malice. They forget that the Right, no less than the “Left”, can, at need, be impressively intransigent.
The opponents of the Treaty Principles Bill are also guilty of forgetting just how adroit a parliamentarian Seymour has already proved himself to be. His End of Life Choice legislation – the ultimate success of which few predicted at the time of the bill’s introduction – is now the law of the land.
Nor should it be assumed that it is only Act’s 8.6 percent of the electorate that are committed to seeing his bill proceed all the way to a referendum. In Saturday’s (27/1/24) edition of the NZ Herald a group calling itself “Democracy Action” inserted a full-page advertisement headed “We Stand With You”, which urged Luxon, Peters and Seymour to be steadfast in the defence of both their electoral mandate and the democratic process. Formed by Aucklanders Lee and Susan Short, Democracy Action has long had the official interpretation of Te Tiriti o Waitangi in its sights. The wealthy couple insist they are not alone.
Nicola Sturgeon and the SDP discovered, to their cost, just how high the price of not keeping faith with one’s voters can be. The Coalition Government would be wise to learn from the Left’s mistakes. The most obvious of which is its truly bizarre belief that intransigent minorities will not be electorally punished for spitting the face of the majority.
*Chris Trotter has been writing and commenting professionally about New Zealand politics for more than 30 years. He writes a weekly column for interest.co.nz. His work may also be found at http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com.
84 Comments
Pretty sure if you held a referendum tomorrow, the vote would be to put an end to the treaty and move forward. Should have been done back in 2000, I seem to remember there was an attempt to politically put an end to "Claims" back then. Time to move on as one New Zealand and get rid of the division.
I strongly agree that it is time to move on as one New Zealand and get rid of the division, but I do not personally think that there is any need to put an end to the treaty itself: it is simply a case of respecting its original meaning and purpose, which is essentially a recognition of the same rights and duties for all NZers, regardless of the ethnic group (which is a nonsensical concept anyway, given how mixed and multicultural the current NZ population actually is).
The Treaty could be still kept, as a symbolic sign of respect for the historical fact that Maoris are the original indigenous people of NZ.
There are no indigenous NZdrs, only different boat ETAs.
Despite the attempts of self serving revisionists to change the definition of "indigenous" to the first arrived.
True. NZ is not the same as Australia, where there is a 65,000 year history of indigenous people. Maori were simply early colonists who waka'd their way over from elsewhere. Should first arrival give you unalienable first rights? They are no more indigenous to the land than those of European ancestry who were born here.
Then you could claim there are no indigenous people anywhere except a tiny part of Africa where the first homo sapiens stood up and started roaming the plains?
The Maori were in NZ for around 600-700 years before real contact with others, or roughly 30 generations. That was enough time to give them a unique culture, sense of self identity and develop their relationship with the NZs unique eco system. They didn't displace anyone that was here before them, they had to adapt, survive and shape themselves to the NZ environment. This gave them a unique culture not found anywhere else, unique methods of governance and warfare, unique mythology, history and ideologies. All of this stuff makes them indigenous and are the reasons why a treaty was required. To pretend all of this didn't happen or reframe the term "indigenous" to try and minimise their claims, is basically revisionist racism.
Errr they displaced people that were here before them, unfortunately that gets swept under the Waka
Please enlighten us with more pseudo history of dubious origin. Its fairly well established that there wasn't anyone here pre-Maori. The Maori themselves found a land devoid of people, else there would be strong indications in their mythology. The closest you can find a some sort of spirit beings, almost vampires. You would need some pretty radical evidence to show the opposite.
Excellent article, thanks Chris.
I may not always agree with Chris Trotter in his judgement of facts but I relish and commend his accurate explanations of the relevant facts. It is too early to make a judgement of Chris Luxon and the National parties stance on only supporting the treaty bill ot select committee, however the lessons of Sturgeon and others in failing to support the wishes of the electorate - left & right - has and is being played out in Scotland/Holland/Germany/Ireland/Denmark/England/France with Scotland a relevant story as its end approaches. The message is clear to politicians globally listen and deliver what voters expect, failure in the short term wil lead to political suicide without acceptable delivery will long term follow the fate of Marie Antoinette and President Nicolae Ceaușescu of Romania who interestingly was executed on 25 December!
This entire mess was predicted when we moved away from FPP to MMP. The entire point to 'Democracy' really is that all the diverse opinions of society can make it to parliament. It is even more important when a party political system such as the Westminster one we use, tends to suppress the diverse views of the members behind some centrally (to the party) decided ideology.
The other part of the issue is this modern world where entitled people seem to struggle with opinions they don't agree with. People seem to be becoming ever more extremist in their views, apparently just to be heard. I'm not sure if it is because they want to make a legitimate argument, or that they just want to be noticed as a separate individual and not one of the faceless masses. But when becoming more extremist, they tend to only demonstrate that their ability to reason and apply logic is to some degree flawed. People need to understand that debate is not about winning, but about learning. Many don't seem to understand that.
In NZ it is becoming increasingly apparent that the way the Treaty is being pushed is in conflict with what Article 3 states. Indeed I saw one news article last week when a young radical stated that the Treaty couldn't be messed with, but Article 3 had to be dropped!
Which platform was this on Murray? I didn't see that one.
I assume you are talking about the Article 3 comment? It was a news article on TVONE, early last week from memory. Young female protester in the background and not the person being interviewed.
None the less the opinion is clearly held by some at least, as they realise the conflict Article 3 has with their agenda. I don't think that will go away anytime soon, and may get worse if too much weight is given to dialling back some of the handouts given to Maori. I feel the level of racism is those groups is getting out of hand.
How do we have a "westminster style of government" when there is no house of lords here? 🤔
political parties were what I was taught is the defining characteristic.
"Westminister style"
From your own link
"A legislature, often bicameral, with at least one elected house—although unicameral systems also exist"
NZ used to have an upper house until 1951. We got rid of it, being an elitist obstructionist self serving waste of taxpayers money that the UK one continues to be.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_Legislative_Council
The Westminister system is wereby the civil service is separate from govt in that the Prime Minister does not appointed a mate to run KO say. Whereby say in the US and I think most republics the President when sworn in appoints who will run that dept. Hence corruption is high. Here the civil service runs its self but answer to an MP and one of the big reasons NZ has a very high standard (think second in the world) for no corruption
The downside is that without replacing those people in the public service, it becomes very difficult to effect change within those organisations. Once a particular culture (eg. woke Leftist ideologies) becomes embedded it becomes impossible to shift. Then the Govt takes the fall for not having delivered the change that the population expected when voting them in. Something David Seymour will find out, unfortunately. If a new Govt could come in and replace everyone instantly, then there might be some hope of shifting the organisation toward different outcomes.
I have only lived here for 20 years and have always felt reluctant to get involved in discussions on Maori issues and by and large, I still feel that way. I can however make some observations.
I see little chance of any rational discussions coming, but lots of shouting from both ends of the spectrum. Heat, but no light. I can't get excited about an increasing use of the Maori language and not just in cultural settings. We can't say how we love the AB's haka and promote the silver fern, but that's it, now get back in your box.
If it takes more Maori led initiatives to improve health and social outcomes, then why not? Where I do feel very strongly is that our not so very robust democracy relies in part on one person, one vote. That right was hard fought and should not, must not be surrendered.
In Article 1 of the Treaty, the chiefs ceded governance of their land to the Queen of England. I don't see how co-governance could possibly be a thing given the Māori text of article 1 sees them ceding governance to the Crown.
The translators of the English text used the Māori word 'kawanatanga', a transliteration of the word 'governance', which was in current use. Māori knew this word from the Bible and from the 'kawana' or governor of New South Wales. Māori believe that they kept their authority to manage their own affairs and ceded a right of governance to the Queen in return for the promise of protection.Māori believe that they kept their authority to manage their own affairs and ceded a right of governance to the Queen in return for the promise of protection. Link
I posted the following below- almost last post at this stage...1st, 2nd and 3rd Articles discussed. Very interesting - more "light" and less "heat".
THE TREATY OF WAITANGI
AN EXPLANATION
by The Hon. Sir Apirana Ngata m.a, ll.b., lit.d.
First published in 1922
"If it takes more Maori led initiatives to improve health and social outcomes, then why not?" Because they won't work for a couple of reasons. First later life health outcomes are mostly a consequence of lifestyle choices and affect everyone. People don't want to change but expect health to fix them up when they get ill, but more than that if you need to see a doctor in NZ, you have to get off your butt and got to the doctor. Maori more than any other group seem to expect the doctors to go to them. Secondly accessibility; this is in part socio-economics and population spread across wide geographical areas. If you live remotely, Maori or not, accessing health care is a problem. In cities socio-economics plays a bigger part as people struggle with transport. Mostly the problems are not racial but socio-economic with a lttle racial component thrown in. Total health funding and lack of innovation are the problem.
Your last sentence - absolutely and also Article 3 of the Treaty.
but expect health to fix them up when they get ill
277k Kiwis living with type-2 diabetes as of 2020 but the most surprising stat is that ~50k of those live in the Counties Manukau region.
Many of the formal complaints the public health commission receives are from ethnic minorities enraged about their doctors/midwives commenting on their worrisome body fat ratios and terrible diets. It is considered racist for your non-ethnic doctor to even bring up the elephant in the room (no pun intended) when discussing poor health outcomes with their patients.
Before someone comments on higher poverty rates among ethnic minorities and the high cost of healthy food choices in NZ: a bucket of fried chicken from KFC or large Maccas meal still costs heaps more than home-baked free-range chicken drumsticks paired with boiled potatoes and leafy greens.
Diabetes can be fixed in many cases by simple, regular exercise, and a healthy diet. Not hard really.
In fact science is proving more and more often that exercise, especially resistance training can prevent and fix quite a number of ailments.
Go to the gym everyone!
No need to go to the gym, it costs money and to much time in the car to get there you are better off with a decent pair of running shoes and just walk and jog to lose weight. If you have room at home just get a decent bit of cardio gear like a bike trainer for the winter, you are on and off it in the time it takes just to get to the gym and back. 30 minutes a day is all it takes.
There is enough research proving resistance training (coupled with a healthy diet) is a better plan against diabetes than cardio alone. Cardio is good at simply burning off the excess blood glucose (prevention against diabetes, not a solution).
Another way your body naturally removes excess glucose from your bloodstream is converting it into glycogen (the role of insulin). 80% of this glycogen gets stored into your muscles with much of the remaining going into the liver. So, greater muscle mass and regular muscle stimulation (resistance training) allows glucose to be more effectively cycled than cardio alone, i.e., improves insulin sensitivity (a key health marker for diabetic people).
You could do a bunch of pullups (basic bar from Kmart/Warehouse), push ups, core strengthening and squats/lunges at home 3-4x a week virtually free of cost.
Cannot beat Cardio for pure weight loss, jogging back when I was early 30's saw me drop to the lowest weight ever. Used to go to the gym way back when its was "Gold's" but as you age things change and I think more of a move to cardio is better but it needs to shift to low impact. Weights alone are useless in my opinion but the cardio is really hard work so I guess people avoid it.
Weights are very important, especially for women, to maintain bone density and muscle strength as you age. Reduce your chance of nasty injuries like a broken hip which is very often fatal or debilitating.
No substitute for putting load on your muscles and bones. Cardio is obviously important too - both are necessary to really be healthy and give yourself the best chance of a long, healthy life.
Living in close proximity to the highest number of US owned takeaway businesses per sq km in the world never helps.
As someone who comes from a family where there's a predisposition to type 2: diet is the core consideration and you just have to keep your weight down - the amount of exercise you have to take to burn off excess calorie intake is prohibitive unless you're using as much energy as someone like a shearer or marathoner, so the solution is to avoid ingesting them in the first place.
Sugar and highly refined carbs are close to omnipresent, and are annoyingly hard to avoid, even when you know what you're looking for and want to: good craft beer is my personal blind spot.
Fun fact type 1 diabetes, age related and gestational diabetes are not fixed by going to the gym and are not caused by weight (although that last one usually resolves in about 9 months it can cause severe life threatening issues when not treated appropriately by medical professionals). Many maori family members are type 1, most are underweight and severely ill because of poor care for type 1 diabetes (where accurate monitors are not available to them). Sister had gestational diabetes with second child, on paleo diet with no processed foods (PCOS, a genetic issue, is a risk factor). My grandad had age related diabetes and died last week because of it. He had endured many diabetic comas because of lack of access to suitable healthcare. He weighed less than 50kg at 171m tall. For the morons in the audience that is LADA an age related diabetic who is underweight and dies from poor access to medical care. Yes it was very painful for him.
Fun fact type 1 diabetes, LADA age related and gestational diabetes are not fixed by going to the gym and are not caused by weight (although that last one usually resolves in about 9 months it can cause severe life threatening issues when not treated appropriately by medical professionals). Many maori family members are type 1, most are underweight and severely ill because of poor care for type 1 diabetes (where accurate monitors are not available to them). Sister had gestational diabetes with second child, on paleo diet with no processed foods (PCOS, a genetic issue, is a risk factor). My grandad had age related diabetes and died last week because of it. He had endured many diabetic comas because of lack of access to suitable healthcare. He weighed less than 50kg at 171m tall. For the morons in the audience that is a non type 1, LADA age related diabetic who is underweight and dies from poor access to medical care. Yes it was very painful for him.
A good start would be to LOOKUP 7 TYPES OF DIABETES CONDITIONS as it is clear you have as little clue about diabetes as you do about a good diet and are just proving your ignorance in the many causes of diabetes in poorer populations and the lack of medical care and essential access to medication missing.
murray86,
"First later life health outcomes are mostly a consequence of lifestyle choices". Partly. My wife was a primary health care nurse for many years and saw far too many children with health issues from living in damp, mouldy properties. That was not their lifestyle choice, yet will affect their lives in a big way.
Of course, non Maori are also affected and i think there can be little or no argument that the overall state of NZ housing is shocking-publuc and private. It almost seems like a 'rite of passage for students to have to live in sub-standard accommodation.
I have chosen to live here in retirement and this is home, but the longer I am here, the more evident are the less savoury aspects of NZ society. I live at the Mount and at any one time, at least one of the apartment blocks are covered in plastic sheeting and why? because they were badly designed and badly built.
Indeed many family members with type 1 diabetes were born with it. They had no choice. Sister had no choice in PCOS as it was genetically passed. You could say that they are blaming people for being born human and punishing them with abuse (due to the abusers own pig ignorance) for staying alive.
Most commenters here know full well that it is type 2 diabetes that is being discussed as a consequence of lifestyle choice here. But if your genetics has a predisposition to be "addicted to", or to crave the addictive bits deliberately put into these "foods" that cause the gross overweightness that cause the type 2 diabetes, then it is not really a lifestyle choice. Like pretending that the NZ First funding tobacco people really believe that vapes can possibly solve cigarette addiction. What a bunch of obvious liars they all are.
I back David to make real progress - his track record is good
And actually having a debate and defining principles could be and should be positive - even if threatening to the Willie Jackson's, Margaret Mutu's and Tuku Morgan's of the world who dont want their self determination (read power) corralled
Is Tuku still alive. He seems to have been underpants, oops, I mean undercover, for ages.
If the Crown intended the ToW to mandate co government it would have been explicitly stated in the English version.
“The process surrounding the Treaty Principles bill is a farce. With 8.6 percent of the vote at the last election, Act has no democratic mandate to advance a referendum on Te Tiriti.”
ACT policies were explicitly stated before the election. Unlike Labours secret co governance agenda, He Puapua, Maori health, race based unelected local govt representatives & all the other ethno state apartheid policies
Brilliant take down of Anne Salmond's thinking by Chris Trotter.
She says "The process surrounding the Treaty Principles bill is a farce. With 8.6 percent of the vote at the last election, Act has no democratic mandate to advance a referendum on Te Tiriti.”
He says ......"A perplexing observation which, on its face, suggests that even to “advance” the idea of a referendum (to resolve an otherwise irresolvable public issue) a political party must first secure 50 percent +1 of the Party Vote......"
Increasingly the left view in New Zealand is to block democracy.
I am not a political scientist, just a numbers guy. So, I tried breaking down this debacle into simple numbers to make sense of it.
In mathematical terms, if 17% of NZ's population gets 50% of representation on boards governing key assets such as health, local government and water (co-governance), each Maori now has 2.95 votes and each non-Maori is 0.6.
One group literally wielding such disproportionate amount of power (~5x) on government affairs is the very definition of oligarchy.
Maori do not get any extra votes . It is a astonishing the ignorance surrounding the co governance proposals.
Though Labour did a very poor job of explaining it , the amount of misinformation is staggering.
There are no "Maori", theyre all mixed race. There is also no justification for special Maori racist electorate seats & local authorities unelected representatives.
All disproportionate extra racist representation.
This is a. a myth and paradoxically b. difficult but not impossible to prove.
Until the 1960s NZ kept a separate register for Māori births. In this register people were classified as being full-blooded Māori, 3/4 etc depending on what their parents were. This register was abolished about 60 years ago. About 15 years ago I was in a job where I saw multiple examples of people's (original) birth certificates where both parents were "full blooded Māori". It is highly likely that some of those people married other "full blooded Māori" and had kids, but because we abolished separate registers it would be very difficult but not impossible to track some down.
So 15 years ago there were some, contrary to your assertion.
As someone who has done family research I know that many birth certificates contain a lot of wishful thinking & false information across all ethnicities.
There have been a handful of people in recent years claiming "100%Maori" on the basis of DNA testing.
I agree, very hard to prove - or disprove.
The Govt has no current information https://fyi.org.nz/request/4924-number-of-full-blooded-maori-living-in-…
I think my (unanswered) question on why Interest.co were unsuccessful in their application for the Public Interest Journalism Fund has been answered. Perhaps those responsible read some of the comments such as this because I have no doubt most would find it repulsive.
By all means, ask for a referendum on te tiriti, but to say there are no "Maori" is as distasteful a comment as I have seen here, and that's saying something because it's rarely pretty.
This sort of stuff needs to be on Reddit, not a financial news platform. I'm sure Reddit have a Klan Aryan eugenics sub-group there for you.
Its the hypocrisy
Remember Willie Jackson calling David Seymour a"useless Maori"
Remember Willie Jacksons appearance on "Dna detectives"
Willie Jackson DNA Test Results
18% English
34% Chinese
25% Ashkenazi Jew
0.4% African
20% Polynesian
2% Spanish
Multi millionaire
Identifies as an oppressed Maori
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6uodxm
PS "I'm sure Reddit have a Klan Aryan eugenics sub-group there for you." That's a pretty repulsive comment from you.
.
.
To further muddy the waters we now have this "identifies as" criteria on government forms. If you are both Maori and European you are arbitrarily considered to be Maori. There are many people with Maori ancestry that are considered, and consider themselves, European. I'm one of them and it's not easy to have corrected; the so called helpline I spoke to seemed completely baffled.
Advisor - If you also calculate the low numbers enrolled and/or vote in Maori electorates, those electors have more MPs than they deserve.
Since NZ First also backed ACT in this, then its not 8.6% of the vote, its 15.44% of the total vote, so comfortably past even the 15% threshold.
https://thespinoff.co.nz/live-updates/22-11-2023/nz-first-wants-to-tack…
"New Zealand First MP Shane Jones has signalled that his party wants to look at the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi.
In the lead-up to the election, Act made it a bottom line to deliver a referendum on the principles of the Treaty, a proposal that has been labelled divisive by many political parties.
But speaking to NZME’s The Country today, Jones suggested his party was onboard with looking at the Treaty and its use. “People should have no doubt as to the willingness and zeal of New Zealand First to bring to heel the polarisation, the exploitation of the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi to drive more divisive outcomes,” he said."
Why would those people be so critical of poor old Dave asking for a referendum on the topic? It can only be because their views are at risk of being totally run over by what the majority of Kiwi voters think. This can only be because their views are those of a minority.
There are grave doubts about referendums. Whatever the subject they descend into a vote of confidence in the govt.
My late father-in-law was a French socialist who was in favour of the aims of De Gaulle's referendum on decentralisation of French government; he voted against something he agreed with because he was anti-De Gaulle.
To a certain extent Brexit was achieved because UK voters were anti the mainstream media not on logical grounds but just by instinct.
A referendum on the treaty would have much the same problems as John Key's flag referendum where I was in favour of changing it but didn't like the choices so votd for the status quo.
However actually debating the treaty makes sense. The public does need to come to a common agreement as to what it means to us today. That is not the same as approving of it. Something similar to speed limits.
A great article Chris, democracy was hard fought for by our predecessors and it means honest open discussion.
The alternative will not leave the next generation the privileges we enjoy. There are some very good examples of countries who have authoritative ideological government and I thank the sacrifice my Grandparents amongst others made for one person one vote.
Where and when was "our" democracy hard fought for?
Where was democracy given to Maori when "New Zealand" was colonized by our ancestors?
Where is democracy now when political policies pander to corporate interests and political lobbying groups with greater access via the $?
Where is democracy when unelected institutions (RBNZ) and private corporations (financial institutions) and academics (economists) have more influence, are given more power and control than the people?
Where is democracy when the people have no long term vision, are so divided, ill informed and ignorant?
Like all other ideologies, "democracy" has also been lost in translation to become just another word given power without any meaning.
I guess you would be in favour of a (the?) referendum then.
Where is democracy now when political policies pander to corporate interests and political lobbying groups with greater access via the $?
Simple answer, we voted for this. Democracy at work. If we wanted something different and actually had the balls to go through with it then we would have seen a different spread on election night 2023.
How refreshing to now be permitted to freely discuss ones thoughts on racially charged matters such as te Tiriti. No longer the uneasy faces and rapid change of subject immediately someone takes a position unapproved by the wokerati, on the meaning or significance of the treaty. Love or hate Seymour, he’s sparking open debate.
I suspect we may be approaching a saturation point where the difference between tolerance and acceptance is realized and those pushing minority agendas of various stripes find their moderate supporters have had their fill.
In the same vein as the political pandering response to gender self determination example used in the article met with reasoned rejection, so too will those running with their preferred interpretation of ToW.
I for one am comfortable with the notion of first nations people worldwide and the harm that should be redressed from a time when things were done markedly differently. But it is simple, there are no humans indigenous to these islands. All humans here, or their forebears migrated here from elsewhere in an historically short time frame. Any group imagining they have superior claim, access or right of refusal of access by others may do well to consider this difference between tolerance and acceptance when assessing the level of support they enjoy.
A referendum as are now held is a waste of time and far to "undemocratic". Visualise a rugby field with 501 red shirted on one side and 499 green shirted on the other. If they mill around there is no way you can see a clear majority. Even if you extend that to 510 and 490 you'll still not see the difference. Something as important as Brexit needed a minimum of 2/3 majority. I don't think the changes to the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi need be subject to a referendum nor the Treaty. Parliament, or specifically David Seymour can re-write the Principles Act, not the Treaty, and put it before the select committee and either it moves forward or stalls at some point.
Another option is to apply a referendum formula along the lines. There is highly unlikely a voter turnout that exceeds 85%. So 2/3 of 85% requires ~57% of those that voted to win. A passable majority. If that is not achieved then its over to parliament to decide.
Why 2/3? What about 3/4 or 7/16th?
2/3 and 75% has been used in voting mechanism in a number of jurisdictions, USA comes to mind. They are numbers that have been used before and coming up with odd intermediates is not worth playing around with.
I think Anne Salmond was responding to Act and NZ First's claims they did have a mandate on many issues.
The wealth of your donors does not count towards a mandate.
Anne Salmond is attempting a strawman distraction, as is your "wealth of donors" comment. She had nothing to say about the last Govts failure to put their racist policies in front of the electorate before the 2020 election or the fact that ACT/NZF achieved approx 4x the votes of TPM in last years election
what did Labour change after the 2020 election, where they got more than 50% of the vote?
they pulled some things back , if anything?
It's the votes they got solarb. And those fully justify the discussion we are going to have.
Don't try to sideline discussion.
Its a discussion that's been going on for at least 50 years . Countless lawyers, high court decisions , negotiations and disputes. billions of dollars , and Act , the party to save taxpayers money , want to regurgitate it all , in a bid to appease their supporters. what do you expect from a party that came up with the ministry of regulation to reduce red tape.
I haven't seen one academic,expert, judge, or anyone who has a remote understanding of the issues involved come up in support of the idea.
If Seymour is correct that it's those very people, particularly activist judges, who have invested so much in reshaping the treaty's intent, it's hardly surprising they'd not be supporters of his principles review proposal.
Activist judges , lol.
NZ Inc. should see the 'Treaty Debate' for exactly what it is: A smokescreen.
While that smokescreen is in place nobody will be paying much attention to what new legislation enters the books.
This is exactly what the National Party and its leadership of extremely rich people want.
Beware.
Case in point:
Who noticed the tax changes by the fourth National Party government (1990–1999) that set off the housing price boom? Nobody?
Not surprising when the fourth National Party government was hell-bent on picking fights with just about everyone and calling it 'economic reform'.
Anyone remember Richardson's first budget, delivered in 1991 and named by the media as 'the mother of all budgets', which introduced major cuts in social welfare spending?
Of course we do. They were part of the smokescreen. And National knew they'd be rolled back by a more caring government. But the tax changes? Why would a new government roll something back when nobody was complaining about it? Meanwhile rich people, aided by accountants and banks, simply got on with the job of building massive property portfolios, driving up house prices, and getting even richer in the process.
So those tax changes completely slipped under the collective radar. And now everyone can't understand why we have some of the most expensive housing in the world (and some of the most profitable banks that are almost all overseas owned!)
Deflecting media and public attention is how you get major things done in NZ politics. Beware.
THE TREATY OF WAITANGI
AN EXPLANATION
by The Hon. Sir Apirana Ngata m.a, ll.b., lit.d.
First published in 1922
https://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-NgaTrea-t1-g1-t1.html?fbc…
Seen the movie Idiocracy?
How does 'democracy' fare in the movie?
I never, ever, want to see tyranny by the majority.
What is fair must override the will of the majority.
The majority are simply too lazy and too self-centered and too ignorant to be allowed to control what happens to the whole.
People's blind faith in 'democracy' scares me shitless.
The chilling implications of the statement 'what is fair must override the will of the majority' scare me even more shitless.
& this says it all "...The majority are simply too lazy and too self-centered and too ignorant to be allowed to control what happens to the whole."
The unconscionable arrogance is breathtaking
Beats tyranny of the Minority hands down.
We see the same ideological intransigence at work within the American Left. The radical wing of the Democratic Party simply refuses to accept that a clear majority of Americans have grown alarmed and dismayed at the number of migrants making their way into the United States.
Lol the immigration problem wasn't given any consideration when the indigenous everywhere were concerned. It's like the proverbial property ladder - great for those at the time but we don't want those coming after us to have the same benefit.
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
Is it only the "right wing" ideology of self determination that should hold power? The climb over everyone else to get ahead, to get to the top?
IMO, once the narratives of left and right, radical left, woke leftists etc gets thrown around, opinion, journalism loses all credibility. It's parroting by those unwilling to see their own bias', unwilling to see that the terms have been highly distorted and misconstrued by those in denial, and unable to understand why the pendulum is swinging so far to either side.
Which minority is Chris referring to as "intransigent". If that minority is Māori, that's a bit rich given the history - bearing in mind that none of the Waitangi Tribunal claims relate to legal/friendly transactions with Māori - the reparation is for specific, historically proven and documented breaches of her Majesty's own laws.
NZ was not conquered - it was negotiated into existence as a nation. And then the governors proceeded to take over/conquer those first peoples; their lands and other possessions via the writing of laws, subsequently broken.
The preamble to te Tiriti forms the basis of the agreement on immigration - noting it is only through immigration (with the help of imported diseases) that Māori have become a minority:
Her Majesty Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom has deemed it necessary, in consequence of the great number of Her Majesty's subjects who have already settled in New Zealand, and the rapid extension of Emigration from both Europe and Australia which is still in progress, to constitute and appoint a functionary properly authorized to treat with the Aborigines of New Zealand for the recognition of her Majesty's sovereign authority over the whole or any part of those islands.
We welcome your comments below. If you are not already registered, please register to comment.
Remember we welcome robust, respectful and insightful debate. We don't welcome abusive or defamatory comments and will de-register those repeatedly making such comments. Our current comment policy is here.