Defining the principles of a Treaty can only legitimately be done by further Treaty with the other party. In this case that would mean at the very least the iwi represented by the original Treaty’s signatories. The discrepancies between the English and Te Reo Māori versions would necessitate addressing this to each version.
The New Zealand parliament is based on the legal frameworks and procedures of the British Parliament, as it began as a colonial outpost of it. Both still legally and symbolically operate under the auspices of the Crown, with the King as head of state. So it’s justifiable to consider the New Zealand parliament as the successor to the Crown in terms of the Treaty in most intents and purposes.
Therefore, any attempt by the New Zealand parliament to “redefine” key elements of the Treaty without full agreement of the iwi signatories is simply a breach of the Treaty. This would add to the sorry history of the Crown breaching the Treaty repeatedly, beginning soon after it was signed.
Since 1975 The Waitangi Tribunal has taken on the necessarily painstaking and difficult task of unravelling these injustices, in partnership with iwi. This makes this Bill an entirely redundant attempt to needlessly destroy nearly a half century of its important and fruitful work.
The “Principles” proposed in the “Summary of the key features” of the Bill represent arbitrary and deliberate misrepresentations of the Treaty. They contradict each other, as well as the historical record.
a) The entire Treaty debate centres on the extent of governance it provides to the Crown and, by extension, the New Zealand parliament. The “Civil Government” principle proposed seeks to arbitrarily and unilaterally end that debate in favour of the Crown. This adds insult to injury, since hapū and iwi Māori have been the injured party in so many interactions with the Crown since the Treaty was signed. It also negates any meaningful partnership, which is the heart and singular purpose of the Treaty. It’s also been clear since the day the Treaty was signed that a great many of the iwi representatives had no intention of handing over absolute power to the Crown and did not consider the Treaty to do so.
b) Simultaneously, the Bill proposes “Rights of hapū and iwi Māori” to include “the rights that hapū and iwi had when they signed the Treaty/te Tiriti”. This would logically include the almost total control of their landmasses, waterways and oceans, along with full self-determination, as this is what hapū and iwi entered the Treaty process with.
The proposal, however, seems intended to refer to just after the Treaty was signed. This again employs the incorrect assumption that the indigenous signatories signed away nearly all those rights for no readily apparent reason. Even if this were the case, which it is not, the proposal fails to address the hapū and iwi Māori who didn’t sign either te Tiriti or the Treaty. The Crown would, according to this Bill, be legally compelled to “respect and protect” their right to self-determination. This, presumably, would also necessitate the return and restoration of any land and other natural resources subsequently taken from them via laws this Bill would supersede, since it seems to accept they entered no agreement to be subject to them. This is clearly not the Bill’s intention. As such the wording of this proposed principle is misleading and confusing to the point of meaninglessness, and would be practically unenforceable.
c) Similarly, the “Right to equality” immediately negates itself, with inclusion of “before the law”. This, combined with the other proposed principles, effectively makes any and all rights of hapū and iwi Māori the gift of the Crown as its subjects.
The Crown, and the New Zealand parliament, of course, has been the prime perpetrator of the arbitrary and often illegal removal of rights and property from hapū and iwi Māori since Cook made landfall. This has placed them in a position of obvious and well-documented inequality up to the present day. It is this that hapū and iwi Māori, through the Waitangi Tribunal and elsewhere, is seeking to redress. The proposal is to simply refuse them any further consideration. Again, this lies at the very heart of the Treaty. It’s another arbitrary attempt to unilaterally redraft it in the Crown’s favour. It also seeks to brazenly ignore nearly two centuries of New Zealand’s history.
In conclusion, the bill is effectively a futile attempt to deny the Treaty’s existence. As such it should be a source of shame for any politician involved in creating or supporting it up to this point.
It’s too poorly conceived and constructed to function as a serious piece of legislation. As such it represents a huge waste of time, attention and resources for all concerned.
We note without surprise that it has attracted well-argued and resounding criticism from almost every serious expert on these matters in the country.
With that in mind we find no need or useful purpose in further detailed analysis.
It should be immediately abandoned in favour of more useful considerations.