Everything you missed from day nine of the Treaty principles bill hearings, when the Justice Committee heard 14 hours of submissions across two sessions.

Read our recaps of the previous hearings here.

Simultaneous oral submissions on the Treaty principles bill were heard over eight hours on Tuesday – one in Room 3, the other over Zoom (though, as Justice subcommittee chair Duncan Webb pointed out, the Act Party was missing from the latter). At this point of the select committee process, many of the speakers are giving individual submissions, and they’re not necessarily all lawyers or academics. They’re teachers, librarians, service providers and people who have observed the ongoing debate around the Treaty principles bill, and want to throw their hat into the ring.

One of the first submitters this morning was journalist Jason Ake, submitting against the bill on behalf of Pirirākau Tribal Authority. He said the authority encompassed hapū who had been classed as “unsurrendered rebels” by the British –  Pirirākau remained “unsurrendered to the Crown”, Ake told the committee.

Submitting against, lawyer Max Harris said the bill was a “gross overreach of state power” and an “ugly vehicle trying to deceive New Zealanders” about the meaning of the Treaty. He argued that New Zealand law already acknowledges that some need to be treated differently to reach equality. “My engagement with Māori has enriched my life,” Harris told the committee, and undermining te Tiriti would undermine these pathways of connection.

Theologian and Presbyterian minister Murray Rae submitted against the bill, which he labelled a “betrayal” to the Treaty. Despite ongoing betrayals by the Crown, Rae said, Māori had continued to be “stewards of their own mana” and honour the Treaty even when their partner failed. He ended his submission by quoting a letter penned by Reverend Octavius Hadfield to the Duke of Newcastle during the land wars, concerning “the everlasting disgrace that will come upon the British empire should they continue to treat the Māori so unjustly”.

“This bill is compounding that disgrace,” Rae said.

High school history teacher Christopher Burns submitted against the bill, which he said “misrepresents and distorts” the Treaty. He said the Treaty has provided a “valuable framework” to addressing failures in Māori education, but if this bill were to be enacted, teachers would have a duty to inform their students that the legislation “cannot be aligned with an honest and accurate understanding of our history”.

An “unnecessary and costly ideology pandering as a vanity project that does not deliver tangible public good” is how Wellington mayor Tory Whanau described the bill. Submitting against, alongside the council’s Ngāti Toa representative Liz Kelly, Whanau said that at a local government level, there was “no knowledge more local than what is held by indigenous people”, and that the focus and resources dedicated to the bill despite the government’s directions to “go back to basics” was “quite surprising”.

When Act’s Todd Stephenson questioned if her submission challenged whether one could “put a price on democracy”, Whanau responded, “It’s your words.”

After the lunch break, lawyer Tania Waikato (Ngā Maihi) opened her opposing submission by playing the Anzac Day ‘Reveille’ – she labelled the bill a “slap in the face and a front to every Māori soldier who fought and died for this country”. She criticised the government’s decision to make this bill available for public consultation at the same time as the Regulatory Standards Bill – both bills, she said, were a part of a “global agenda to silence indigenous voices”. Her submission ended with a rendition of ‘Hoki Mai’, a chorus carried by her supporters and the other submitters waiting their turn in the public seats.

Williams family members, a group representing 164 mokopuna of te Tiriti translator Sir Henry Williams, submitted against the bill. Williams’ great-great-great grandson Martin Williams told the committee the Williams family members did not want to see their tīpuna “made out to be a lie”, and that the proposed bill was “an act of buyer’s remorse writ large: ‘we don’t like the deal any more, so we’re going to rewrite it’.” He said there was nothing for the Crown to regret – Williams had viewed the Treaty as an “act of love” for Queen Victoria, a “magna carta” for Māori and, he said, it was the “envy of the modern world in race relations”.

“Toitū te Tiriti,” Williams told the committee.

Justice subcommittee B

“Good to see you all!” said Duncan Webb, the chair of justice subcommittee B, as he kicked off another day of Zoom hearings. His hair was wet as if he had just gotten out of the shower.

Traci Houpapa for the Federation of Māori Authorities said the bill “undermines Māori economic rights and longstanding Treaty obligations.” She called on the government to abandon the bill and focus on law reform that could benefit Māori.

Maia Wikaira spoke for the Tūwharetoa Maori Trust Board, which has rights over Taupō waters granted by a 1992 deed with the Crown, which was a “clear example of the existence of a relationship of iwi rights and interests outside of settlements”. This deed would not be covered by principle two of the proposed bill, because it was not a Treaty settlement. She said principle two was “a fundamental breach in bad faith of the Taupo deeds”. Agnes Walker, for Ngā Hapū o Ngāti Porou, emphasised a similar point; that the Ngāti Porou Claims Settlement Act was also not a Treaty settlement so would not be provided for under principle two.

Hayden Turoa said Treaty settlements were never intended to define iwi and hapū rights – those rights already existed when te Tiriti was signed. “This bill falsely repositions Māori as subjects to Crown generosity, rather than signatories to a foundational agreement,” he said.

Nick Whittington, speaking for the New Zealand Law Society, said the bill was inconsistent with the spirit and text of te Tiriti, and that the select committee process was “woefully inadequate” for such a significant constitutional change. He said the principles were a matter of international law and contract interpretation. “It’s telling that the chief legal institutions of this country have all submitted against this bill,” he said.

Agustina Marianacci from the New Zealand Society of Translators and Interpreters said the bill “undermines our profession” because it was based on a mistranslation. “Any attempt to rewrite the principles based on inaccurate translations risks distorting the intent of the original document.”

Former Green MP Gareth Hughes spoke on behalf of the Wellbeing Economic Alliance. He called the bill “the legislative equivalent of Act’s new school lunches. They’re attempting to take something that was full of flavour, diversity, colour, something healthy, successful, and benefiting local economies, to something bland, colourless, only benefitting profit-seeking multinationals.”

Justin Carter, chief executive of Te Ātiawa o Te Waka-A-Māui Trust, said the bill was “a betrayal that strips the Crown of integrity.”. The Crown apologised to his iwi in 2012 and promised a partnership moving forward, but this bill “hollows out the apology and undermines it”, he said.

Kura Moeahu, of Te Rūnanganui o Te Āti Awa ki te Upoko o te Ika a Maui Inc and Waiwhetu Marae Trust, said the bill “lacks the courage to address the real issues facing our nation…. true courage is inclusive”.

Edward Valandra, a Sicangu Titunwan born and raised on the Rosebud Sioux Reservation in South Dakota, said his people signed several treaties with US settlers, and he understood the domestic vision and international alarm that the bill had caused. “I want to make it clear to New Zealanders that their problem does not rest with the Māori, but with their failure to recognise the permanence and sovereignty of Māori people.”

Piripi Walker spoke for Ngā Kaiwhakapūmau i Te Reo, the organisation that took the WAI11 Māori language claim to the Waitangi Tribunal. He said the battle for the official status of te reo Māori in New Zealand had been lost over the last 14 months under this government. “Official use has been stopped in its tracks. Te reo Māori has faced a withering attack producing a loss of confidence that will take many years to restore.”

Anthony Blomfield, submitting in support of the bill, said a “Māorification campaign has resulted in a class division” and that iwi have “about $90 billion in wealth and they intend to bring the government of our nation down with this money”.

Sharon Hawke of Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei said the bill and its principles “pollute the idea of a future together”. Te Rūnaka o Koukourarata said the bill “shifts te Tiriti from a partnership to Crown dominance”.

Tina Ngata, a member of the Maranga Mai Working Group on the People’s Action Plan Against Racism, said the bill was “racist in logic and content” and that a referendum would compound racial harm.

Aperahama Edwards of Ngātiwai Trust Board made his entire submission in te reo Māori. When Webb said it was time for questions, Edwards cut him off. “We have questions for the panel,” he said. “Um, it’s not quite how it works,” Webb replied. “We’re not in a position to answer questions, our job is to listen to you and understand your thoughts on the bill. We’re not here to defend this bill, in fact, the party whose minister put this bill forward isn’t on this particular select committee.”

Fraser MacKenzie, who supported the bill, said he was worried his two daughters might not be treated equally in schools, and that his parents might be treated unequally in healthcare. “Trying to make it equal for everybody would be a better outcome for all than trying to make it that certain people get VIP treatment,” he said. Te Pāti Māori’s Tākuta Ferris replied: “Māori are definitely not getting VIP education or health.”

Ipu Tito-Absolum, speaking for the hapū of Te Mahurehure, said the Act Party was “fast becoming the biggest threat to the security of Aotearoa” and described David Seymour as “a trickster full of guile and deceit”.

Pakilau Manase Lua, for the Aotearoa Tonga Response Group, placed the bill within the wider context of European colonisation of the Pacific. He said the bill and its supporters “represent the spirit of the coloniser. So if it twerks like a kūpapa, quacks like a kūpapa, it must be a kūpapa”. The group requested an apology from the Crown for proposing the bill.