New Zealand has nothing to fear from the Treaty and everything to fear from Act: Willie Jackson

Labour MP Willie Jackson. Photo / RNZ

OPINION

In a desperate bid to justify Act’s race-baiting referendum on the Treaty principles, David Seymour mixes claims of “democracy” with the bitter complaint of division - which would be funny if he wasn’t the one generating the division!

A little history: Māori have waited 184 years to work with the Crown to honour the Treaty and Lord Robin Cooke’s 1987 Appeal Court decision declaring the Treaty had defined a partnership was historical recognition as much as it was a modern attempt to give real weight to the need to work together.

The decision didn’t appease all Māori, and there were those who demanded total sovereignty and we can hear those calls echo from the Māori Party now, but what the process brought us was a pragmatic shared platform where Māori and Pākehā could work together.

Seymour’s alternative principles bill, however, is a sham and is designed to erase Māori interests enshrined in the Treaty.

He has taken it upon himself to rubbish our shared history, the judiciary and past politicians for their interpretation of the Treaty as a partnership. Think about that for a minute, it is a Donald Trump-like strategy. Like Trump he dismisses every credible opinion, even those of the most brilliant judges in our history, and every National and Labour Prime Minister since 1987.

Act Party leader David Seymour.

The division that Seymour is stirring up is a disgrace, he is creating conflict through race-baiting.

He claims to champion democracy, but no one was asking for this extremism as a policy position. Māori don’t have “race rights” as David puts them, we have “legal rights” under the Treaty and the Crown has a responsibility to engage with Māori in a good faith means to ensure that.

The division is being whipped up by the fringe right who have sold any attempt to work honourably with Māori as apartheid.

The division is from the fringe right using racist historic myths and false democratic values to whip up their supporters.

The division is from fringe right think tanks and monied interests who wish to seed division.

The vast majority of Kiwis do not see a positive relationship with Māori as a source of shame or angst, they see it is a strength and part of our evolving national identity.

That PM Christopher Luxon is allowing this staining of Māori mana just to rule speaks volumes of him.

ACT does not want a good faith debate, it wants the very dog-whistling division it claims to be against.

We deserve real cultural leadership here, not more right-wing spite.

Willie Jackson is a Labour MP.