Sir Bob Jones says he'll sue woman behind petition to remove his title

Sir Bob Jones wants to sue the woman who has started a petition to remove his title. Photo / Brett Phibbs

The controversy sparked by a column written by Sir Bob Jones continues as he considers taking the woman behind the petition to strip him of his title to court.

His column was pulled from the National Business Review due to its "inappropriate content" which included the comment there should be a "Maori Gratitude Day" instead of "a much disdained Waitangi Day".

An online petition to remove his knighthood had gained more than 40,700 signatures.

Sir Bob Jones told One News he wanted to sue the woman who started the petition.

"I won't sue her for a lot because that would seem like I'm bullying her," Sir Bob told One News.

But he planned to sue her on the basis of hate speech.

The petition was started by filmmaker Renae Maihi and addressed to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.

In the petition she called the column he wrote "a vile racist rant".

"This pitiful and severely uneducated attack is not to be tolerated in New Zealand, Aotearoa: a country founded on a partnership between two peoples," the petition reads.

"We are better than that. I know we are."

Maihi told One News she had not been contacted by Sir Bob's legal team but that he needed to understand when people said things that crossed the line there were consequences.