Prime Minister Christopher Luxon speaks about National's relationship with Māori and the Treaty Principles Bill at Rātana. Video / Mark Mitchell
Oral submissions for the Treaty Principles Bill begin on Monday, and are expected to last about a month.
Denis O’Reilly and Rizwaana Latiff from Hawke’s Bay will speak against the bill, emphasising the need for unity and Treaty affirmation.
A karakia was held at Waiohiki Marae on Sunday before the speakers travelled to Wellington.
The journey of two Hawke’s Bay leaders on their way to address the select committee on the controversial Treaty Principles Bill started at the marae of the first Māori person to speak in Parliament.
Oral submitters speaking at the select committee for the Treaty Principles Bill on Monday from Hawke’s Bay met at Waiohiki Marae for a karakia before they travelled to Wellington on Sunday.
Tangata Tiriti Aotearoa founder, chairman of the Consultancy Advocacy and Research Trust and lifetime Black Power member Denis O’Reilly, who will be making oral submissions on Monday morning, said it seemed appropriate to go to the marae of Tāreha Te Moananui, the first “Māori New Zealander” to speak in the Houses of Parliament, to receive “blessings on the mission”.
“It’s at that metaphysical level that we’re seeking blessings from the hapū, from the tribe, from the manu whenua [and] tangata whenuā as we go forward to represent tangata Tiriti in our simple way,” he said.
“You noticed it in [Cyclone] Gabrielle, you know, where people just pulled together, where New Zealanders just pulled together.”
O’Reilly said he would be speaking to represent “an older line of immigrant New Zealanders”.
“We were Irish [migrants] in the 1860s who settled in the South Island.
“We didn’t understand – there weren’t any Irish stone fences or English paddocks where my people settled, and they were naive in the alienation of Māori land."
Part of O’Reilly’s “mission” at the committee was to “reject this bill and affirm the Treaty”.
“This has been, in my view, improperly contextualised as a racial thing when it’s not,” he said.
Joining O’Reilly to speak to the select committee is Multicultural Association Hawke’s Bay president Rizwaana Latiff.
Latiff immigrated to New Zealand from South Africa 25 years ago.
Latiff said she wants to acknowledge the people of the land when she speaks before the committee, with the goal of “leaving this space a better space”.
She said getting involved in te reo Māori helped her gain her identity as a New Zealander.
“I grew up in apartheid South Africa – I’m of mixed heritage, and you don’t really have an identity because you are classified according to the colour of your skin,” she said.
“But learning te reo, learning about the Treaty, and walking that talk helped me to be proud of who I am, as well as [develop] a sense of belonging.”
Rizwaana Latiff (left) and Neill Gordon at Waiohiki Marae. Photo / Jack Riddell
O’Reilly believes a “new New Zealander” who was “not being sucked into the racial game of blaming an indigenous minority” was an important voice to have at the table.
He called the bill a “dead duck”, but said he needs to be there to make submissions to make the “implicit explicit” and have them recorded in perpetuity on the Parliamentary record.
O’Reilly was critical of Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, saying if he had any courage he would’ve “done something” about the bill already.
He said the bill should have been “killed” but wasn’t, hence the 300,000 submitters saying it is not good enough.
Luxon was out of the country when the Treaty Principles Bill had its first reading in Parliament, though he has maintained National will support the bill no further.
“Frankly, a Treaty Principles Bill that is simplistic, that hopes to rewrite a debate and discussion over 184 years through the stroke of a pen, is not the way forward,” he said in November.
Oral submissions to the select committee will begin Monday, with the hearing expected to last about a month.
The bill’s author, Act leader David Seymour, will be the first to make an oral submission to the committee on Monday morning, but like every other submitter, he will only have 10 minutes to present his argument.
Earlier in January, Seymour told Stuff the unprecedented public response to his bill was a good thing.
“Even people who don’t support my bill appear to be supporting the idea of mass participation in what the Treaty means in 2025. I think that is very, very exciting,” he said.
Jack Riddell is a multimedia journalist with Hawke’s Bay Today and spent the last 15 years working in radio and media in Auckland, London, Berlin, and Napier. He reports on all stories relevant to residents of the region.
