The Treaty Debate

It has been interesting viewing from afar the reaction to Don Brash’s very thoughtful speech on the Treaty of Waitangi. I would encourage people to read it.

I am very proud of what National achieved in the 1990s with settling historical grievances, but also believe that the Treaty has been pushed into a near mythical status which is unwarranted. I have seen two very intelligent and concerned National Party Leaders study the Treaty issue at great length (including historical texts from 1840) and both of them have concluded that continuing on the current path will be a huge mistake for NZ. Dividing the country up on the basis of Maori and non Maori will, especially as the proportion of NZers of Maori descent rises, take us down a Fiji path. In 50 – 100 years one can not have 50% of the country with special rights the other 50% do not have.

The media seem to have reported only opposition to what Don Brash has proposed, but when the only people you quote are Government Ministers and Maori spokespersons, that is hardly balanced reporting.

It is a shame that Labour MPs only response seems to be to call anyone who disagrees with as racists. As ACT rightly point out, we seem to have 1984 style “newspeak” when it is deemed racist to propose not allocating seats on the basis of racial ancestry.