by Catherine Delahunty
If water keeps dripping it eventually changes the shape of a stone. Thus the D.R.I.P (Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People) will help change our country.
It took 22 years of hard work and tough negotiation to achieve this milestone and good on the Maori Party if they managed to speed up the National Government and get the Declaration signed.
It has been quite weird watching Labour attacking National and National playing with words, but the most useful comments came from Moana Jackson on “Native Affairs”. He said that the DRIP signing is another tool in the tool box available to all of us fighting for constitutional change based on Te Tiriti o Waitangi and for indigenous rights.
There may no obvious binding legal obligations which will alter New Zealand domestic law today but there is a sense that the complacent dominant culture will be pressured by a fresh moral imperative to recognise indigenous rights.
Interestingl,y the United States is now muttering about signing and they are the last taxi to leave the colonial ranks on this issue.
The Green Party has held a consistent position on this issue and as my taxi driver from Tuwharetoa said to me today “The Green Party is the conscience of the nation” . We were talking about mining, the Declaration and the problems with Treaty settlements and as usual it was a better conversation than watching Jim Anderton and Rodney Hide reciting the myths of the monocultural dinosaurs.
Kia kaha to the those rangatira who built this path to a better future.
Published in Environment & Resource Management by Catherine Delahunty on Tue, April 27th, 2010
Tags: Catherine Delahunty, Declaration on the rights of indigenous people, DRIP, Green Party, maori party, treaty of waitangi
More posts by Catherine Delahunty | more about Catherine Delahunty
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
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BUT… John Key has come out and said that the DRIP is without significance to NZ – so it won’t change anything whilst this Gov’t is in power, but will cause more racial tension between pakeha and maori in the future (although personally I see being called a pakeha as being racist as well… but thats a whole ‘nother kettle of fish)
See: http://www.thestandard.org.nz/two-faced-too-far/
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Albeit an inconvenient and marginalised conscience?
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Like Section 59, this bill will create a lot of angst from some quarters of society who will see this as a threat to their mono-cultural view of the world. However, when the sky doesn’t fall on their heads, there will be a relaxing of tensions and another small shift towards understanding. It’s just a pity, as Mctap says, that those that champion social change or are the country’s niggling conscience are generally denigrated as party poopers.
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“when the sky doesn’t fall on their heads”
…..
” the proposal is that these customary interests would not affect public access, fishing, navigation, and existing use rights until the end of their term. But ~ the next thing to be very alarmed about ~ note carefully that these customary interests would be able to affect other things. You may read about these on pages 38 to 41. The holders of customary rights would be able to have input into such things as the allocation of space in the foreshore and seabed, and how coastal permits are granted.Local authorities would have to take the planning documents of coastal iwi and hapu into account when planning under the Resource Management Act. The Historic Places Trust, Department of Conservation and Ministry of Fisheries would have to take them into account.
It is easy to imagine that such a simple thing as the renewal of a whitebait stand (which requires a coastal permit under the RMA) could become involved in racial politics. If Maori have a customary interest, might they not insist that they should own all whitebait stands? One can imagine a hundred situations like this. On page 40 we read that ‘the coastal iwi/hapu would have the right to decide whether an activity requiring a coastal permit could be progressed by the consent authority’. So any Maori with customary title will essentially have a right of veto over innumerable things which might take place on the foreshore and seabed.
They ‘would not be obliged to comply with the requirements of the RMA when giving or declining permission for a coastal permit’. They ‘would have the right to…refuse to give…consent to conservation proposals and applications…’ they might well decide that in future they, with their customary rights, will be the sole users of foreshore and seabed in future. And even if they decide to let other people use the foreshore and seabed, there will, of course, be nothing to stop iwi from accepting a koha ~ a financial inducement ~ in helping them to reach a decision on the matter. You will have heard just in the last couple of days that Meridian Energy has donated money to a West coast iwi which, after initially opposing the proposed Mokihinui dam, changed its mind in the course of the hearing, and now supports the scheme. This is by no menas the first case where financial sweeteners have assisted Maori decision-making. Even blunter expressions than ‘financial inducement’ and ‘sweetener’ may spring to your mind. But this is the future being made possible by the present government. Thanks Chris. Developments may well continue on the foreshore and seabed ~ marine farming is quite profitable, I believe ~ but another opportunity will be given to the new landlord/rentier/parasite class to clip the ticket on each proposal.
And do not think for a second that this will be the end of it. If this proposal goes through it will just be an opportunity for further claims. Most of the coastline will have customary interests claims made over them. Planning documents will proliferate. Before very long things will get so complicated that new legislation will be required, which will give Maori just a bit more. And then more, and more…”
David Round
David Round teaches law at the University of Canterbury and is author of “Truth or Treaty? Commonsense Questions about the Treaty of Waitangi”.
http://www.nzcpr.com/weekly224.htm
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So John Key thinks it won’t change anothing but the Greens/UnPopular Left think it should but the “sky won’t fall in”…. and that’s about as far as the Green Party will go on specifics (aware that anything they say will be echoed in the media).
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Kia kaha to the those rangatira who built this path to a better future.
…..
better future for who?
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Seabed makes odd bedmates
FROM THE LEFT – CHRIS TROTTER
The Dominion Post | Friday, 08 February 2008
“The Labour-led Government’s decision to pass the Foreshore and Seabed Act represented their determination to ensure that our beaches remained the common property of all New Zealanders. It had long been held that the Crown’s ownership of the foreshore and seabed was “settled law”, which is why the Court of Appeal’s upholding of the Maori appellants’ claim to exercise “customary title” came as such a bombshell.
Michael Cullen’s legislation was, in effect, a renationalisation of the foreshore and seabed on behalf of the whole nation – Maori and Pakeha.
The Maori Party, the ACT Party, and (to their shame) the Greens, in calling for the act’s repeal, are, in reality, calling for the privatisation of large parts of the New Zealand coastline.
…”
http://www.stuff.co.nz/4392654a1861.html
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Cultural Marxism, or Political Correctness, says that all history is determined by power, by which groups defined in terms of race, sex, etc., have power over which other groups. Nothing else matters. All literature, indeed, is about that. Everything in the past is about that one thing.
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This topic is in danger of becoming jh’s – who is deathly afraid of anything to do with Maori having any say in what happens in this country. What makes you so fearful? And why do you spend so much time with people you clearly have no empathy with at all?
On the foreshore thing: the only beaches you don’t have access to are the ones owned by rich and largely absent freehold landowners. Some iconic bits of foreshore are locked up by the likes of Julian Robertson for example.
Tribal ownership is an entirely different model and you should take the trouble to understand it.
In terms of the DRIP – at last, a potential dialogue between equals! Hooray! We have the opportunity to shape our laws and customs to reflect everyone, not just the dominant group.
Of course there are extremists and opportunists in every group, just as there are idealists and co-operative people – the more you oppress a group the less likely they are to want to co-operate with you at least in the beginning.
You can’t stop the march of history, but you can learn from it. History tells you that you can’t keep any group of people down forever, whether they are slaves, women, gays, indigenous minorities. It’s never too late to learn.
And: please stop bombarding us – take your turn and do occasionally listen to what is being said instead of throwing all this other stuff at us.
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no worries Janine – I think it a relatively benign form of tourette’s eh?
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The Maori Party, the ACT Party, and (to their shame) the Greens, in calling for the act’s repeal, are, in reality, calling for the privatisation of large parts of the New Zealand coastline.
If Chris thinks that’s the Greens position, then he is wrong too.
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One of jh’s themes has been dis-satisfaction with the Green Party for not being specific about the outcomes of our policy in relation to the Treaty. “What, specifically, will this country be like if we go down this course?”. It’s a question I have heard many times over the years, and it usually speaks from a position of fear and insecurity for Pakeha: what if I’ll be worse off? or even what if there’s no place for me?
I want to acknowledge that actually we are asking people to do something (and we are doing it too) quite different from what we usually ask with our policy. Normally we have a very clear idea of the outcome we are seeking, and establish a policy to reflect how we will get there.
But the Treaty is different. The words all have the potential to sound pretty hammy, but fundamentally the outcome being sought is a process: the process of absolute good faith negotiation, in which we Pakeha engage from a position of honour – acting ethically and morally.
That process involves courage because we don’t know the outcome (and because we know we have it pretty sweet just how things are, let’s be honest). It is pretty scary, but it’s also pretty damn exciting!
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@jh 3:29 PM
Chris Trotter has always had a difficulty recognising there are bases for oppression other than class.
Trotter wrote this in response to Phil Goff’s appallingly racist “Nationhood speech“:
Trotter just doesn’t get it. Goff strongly attacked Hone Harawira, who is about as far from “neo-tribal capitalism” as you can get, in his speech. Trotter either has no concept of where Harawira is coming from, or conveniently chooses to ignore it, so just lumps him in with the Brown Table because it conveniently fits Trotter’s axiom that all oppression is based on class.
Lazy political analysis, but until Trotter gets beyond “it’s all about class” (and he may be too old and blinded in his analysis to ever do so) I don’t think we can expect much else from him.
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.
There is a huge amount of risk here Kevin.
Now I am not necessarily disagreeing with you, but I think the foundation must be very carefully laid otherwise any “nation-building” will ultimately fail, and perhaps very destructively.
We can’t afford to mix up other agendas in the process, “good faith” also includes those that can take advantage of the process for political advantage, do you really think people are this restrained?
It would be a tragedy if we end up inventing new racial problems.
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….
yea could make a great movie ( like Idi Amin, Rwanda…)…. of course people won’t let it get to that as there are too many non Maori.. but so far the Greens wont give us specifics just “the sky won’t fall in” and “they are afraid it might mean something and effect the law of the land..”. The Greens seem to assume that Maori are a native to NZ species and with an eco culture that would never damage the environment. Non Maori are a weed species (bear in mind of course it’s a matter of cultural identity).
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…
Margaret Mutus mother is Scottish:
.
“Auckland University Professor of Maori Studies Margaret Mutu’s irresponsible threats and outrageous assertions before the Parliamentary Select Committee on the Foreshore and Seabed Bill must be challenged, Committee Member and ACT MP Ken Shirley said today.
“While I believe that Labour’s foreshore and seabed legislation is misguided and inappropriate, Margaret Mutu asserted that her iwi, Northland’s Ngati Kahu, has full unrestricted ownership of all foreshore and seabed within her tribal boundaries with sole powers to regulate, manage and control all activities,” Mr Shirley said.
“She claimed that this power of ownership extends to Tahiti, the ancient homeland of Hawaiki.”
“Prof Mutu’s obnoxious submission threatened that any restrictions on this asserted ownership would result in acts of terrorism and civil war, She openly condoned the type of terrorism operating in Palestine to resist any denial of the extensive rights she asserts.”
http://www.act.org.nz/news/margaret-mutu-must-be-challenged
.
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MARGARET MUTU: For centuries now, Maori have considered themselves to be what we call mana whenua, mana moana, which includes the European concept of ownership. So we do consider ourselves to have been the owners of the foreshore, the seabed and all of our lands.
And what the Crown is proposing here is to remove our ownership. Effectively, the Crown is proposing to steal our foreshores and seabed off us.
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We must stop oppressing Maori: it isn’t fair that they cannot own the foreshore and seabed, after all they are descended from tribal members who were here first.
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“Trotter just doesn’t get it. Goff strongly attacked Hone Harawira, who is about as far from “neo-tribal capitalism” as you can get, in his speech. Trotter either has no concept of where Harawira is coming from, or conveniently chooses to ignore it, so just lumps him in with the Brown Table because it conveniently fits Trotter’s axiom that all oppression is based on class.”
…
but whatever Hone wants eventually organisation will evolve into a another form of “neo-tribal capitalism” or “neo tribal socialism” but it will be at the expense of the well being of the general (to use a Green Party term) “tau-iwi” population.
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Prefer “tangata Tiriti” to “tau iwi” jh.
The most commonly accepted translation for “tau iwi” is “strangers”, which those of us who have had family here for several generations certainly are not.
“Tau iwi” probably better applies to recent immigrants (although I fear, jh, that you might get off on that interpretation in a disparaging way).
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“That process involves courage because we don’t know the outcome (and because we know we have it pretty sweet just how things are, let’s be honest). It is pretty scary, but it’s also pretty damn exciting!”
Pol Pot.
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Certifiably paranoid.
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jh certainly doesn’t seem to recognise a peaceful overture!
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Reds everywhere, Kevin. Boo!
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under your bed
in your head
maybe you better off
dead than red!
Or coconuts or boongas or wogs or dagos or spics or slopes or niggers or poofters or dykes or trannies or gyppos or jews from where jh seems to be coming from.
Not sure about pommies and dinkum (not Abo) Aussies in jh’s world though? They might be okay.
What you say, jh?
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Oops, I forgot Mowreys, jh!
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I have drunk too much wine!!
psst (Don’t tell the padre!)
ps, I like Maori, those Pakeha tho?, ooooo… tooo many of those fullas have screwed me over.
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What Maori want is their name on the foreshore and seabed; overcoming that mindset of public ownership (national territory) will be the first goal. Perhaps they will put up signs or change the name to achieve that. Another goal will be to benefit economically. There will then be a tightening of who belongs to the iwi (resources).
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“Tau iwi” probably better applies to recent immigrants (although I fear, jh, that you might get off on that interpretation in a disparaging way).
……..
Sue Bradford uses it in relation to the Pakeha population (Green website).
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Sprout Says:
“Like Section 59, this bill will create a lot of angst from some quarters of society who will see this as a threat to their mono-cultural view of the world.”
——–
Maori don’t have territorial instincts, they just want to continue being kaitiaki but are being prevented by the “settler government”.
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greengeek
Posted April 26, 2010 at 9:55 PM
…work through the issues of colonisation and create a fair society based on Te Tiriti o Waitangi.
These are mutually exclusive goals.
Working through the issues of colonisation is laudable.
Accepting the Tiriti is damaging. The Tiriti itself is one of the legacies of colonisation and simply continues the tradition of false promises that colonisation brought.
Unless you treat all people the same you will simply continue past wrongs and usually amplify them. Why should an “indigenous” person have the right to self determination if I myself don’t?
…….
well put. But what do Kevin and Catherine say?
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“That process involves courage because we don’t know the outcome (and because we know we have it pretty sweet just how things are, let’s be honest). It is pretty scary, but it’s also pretty damn exciting!”
Pol Pot
………
The road to hell is paved with good intention. I was musing that perhaps the Kymer Rouge started out with a view that what they were going to do was down a road no one had been but was virtuous in the long run…. The same wooly lack of judgement.
.
Your Maori are some (mythical) “tangata whenua”… wise old people as seen in a Goldie painting, who will cast an ethereal presence over the beaches, while calmly and kindly marshalling the dumb hick un-environmentally concious Pakeka?
.
Will you be happy with a new map of the New Zealand Territories: The center is for the general population and around the edges Iwi Territories?
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No, and our policies would not lead to that. You were the one pushing free hold ownership and development rights recently, not the Greens.
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Picture this: Jh, propped up in his over-stuffed armchair, arms akimbo, dressing gown askew, musing … over his shoulder, a carefully straightened portrait of Pol Pot beams down on his acolyte, with puffy cheeked benevolence. How proud Saloth Sar would be, of the sterling work done by jh to keep his name alive, his works remembered.
Every time you mention his name, jh, I see you there, musing, glancing up in admiration, pulling your laptop a little closer, cracking the knuckles of your bony fingers in readiness for sending off a volley of righteous propaganda…
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Valis Says:
“No, and our policies would not lead to that. You were the one pushing free hold ownership and development rights recently, not the Greens.”
……..
I was quoting the Duncan Garner Chris Findlayson interview .
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1004/S00097.htm
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The Green Party Policy allows development of the foreshore and seabed as long as it isn”t sold. The Maori Council say that this (can’t be sold) is a breach of tino rangitiratanga. The Greens support tino rangitiratanga…. and so it goes on….
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The Green Party considers that:
1.there should be no saleable private and exclusive title granted over the foreshore and seabed to anyone, New Zealanders in general, tangata whenua, or overseas interests.
2. Te Ture Whenua Maori Act be amended so that Maori customary foreshore and seabed land must remain in Maori ownership.
3.Collective customary title to the foreshore and seabed is to be upheld and not extinguished by legislation.
4.Public access should be protected, except for very special areas where environmental protection, historical, cultural, or spiritual significance makes this inappropriate.
Collective customary title includes kaitiakitanga responsibilities and rights to development subject to the normal environmental and planning framework.
http://www.greens.org.nz/actionalerts/foreshore-and-seabed-act-review
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Will kaitiakitanga knowledge be tested? The marine scientists pumped out by our universities know a bit too. As does anyone who goes to the library (Pakeha’s massive store of knowledge).
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Catherine Delahunty:
“I explained that as a Pakeha I had a very limited relationship with the foreshore and seabed but “loved the beach” generally. This did not compare well to the 1000 years of whakapapa and site specific responsibilities that Betty and her hapu maintain to this day. Yet she had been refused a chance to speak. I also waved a copy of Te Tiriti around in a flamboyant manner.
Betty talked very clearly about her people and their relationship to their foreshore and how Te Tiriti reaffirms their customary rights, therefore the Bill cannot pass. She is 71 years old and has given her whole life to kaitiakitanga. It was a privilege to be beside her. It was also great to have Tariana and Metiria at the table emanating their respect and love for her korero. From the window we could see across to Hauraki and Te Moehau the mountain shining on the horizon as she rises up from Tikapa Moana.
Then Gordon Jackman, wearing his “qualified archaeologist” hat took the Committee on a journey from a beach of sand and shells through to the 1868 Deed of Cession on the East Coast, wherein the foreshore and seabed were never ceded. He explained how from the archaeological layers they uncovered at the Port of Gisborne, you can see people arriving, establishing manawhenua and adapting to population expansion from within their cultural framework, and then the violent imposition of Pakeha power in that place. Gordon challenged the committee to re assess their limited understanding of the term “ownership” and to recognise that the Bill was a continuation of Crown violence based on a crude and absurd underestanding of the word”ownership” He described the process as part of “democratheid” a word he has coined which describes the majority imposition of racist policy in a democrarcy. He also described the consequences as not civil war in the conventional sense but a long term proliferation of misery, poverty, misunderstanding and injustice.
http://www.greens.org.nz/misc-documents/diary-debacle-archive-6th-september-15th-september
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jh – what drivel – “Pakeha’s massive store of knowledge” – non-pakeha haven’t contributed to that store? No Maori/Chinese/you-name-the-race authors in your niggly little world, jh? And in that world, it seems Maori don’t visit libraries either.
Back to your pol potting, jh. You’re rambling.
Your argument has not even the weight of a single bead of polystyrene.
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Though in your defense I have to note that at least you didn’t do your trademark pointless cut and paste.
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Catherine Delahunty:
The other MPs except for Tariana and Metiria, trotted out all the favourite myths about “they killed the moa” etc
……..
“Yes, this was a blitzkrieg,” Diamond wrote in Science. “Yes, a few people could and did kill every moa.”
http://dml.cmnh.org/2000Apr/msg00529.html
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non-pakeha haven’t contributed to that store? No Maori/Chinese/you-name-the-race authors in your niggly little world, jh?
…….
Pakeha are non Maori New Zealanders (by my definition).
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Yes hj. I understand.
Your definition.
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Very interesting comments and that is the good thing about the D.R.I.P it has encouraged debate and a recognition that things are changing. Last night I spoke on the Waikato Tainui Raupatu Bill which is mainly about restoring the Waikato River through a co management model of tangata whenua and Pakeha. Everyone was very positive about it except the ACT Party who think that co management symbolises the end to what they quaintly term “one man one vote”.It seemes very unsophisticated to think that decision making in a modern state which has been built on colonisation and is now trying to restore equity should rely on a single crude mechanism. There are times for voting and times for consensus and we can develop many strategies for decision making if some of us get over needing to control everything.
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Catherine Delahuny, do you believe in equal rights?
Assuming you do, can you explain to me why one born New Zealander should have different rights to another born New Zealander? Whether that be on the basis of race, gender, religion, culture or any other criteria for that matter.
@janine you said
“In terms of the DRIP – at last, a potential dialogue between equals!”
Which is precisely what it is not, it gives (in theory) different rights to one group over another.
Very scary.
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John Key promised a statement the same day about how this would work in practice. When somebody finds it, please can there be a new frogblog article with a link to it?
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“It seemes very unsophisticated to think that decision making in a modern state which has been built on colonisation and is now trying to restore equity should rely on a single crude mechanism. There are times for voting and times for consensus and we can develop many strategies for decision making if some of us get over needing to control everything.”
.
“one man one vote” is actually one person one vote, but Catherine Delahuntys thesis is that this shouldn’t apply because we are a colonised country (“Maori were here first”).
If a pakeha woman marries a Maori the child is tangata whenua and has more right to be here than the mother by her type of logic.
……
“Everyone was very positive about it ”
do we have atranscript of the debate (or whatever it was)?
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