Waatea News Column: Nothing highlights the denial of colonialism quite like the Parihaka apology
We must never allow the perfect to defeat the good, but the fact that it’s taken 138 years to formally apologise for the tragedy of Parihaka speaks volumes about the cultural denial of the negative effects of colonialism.
The secret to New Zealand’s economic success over its barely 200 year life has been the illegal seizure of indigenous lands and point blank refusal to hand them back or pay genuine compensation for their theft.
Māori lost 95% of their land in less than a century, the economic, cultural and political legacy of that level of theft is seen today in every negative social, education and health statistic we have.
Settling the Treaty is a Pakeha desire so that they can drop the pretense of solving that legacy, where as honouring the Treaty requires an engaged partnership and real understanding.
The Treaty settlement process to date has been a farce that has only succeeded in exacerbating and entrenching the injustice of the original confiscation, so what needs to happen now?
I am a big believer in the Treaty and a big believer in Constitution. If we are serious about righting the wrongs of our colonial past so that Māori have the same agency promised to them under the Treaty, we must consider political structural change with an Upper House created within Parliament that has 50-50 Pakeha and Māori representation.
This Upper House would consider law from the perspective of its Treaty obligations and reject legislation back down to the House of Representatives if that law didn’t reach that standard.
Tinkering and flawed processes have done nothing to bring justice in 138 years since Parihaka, that is what the Government should truly be apologising for.
First published on Waatea News.
As long as there are commentators like Nelson’s Amy Brooke, formerly Agnes-Mary Brooke, chipping away
like a te peke rakau at everything Maori, then there’s a pernicious anti-Maori undercurrent meanly festering, and ignorant, or not caring, about the realities of history.
Why she publishes this bilge in overseas publications, is a bit odd – unless it’s for the money. Does she think that Australian readers of The Spectator will all rise up on the side of white NZ’ers ? Not likely – this is Amy
being Amy, per usual.
As the wife of a medical practitioner, and as somebody who has spent little time out in the paid workforce, Amy Brooke is, I suggest, unacquainted with the dynamics of the lives of people who sometimes don’t have money for shoes for their children, or money to heat their rented homes, year after year after year, and this sometimes due to the vagaries of a history imposed on them in a way which the civilised among us know to be unconscionable.
https://www.spectator.co.uk/2019/10/made-up-maori/
A constitutional change to establish an upper house may not necessarily be the best way of honouring the Treaty, and if Brooke is representative of the well-heeled half-educated Pakeha middle-class who object to Waitangi Tribunal settlements per se, it will be seen as divisive – which it will be.
Snow White: “…Nelson’s Amy Brooke, formerly Agnes-Mary Brooke…”
Her profile in NZ nowadays is so low as to be subterranean. In truth, I doubt it has ever been particularly high, even when her column was syndicated, back in the late 80s – early 90s. My impression is that she’s always been a bit abrasive, tending to fall out with people who might otherwise have been supportive of her views. She won’t be having any kind of influence here, I’d guess.
“…chipping away like a te peke rakau at everything Maori…”
D’Esterre – AB was contributing to Investigate Magazine (I don’t know if it still exists) and publishes her own children’s books and other people’s books; and Wishart’s company, published her book, The 100 Days. In it she is anti-Islam, but possibly unaware that there are more forms of Islam, than Christianity. She also argues for abolishing the Treaty – vigorously argues anti-Maori on all Maori issues I think – it’s not indexed, and others may be more interested in tackling it than I – I dipped.
The book reads as if it may be a compendium of old columns, but I think without the benefit of the late Frank Haden’s sub-editing. There are things in it which I think plain wrong e.g. that the govt obliged mothers to use Plunket’s services, and an horrific allegation against Plunket, which I won’t repeat.
She writes much with which I would not agree, including, ” Nowadays lesbian and homosexual teachers are ready to pounce to indoctrinate vulnerable teenagers via gay support groups at schools,” and I have to be careful here, as I cannot afford costly litigation. Her brother told me a few years back that she disputed a fairly minor-type traffic infringement with a woman police or MOT person, hired a top Wgtn barrister to take it to court, and won at a personal cost of $16,000.
This is an elegant example of the gulf which exists between people with money, and those without – the rest of us would gulp, and pay up for small traffic stuff, but many cannot afford to do that – an unexpected demand upon an empty purse can precipitate a major family crisis; $16,000 could buy more than enough instant noodles to feed a family for a year.
I am not anti-homosexual; I don’t care that Helen Clark is childless – or that Ardern isn’t; I don’t mind whether Sue Bradford is Marxist or Socialist and welcomed her anti-smacking bill; I like Noam Chomsky, am ok with Che Guevara (and have Jon Anderson’s v long definitive book on him), and don’t think that this country will suffer through not believing in the virgin birth. However, the Treaty stays, and whatever wrinkles may occur in it’s implementing, they must be addressed, and will be, with patience required from all parties, and hopefully with no more unhelpful judgmental labelling of the undeserving. (Hint hint Greens.)
Snow White: “However, the Treaty stays….”
I used to think that, too, back in the 1970s and 8os. But: the more years have elapsed since then, and the more NZ society has changed, the less certain I am about the place of the Treaty, or what implementing it actually means. Here’s Elizabeth Rata’s take on it:
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=10853668
She encapsulates my view on the issue nowadays. I think that many NZers share a similar perspective.
Snow White: “….Nelson’s Amy Brooke, formerly Agnes-Mary Brooke….”
Nowadays, her profile is so low as to be subterranean; in truth I doubt that it was ever particularly high, even in the days when she had a column in the Press.
“….chipping away like a te peke rakau at everything Maori…”
She’s certainly had a bee in her bonnet for many years about taha Maori. As the wife of a GP, I’d have thought that she’d have been privy to the hardscrabble side of life that is, in general, the lot of the poor. But then, she lives in the Nelson area. I was born near there; pakeha settlement came very early, and I’ve got the impression over the years that the descendants of the original settlers have a negative view of Maori. This may be driven by memories of the Wairau Massacre being handed down from generation to generation.
While I don’t doubt that some citizens who aren’t Maori share her views, my impression (admittedly this is anecdotal) is that most don’t. If their family is intermarried (as is my extended family), they’ll have an opinion formed by experience; otherwise, it seems to me that they know little and generally care less. They aren’t negative, just not interested. Many Maori no doubt feel the same about pakeha, if they don’t have regular interaction.
“Why she publishes this bilge in overseas publications, is a bit odd…”
Probably because nobody in NZ will publish her. I read that Spectator piece: it fairly represents her views, hostile as they are. But – all other things being equal – I fail to see why she couldn’t get it published here. Free speech and all that: she’s at liberty to hold any opinion she likes, and if she were to be published here, it would provide the opportunity for people to challenge her. It isn’t until I look at an article like this of hers that I realise the extent to which public discourse here is censored. Not only does it dumb down such debate as there might be, it’s potentially dangerous.
“…if Brooke is representative of the well-heeled half-educated Pakeha middle-class who object to Waitangi Tribunal settlements per se…”
She may be, but I doubt that, to be honest, from what I’ve heard. Though I have picked up a note of impatience among the middle classes, given the history of Treaty settlements and the fact that their benefits haven’t percolated down to the poorest Maori. And they can read: they see the education, healthcare and crime stats. Once upon a time, I agreed with those who claimed that Maori needed a separate education system: discrimination based on skin colour and so on. However, the arrival of waves of non-English-speaking migrants, whose children by and large did well in school, changed my mind. And in truth, middle class Maori had always performed well in education: I went to school and uni with them. And the same is true of healthcare: I worked in that system for many years, had my eyes thoroughly opened to the realities.
“A constitutional change to establish an upper house…”
I’ve always favoured a return to the upper house system, as we used to have. But I most emphatically don’t favour appointments to it.
If we were to have an upper house, we must elect those who sit in it. I doubt that many citizens (many Maori included) would want a quota for Maori; in the modern world, which we now inhabit, quotas of that sort bespeak segregation – and, technically, racism. My generation fought against segregation in various other polities: it would be bizarre indeed, were we to find that sort of system instituted in our own polity.
‘We have moved on from colonial times ” not in towel ronger look at here council and not in mosgiel and parts of the south island racism is very much alive and festering.
Michelle: “….towel ronger…”
It looks as if you need a bit of a hand with your spelling (and possibly pronunciation) of Maori place names. I can help there: I learned te reo Maori back in the 1970s, when I was a young adult: I’m crash hot at spelling and pronunciation.