We need to put New Zealand values first, not Winston First
As Aotearoa marks Waitangi 2026, debates around immigration, co-governance, and national identity are being deliberately inflamed by political actors seeking division. This essay argues that Western Pākehā democratic traditions and Māori kaupapa are not in conflict with multiculturalism — they are strong enough to sustain it. Grounded in Te Tiriti o Waitangi and universal democratic values, the piece challenges fear-based narratives while calling for an immigration system that protects both migrant workers and domestic communities.
We need to put New Zealand values first, not Winston First
Immigration Scapegoating and the Return of Fear Politics
Attacking immigrants and scapegoating their desire for a better life for the hollowing out of public services and the deunionisation of the Labour force that continues to push conditions and wages lower is an age old tactic that looks like it will be making a come back this year thanks to NZF.
Sir Ian Mclennan has a a response for Jones…
Why Bicultural Foundations Strengthen Multicultural Societies
…I think our Western Pakeha values + Māori Kaupapa are strong enough to welcome multiculturalism, not fear it.
I believe co-governance is a strength, not a weakness!
We need to put New Zealand values first, not Winston First.
Co-Governance Is Not Apartheid — It Is Accountability
In my entire 50 years of life, I as a Pakeha male have never once been penalised in any way shape or form by any measure to help Māori!
I don’t see co-governance as the faux apartheid some manufacture it as.
We need to put New Zealand values first, not Winston First.
Te Tiriti o Waitangi and the Crown–Citizen Relationship
For me, I love the Treaty because of the relationship of responsibility it immediately sets up between the Crown and its people.
I believe Pakeha have to actually understand that the Treaty applies directly to them as well because it explains the relationship between the state and its citizens!
The Treaty sets out the obligations of the Crown to protect the rights of its people. We deserve as a nation to entrench the Treaty as the basis of our constitutional relationship so we can force Governments to protect our rights rather than strip us of them.
Treaty’s are to be honoured, not settled!
That Treaty centric focus to our being as a people allows our Pakeha values to welcome migrants, not shun them.
We need to put New Zealand values first, not Winston First.
When Immigration Anxiety Becomes Far-Right Mobilisation
Tommy Robinson’s enormous 110,000+ protest in the UK last year was not about the Anglo Saxon values we whakapapa to in the West, they are white supremacy fears using mass immigration as the fuel…
Westminster’s hardening attitudes to immigration are leading anti-racist campaigners to warn a far-right UK government no longer seems unthinkable
Anglo-Saxon Democratic Values Are Universal, Not Racial
…in his powerful 2013 polemic, ‘How we invented freedom & why it matters’, Conservative Politician and writer, Daniel Hannan makes a powerful case for the values of the Anglosphere by tracing the history of Anglo-Saxon democratic friction points from Crown vs Parliament, Protestant vs Catholic and Whig vs Tory.
Hannan argues that these friction points towards a common law where the individual was empowered against the Crown set in motion a raft of unique Anglo-Saxon political values that created an exceptionalism for Western Democracy.
Free Speech, free contract, free assembly, parliamentary control of the executive, an independent Judiciary, these Hannon argues sets in motion a collection of values that builds a democratic infrastructure that has been honed by Whig and Tory factions over centuries and diluted a system of Western Civilisation that empowers the individual and protects them from tyrants.
These Anglo-Saxon values of Free Speech, Freedom of Religion, no taxation without representation, the freedom of the individual, Independent Judiciary, free contract, free assembly – these are values that EVERY human wants, regardless of skin colour or culture.
Robinson is simply using fear to attack others coming into our countries and enjoying the universal freedoms that Anglo-Saxon tradition has built over 1,000 years.
The Rule of Law, and not the whims of a brutal leader are something everyone wants.
We need to put New Zealand values first, not Winston First.
Mass Immigration Without Planning Creates Real Social Pressure
The cultural friction of mass immigration has been allowed because cheap immigration is a lazy way to expand GDP by politicians who show little concern for.
Take NZ.
National, ACT and NZF have over the last year let in 140,500 new mostly-young workers, predominantly from India, China, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Fiji and South Africa, while 201 Kiwis flee the country EVERY SINGLE DAY!
Both Labour and National over the last 3 decades have used mass immigration as a lazy GDP bump rather than invest in us as a people to expand our own population base.
Like everything, all Parties have allowed the free market to work it out rather than protect our own people AND migrant workers from being exploited!
Auckland has ground to a gridlocked stand still because it’s size has grown by 17% without any of the extra revenue to pay for that growth!
At some point we are going to have to have a serious conversation about mass immigration and how it is placing unsustainable pressure on the country!
You can’t bring that huge number of people into NZ each and every single year without there being intense cultural, political and social friction.
We need to put New Zealand values first, not Winston First
What a Progressive, Fair Immigration Policy Could Look Like
Here are some ideas:
- We have to incentivise Kiwis into lifting their fertility rates and heavily subsidise childcare and maternity leave – we need us having more kids to keep up with the population requirements so we don’t need to keep importing so many people.
- Lift our refugee numbers with wrap around services – we have an obligation as a Liberal Progressive Democracy to provide haven for those being damaged on a warring planet.
- Ensure every single migrant worker coming into NZ are automatically enrolled in a migrant Union to ensure they are being paid the same as domestic workers so bosses can’t use
- Bonded education – pay the fees and provide a living allowance plus cheap accomodation to all domestic Kiwis training to be teachers, drs, nurses, and all other public service roles and jobs – they get the education for free in return for 5 years bonded service in NZ.
Allowing the free market to simply push out anyone with skills to bring in cheaper work forces for exploitation IS NOT AN IMMIGRATION POLICY!
We need to put New Zealand values first, not Winston First.
Climate Migration and the Future of Democratic Responsibility
As the planet burns, these trends are are only going to become more extreme, we will start seeing vast numbers of climate refugees fleeing parts of the planet that become increasingly inhospitable, so we need a plan to cope with that while holding onto the Anglo-Saxon values that make our Democracy so attractive in the first place.
Those Anglo-Saxon values don’t have a skin colour, they are universal, we welcome our migrant brothers and sisters because the values we stand for recognise the importance of the individual, but we also need to recognise the pressures generated by mass immigration when we are economically played off against each other.
Protecting our migrant communities from exploitation strengthens us all and a multi-cultural society built upon the biculturalism of the Treaty is a strength, not a weakness.
We need to put New Zealand values first, not Winston First
We are stronger for multiculturalism, not weakened by it!
Winston isn’t arguing for NZ Democracy, he is arguing for majoritarianism which is 2 wolves and a lamb voting on who to eat for lunch.
He is scapegoating the other and he is demonising them.
He wants to lift up the Māori Electorate ladder after he has used it, how very Boomer of him.
He is older than the state of modern Israel and has been kingmaker 4 times, how has he left NZ better?
He hasn’t!
We need to put New Zealand values first, not Winston First!
“Robinson is simply using fear to attack others coming into our countries and enjoying the universal freedoms that Anglo-Saxon tradition has built over 1,000 years.”
The main reason for immigration is standard of living. High GDP country attract migrants from lower GDP countries. One hour of labour in New Zealand buys more on the international market than one hour of labour in India or Samoa. Similarly far more new Zealanders are attracted to live and work in Australia than the other way round, given Ausrtralia’s actual income is about one third higher than what it is in New Zealand – although I have heard that it was once the other way round, I could be wrong here.
Aside from wealth disparities and war and famine and extreme political instability, most people will stay where they are born.
New Zealand does not have a superior political system to say Iran or China’s. It has a far higher GDP, a legacy of imperialism.
Those values you claim are Anglo Saxon are also values everyone wants, but at the same time like everything in life you can it prioritize everything at the same time. If your country once went through extreme poverty and war and invasion, political stability may be more important than political pluralism. Other places like Singapore prioritize the rights of woman to walk the streets safely at night. Far more safely than Auckland’s CBD. But that means you may have to deprioritize the ‘rights’ of rapists or would be rapists or drug addicts.
Indeed I would say women’s rights are far better protected in almost any East Asian city than in the West as public safety is paramount. Western values are often performative rather than measured in outcomes.