Waitangi Day 2005: Fair and frank for the good of the nation

The Treaty House: Waitangi Day is an opportunity to take stock of national qualities like fairness and the right to protest. Picture / Richard Robinson

Ahead of Waitangi Day on Sunday, the Herald invited three New Zealanders to reflect on nation building and race relations. Today Philip Temple, a Dunedin writer and historian, and Hone Harawira, Maori Party candidate for Te Tai Tokerau, set out their thoughts.

* Philip Temple

The economic state of the nation is said to be the best it has been for 30 years: money in the bank, low unemployment, an open, diversified and flexible marketplace. The prospects are good. Despite the relatively lousy summer weather, we still have the best climate in the world. And the best beaches, mountains, lakes and the rest of it.

There are still not too many of us to seriously compromise our enjoyment of these. We are still far enough away from the rest of the world that we avoid its worst excesses of overcrowding, pollution, terrorism and the rest, even if we have to cope with an increasing number of its refugees. Compared with anywhere else I can think of, this is still God's Own. So why do I feel deeply uneasy about where we are going?

Own Land

Let's take those beaches, lakes and mountains first. The early warning systems are already flashing. The Milford and Routeburn walking tracks are now full to bursting. Overcrowded huts replace solitude. Streams of jostling walkers impede the view, let alone the sound of the birdlife. The Sutherland Falls are now a digital photo or video opportunity. Tour operators, looking for a bigger buck, find ways of illegally boosting walker numbers.

Further north, at Aoraki/Mount Cook, the Hooker Valley track is a fixture on the itinerary for thousands of international travellers so that the walk becomes less an exercise of spot the buttercup than dodge the tourist. A fine day's atmosphere is drilled with the persistent reverberations of ski-planes and helicopters. If you are a climber, expect to be a performer for aerial tourists, too.

Along the coasts and across the high country, we read regularly of another chunk of our prime natural heritage being sold off to the highest bidder. Given the price of our land compared with North America and Europe, we attract a new kind of economic refugee - the bolt-holing mega rich. Damn the effect on land or natural heritage values.

So what should be done? Access to New Zealand's natural heritage facilities - tracks, huts, etc ... should be an extra charge on non-New Zealanders. A clear premium would assist protection and renewal. It might also suppress usage.

A bad thing for the tourist industry? No - it would increase the life and value of the attraction.

It would also give New Zealanders a bit more elbow room in their own outdoors.

Purchase of land by overseas owners? End it. Purchase of New Zealand land only by New Zealanders. If prospective overseas buyers love this country so much, then they should come and qualify for citizenship.

And if they don't want to, but have plenty of cash to spare, then they can afford to rent or lease here.

Our Own Lives

As the old Beatles song says, money can't buy you love. A prosperous economy also cannot buy you personal freedom. An authoritarian tendency of the current Government has become more prominent as it has felt more secure and confident. This has shown itself most recently in the anti-smoking legislation and the attitude of the police towards a largely law-abiding public. I gave up smoking a while ago and am glad to have smoke-free restaurants.

But a part of me rebels against the idea of politicians considering it perfectly all right, relying on statistical bullshit, to restrict the rights of people who are really causing other people very little harm. Instead of Wellington bureaucrats considering the possibility of licensed smoking bars for the 15 per cent who will always smoke, they suggested instead that movies with smoking actors in them should be censored. So people under 18 should no longer view Casablanca?

For all of Michael King's well-meaning reassurance that most New Zealanders are good-hearted, practical, commonsensical and tolerant, the anti-smoking legislation shows that a fair number are also punitive, impractical, lacking in sense and intolerant. This wowser part of the national character, which is being allowed more rein under the present regime, is also exemplified in the belief of the police that large resources should be put into punishing non-criminal citizens who exceed the speed limit rather than in pursuit of dangerous drivers or into improving their own response times to acts of violence, burglary and murder.

No, I have not collected a speeding ticket recently. But I have recently witnessed undertaking on the shoulder at 100km/h on State Highway 1, belligerent tailgating by Remuera tractors and suicidal overtaking which has required evasive action. Of course, there is never a patrol car in sight when these sort of things happen. But driving between Huntly and Tirau at New Year I counted six patrol cars policing calm and orderly traffic streams.

The latest police move in the cause of catching criminals is to send up to six officers into bars and hotels to see if anyone has drunk too much. The underlying presumption in this is that you are guilty unless you can prove you're innocent.

What's next? Drinking ration cards? The police can only operate as wowser monitors if the climate within Government allows such action. Bringing some good-hearted, practical commonsense and tolerance back into the equation will depend on citizens telling MPs what they think and on how they use their vote later this year.

Our Own Values

I support a change of national flag. I have done so since I first saw the Canadian maple leaf flag many years ago. Changing the flag would not mean the end of the world as we know it - as opponents claim - or the inevitable shift to a republic, independent of the British Commonwealth. It did not happen in Canada.

But a flag is a symbol of place and identity and we should be proud to demonstrate more distinctively our special place and role in the world.

More important will be how we work towards preserving the constitutional values that our flag symbolises.

An American observer at one of our elections some years ago noticed that while the word freedom was dominant in US campaigns, fairness was the key word here. This simple idea underpins such key concepts as equality of opportunity, social justice, reparations to Maori under the Treaty of Waitangi and a highly representative and open Parliament. We have one of the finest democratic systems in the world.

But this is under threat. All the problems of the world, without exception, are caused by one group of people claiming primacy over another.

No matter whether this is through the invasion of another's land, the tyrannies of class or caste, the moral aggression of those who insist only they hear the real word of God, or of those who claim primacy in all matters because they arrived somewhere first.

Our social values and our constitutional system are continually tested and constantly under review. In this process, whether privately, in attending a select committee hearing or in simply casting a vote, my hope is that the security of our own special democracy and its underlying precept of fairness will always be our people's touchstones and that we will always resist those groups in our country who seek to diminish either, or who count themselves above them.

 

* Hone Harawira

Waitangi Day rolls around again and, as in past years, politicians, leaders and anyone who wants to be someone is taking a shot at protesters.

But they are wrong to decry the importance, and the place of protest in our society. Waitangi Day should be a day of protest. Maori have lost a lot, and to not protest is to assume that things are okay. They aren't.

I know, as does Helen Clark and many others, that protest is often the basis of positive change. And for Maori, protest has a long and dignified history.

Hone Heke chopped down the flagpole at Kororareka to protest the imposition of ideas which threatened his authority.

In fighting the British, Rewi Maniapoto gave us the famous saying, translated, "we shall fight on forever and ever". To protest the theft of their lands, Te Whiti and Tohu gave the world its first real look at a concept which has come to be known as passive resistance.

More recently, Government refused to recognise treaty rights and land rights until the land march forced the issue. Nga Tamatoa had to suffer sustained and massive abuse from Maori as well as Pakeha in their drive to get the Maori language taught in schools. Bastion Point wasn't given back to Ngati Whatua because somebody asked for it back, but because people kicked up so much fuss that it couldn't be ignored.

The Springbok tour, and all of the state violence, marked a turning point in the way this country treated South Africa; Maori were a vital part of that noble movement.

Protest has pricked the conscience of our nation and brought us smoke-free venues, GE-free foods, Maori broadcasting, nuclear-free waters, and many other treasures that we take for granted.

So let's none of us ever be so high and mighty that we can afford to ignore our own reality. Protest has a valid place in Maori and Pakeha society.

National Reflection

But Waitangi Day should be more than just a day of protest. It should also be a day when we measure ourselves as a nation; when we can look back over the past 12 months to see where we have come, and to look ahead and plan for the next 12 months.

I have spoken to politicians from across the spectrum, as well as iwi leaders and protest veterans, and many agree with the idea of Tai Tokerau hosting an annual conference to assess where we are as a nation. Not just politicians coming to pontificate, nor am I suggesting Waitangi be just a venue for the ranting of radicals (including myself) - I'd like to see economists, unemployed, bankers, artists, workers, philosophers, all coming to share their thoughts and ideas about where we are and where they think we are heading.

We need to hear many perspectives: those in land occupation; those who seek to retain their sovereignty; those Kiwis who fear the loss of access to beaches; and those who oppose overseas land ownership.

As we move towards a republic, we need to decide whether we are serious about the Treaty of Waitangi being our founding document, and if so, how to ensure that Maori expectations will be meaningfully addressed, while giving all New Zealanders the same sense of national pride.

We need to broaden the debate, and we need to broaden the audience who can participate in that debate. I have no qualms about Maori and Pakeha being there, or Asian and Pacific Islander, or anybody else.

We need to hear from other indigenous people about whether there are better ways in which we can promote nationhood and what advice they can give on how we might better respect our cultural differences while still recognising the special place of Maori in this country.

We should invite international constitutional experts to speak to us about the rights of different populations, and we need to consider the obligations we all have to building a brighter future in our land.

We need to lift the discussion of ideas from the venomous attacks of previous years to a point where there is genuine communication, and we need to lift the level of political response from the patronising replies of the past.

Waitangi is the only forum where this can take place, and Waitangi Day the day for it to happen. Waitangi Day is, for better or worse, the day we commemorate the birth of our nation. It is appropriate we use that opportunity to measure our progress, or regress, as a nation.

* Hone Harawira is the organiser of the foreshore and seabed hikoi to Parliament in 2004, and the recently appointed Maori Party candidate to contest the Tai Tokerau seat.