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The Tino Rangatiratanga flag flies alongside the New Zealand national flag on the Auckland Harbour Bridge during Waitangi Day celebrations (photo: Hannah Peters/Getty Images).
The Tino Rangatiratanga flag flies alongside the New Zealand national flag on the Auckland Harbour Bridge during Waitangi Day celebrations (photo: Hannah Peters/Getty Images).

OPINIONĀteaApril 27, 2020

The relevance of te Tiriti o Waitangi in the Covid-19 era

The Tino Rangatiratanga flag flies alongside the New Zealand national flag on the Auckland Harbour Bridge during Waitangi Day celebrations (photo: Hannah Peters/Getty Images).
The Tino Rangatiratanga flag flies alongside the New Zealand national flag on the Auckland Harbour Bridge during Waitangi Day celebrations (photo: Hannah Peters/Getty Images).

Law professor Dr Claire Charters (Te Arawa) lays out Aotearoa’s dual legal systems and the government’s obligations to both in these uncertain times.

The Covid-19 era is like a fast-moving picture which perpetually develops and re-develops. The picture adjusts with ever-changing information on the relevant health-science, the impact on the economy, the need for restrictions on movement, and the openness of our borders into the future. Where does our rock, New Zealand’s constitutional foundation, te Tiriti o Waitangi fit in all of this? Right in the centre, together with He Whakaputanga o te Rangatiratanga o Nu Tireni and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

First, te Tiriti sets out who has authority to regulate New Zealand, her lands, territories, resources, and the people here. And regulation – in the form of laws, rules and power – is the tool of government to address and respond to Covid-19.

Te Tiriti tells us that the New Zealand state government has some authority (kawanatanga), that Māori have some authority (rangatiratanga), and that state law and Māori law both regulate together. We have seen numerous examples of this. The state has issued new laws and rules under the Health Act 1956, the Epidemic Preparedness Act 2006 and so on. Māori continue to exercise their authority too, under tikanga Māori, to restrict access to our communities, provide flu vaccinations to our people, feed our kaumātua, educate our children, and provide personal protective equipment to our health providers.

As in any place where multiple legal systems are in play – which is anywhere with indigenous peoples – there needs to be coordination between the makers and the enforcers of the law. It has been heartening to see the police and iwi working together on the East Coast and now in Taranaki.

It would be good to see more effort by state government to work in partnership with Māori government to jointly devise and implement strategies, under law, to address Covid-19. State funding to support Māori initiatives to respond to Covid-19 is to be welcomed, even if it might have come sooner. Coordinated governance would be even better, especially based on shared information and expertise.

The UN’s Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples provides a blueprint for how indigenous law and state law should co-exist. I hope that the New Zealand government will continue with its work towards a plan to realise the Declaration to provide more detail on a post-colonial plural legal structure. We could have used that blueprint during this emergency.

Second, te Tiriti imposes restrictions on state government, te Karauna. If authority and power is not exercised in accordance with te Tiriti or human and indigenous peoples’ rights, it is illegal and illegitimate, even in times of emergency when restrictions can be somewhat relaxed. It is important that both state government, te Karauna, and rangatiratanga Māori are exercised in accordance with those limitations.

The principle of equity is basic to te Tiriti. What we know for sure is that Māori do not enjoy equity with non-Māori in today’s Aotearoa. This is an unfortunate truth in many of the areas that are now under pressure during this time: health, education, housing and criminal justice, especially our prisons.

As my colleague and whānaunga Dr Elana Curtis points out in this excellent piece for e-Tangata, it behoves state government to focus on the impact of seemingly “neutral” Covid-19 strategies on Māori. For example, diverting care from patients with chronic illness which Māori disproportionately experience. And given our relatively high-level of chronic illness, it requires the state to take good care that Covid-19 does not come into high-density Māori communities where the impact could be proportionately worse. Te Tiriti, our foundational law, requires it.

Third, te Tiriti protects Māori rights to taonga Māori, including our culture. How is this relevant during Covid-19? By way of example, it requires attention to how restrictions on movement and association might impact on Māori practising our culture, whether it be in relation to tangihanga and catching fish, or the ability to kaitiaki river or manaaki our manuhiri. Such restrictions, even if part of a general prohibition, are only justified if they are kept to the minimum level and for the shortest time necessary.

So, in this wash of emergency law and regulation needed for the Herculean effort to protect the lives of all New Zealanders from this invidious virus, te Tiriti o Waitangi must continue to be the lighthouse on the shore, guiding our way.

Dr Claire Charters (Te Arawa) is an associate professor of law at the University of Auckland.

Ngāti Ruanui CEO Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. (Image: supplied)
Ngāti Ruanui CEO Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. (Image: supplied)

ĀteaApril 24, 2020

Debbie Ngarewa-Packer on attack politics, Covid-19 and her new Māori Party co-leader

Ngāti Ruanui CEO Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. (Image: supplied)
Ngāti Ruanui CEO Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. (Image: supplied)

Rebuilding support for her seatless party in the midst of a global pandemic is an unenviable task, but new Māori Party co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer is taking it in her stride.

On April 15 the Māori Party announced its new co-leaders, one tāne, one wahine, as per the party’s charter. In the top spots, the sometimes controversial former broadcaster and Labour MP John Tamihere, now head of the Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency, and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, a relatively new face in national politics, but one that’s familiar to those in her rohe of Taranaki.

Ngarewa-Packer (Ngāti Ruahine, Ngāruahine, Ngā Rauru) stepped up to contest the Te Tai Hauāuru seat, currently held by Labour’s Adrian Rurawhe, back in October 2019. At the time, former Green Party policy co-convener Jack McDonald wrote an impassioned endorsement of her nomination: “Debbie Ngarewa-Packer demonstrates what kaupapa Māori leadership can and should look like. We need her in parliament.”

When I call her at home she’s “hui-ed out” from a day of calls and online meetings, and distracted by the more pressing matter of getting wood cut for kaumātua in her area. “Real life,” she says, laughing.

Real life for the CEO of Te Rūnanga o Ngāti Ruanui, and former deputy mayor of South Taranaki, for many years has been advocating for Māori health and the environment at a grassroots level. Ngāti Ruanui has led a four-year fight against Trans-Tasman Resources, a company looking to mine up to 50 million tonnes of iron sands off the south Taranaki coast, and claimed victory this month with a Court of Appeal decision that ruled against its seabed mining consent.

The company is seeking leave from the Supreme Court to appeal the decision, meaning Ngāti Ruanui will likely find themselves in court again.

“We’re annoyed that we may have to go to court for a fourth time as right now our efforts are focused on protecting our community from Covid-19,” she sad in a statement on Friday. “But we are undeterred in our resolve and we will oppose TTR’s application for yet another appeal.”

So despite a bid for a seat in parliament and the unenviable task of rebuilding national support for the seatless Māori Party, the work at home will continue, it seems. “I guess life has always been focused around kaupapa and home and marae and iwi. So it will be the same, but a wider a platform for us to take some of our issues to… I’ve been waiting for a while to stretch that platform,” she tells me.

Ngarewa-Packer and Tamihere are the first leaders appointed since the Māori Party failed in its bid to stay in parliament at the 2017 general election, after which then-leaders Marama Fox and Te Ururoa Flavell stood down. This is also the first time since the formation of the party that leaders have been appointed without any representatives in parliament. For the party members, it was a chance to start from scratch, Ngarewa-Packer says. The nomination and election process also had to be done remotely thanks to the Covid-19 restrictions.

“It was encouraging that the nominations had to come from the electorates,” Ngarewa-Packer notes. “The nominations then had to go back to the electorates and they had a special general meeting that determined the leaders only if the electorates gave 100% support.”

The general meeting was held online and the announcement of the new leaders made soon after. Ngarewa-Packer says, as modestly as possible, they ran uncontested. “It came out that there were a strong two. No other names were put forward.”

The new Māori Party co-leaders, John Tamihere and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer (Photo: supplied)

She says the focus leading up to the election will be on health and the environment. Pre-Covid, a lot of energy was being put into the party’s flagship programme Whānau Ora, established in 2010 by founding Māori Party co-leader Tariana Turia. “Also He Kai Kei Aku Ringa, a major piece of policy within E Rere, which is about employment and training for our rangatahi. And obviously with my presence, it’s a major push on wai, on our environment and our seabed.

“But to be really honest, we’ve spent a lot of time on Covid. A lot of thinking on how we capture what the Māori movement has done across the motu with our pandemic response. All the responses that we’ve been involved in, whether it be Waipareira care packages or iwi protecting their borders, or us here at Te Tai Hauāuru with creating our own digital hubs, our own welfare centres, our own testing stations.

“The stand-up way Māori have responded must become a critical part of the future of Aotearoa. We’ve always talked about the strength of mana motuhake and the strength of Te Tiriti partnerships, but sometimes it’s not a tangible thing that the average person can grasp. So that’s the most important part, making sure that we amplify that and bring that through in a strategic and policy setting for this government.”

Ngarewa-Packer was a key voice in the Covid-19 iwi response, not only in analysing and mitigating risks in her own rohe, but in keeping applied pressure on local and central government to include Māori in their risk assessment. Despite some initial oversights, she thinks the government has done well.

“We want to work with the government and apply different politics in what unity and working together looks like. I think that’s the leadership we’re seeing from the prime minister; she’s done a sterling job.”

She’s coy about whether there are any big issues on which they’ll be taking on Labour’s Māori caucus. “We’re Māori! There will be lots of kaupapa we butt heads about. The most important thing is to respect people when you do go head to head, to disrupt thinking and to land something that’s going to be a critical lever or solution.”

Regardless of who she might find herself in opposition to, she’s critical of attack politics, calling it “old boys’ behaviour”.

“This behaviour of looking for things you don’t have in common instead of a strengths-based approach, it’s really archaic. I don’t think that’s the politics that turns our people on and brings about unity. We’re at war, we’re trying to save our whānau’s lives. So it’s going to take a different type of discipline.”

When I point out that’s she described a style of politics her co-leader has subscribed to in the past, she’s diplomatic.

“[John] has taken a different journey to arrive to where he believes is the best position for mana motuhake. I’ve always had clarity of politics and I’ve always had clarity of Te Pāti Māori and its purpose, so I have no doubt that there will be different styles.”

Commentators were quick to point out the potentially incompatible differences between the two leaders – Tamihere’s forceful rhetoric versus Ngarewa-Packer’s tend-the-ahi-kaa approach. Diplomatically avoiding another question on whether she’s worried Tamihere is a divisive figure, she says, “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t worry about a lot of things that we have before us”.

“I’m really worried that we’re not in government. I’m worried that we’ve got such a big mission to help push all the amazing kaupapa that are going on and our own solutions to get people out of poverty and out of situations that the government machine doesn’t understand how to solve.”

“It’s natural for us all to have concerns, but I do think that the party has an absolute conviction of purpose and I think that’s our focus. It has to be. I have no doubt we will have challenges!

“I mean, look at Jacinda and Winston, who would have thought?”