I am hoping you might indulge me as I write about the events of this week and how it demonstrates the dangerous path of division we are being forced down by a Labour Government controlled by its Maori caucus that is yet again demonstrating racist bullying that no other elected representatives could get away with.

On Wednesday I discovered a new hero, something that is rare in New Zealand at the moment.

ACT’s Karen Chhour demonstrated what it means to be a proud, dignified New Zealander who also represents Maoridom in a manner which is inspiring.

In her fight to protect the rights of vulnerable children, she was attacked by an individual that can only be described as a bully and a thug.

Supported by the derisive laughter of his peers, Kelvin Davis attempted to belittle the ACT MP, not by challenging the facts at issue, but by attacking her identity.

>> Click here to watch the news coverage <<

Sitting in the lofty heights as the self-appointed determiner of what Maori are and are not allowed to think and feel, he denied Karen Chhour her identity.

Let us not forget that Kelvin Davis, before Labour came into Government, made it a bottom line that he would resign from Parliament if Charter Schools were scrapped. Charter Schools were quickly scrapped under the Labour Government and, demonstrating the backbone of an invertebrate, Kelvin fell silent on his bottom line, with his forty pieces of silver including the deputy leadership.

Charter Schools were the most successful educational system for at risk and vulnerable Maori kids, achieving outcomes that were unprecedented. It seems, however, that once in government, Kelvin was not interested in what’s good for Maori; he’s only interested in advancing himself and a narrative of separatism.

Let us not get bogged down in the need to achieve real benefit for Maori when we can instead deliver a bunch of virtue signalling nonsense that benefits only an elite class of Maori, who can slap each other on the back enjoying the success of bullying those who are trying to advocate for the vulnerable.

But, of course, I will be classified by Kelvin as having the “vanilla lens” that prevents me for exposing a fraud and bully when I see one. I can’t possibly speak until, according to the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party,  I “cross the bridge that is Te Tiriti o Waitangi” so I can get to understand my Maori world better.

I wonder by whose measure the understanding of my “Maori world” is tested. After six years of advocating for equality of rights for ALL New Zealanders in my role with Hobson’s Pledge, the attacks on my right to speak as a Maori are truly water off a duck’s back. Unlike the Kelvins of this world, I don’t claim to speak for ALL Maori. I am not afraid of my views being challenged and I will debate the issues and demand accountability. I do not need to resort to name-calling and insults that belittle those who have a different point of view. But in Kelvin’s case, I have decided an exception can be made.

Karen Chhour demonstrates the growing awakening of Maori who have tired of the bullies and thugs who claim to speak for “us”. She speaks for accountability, and demands delivery of better solutions without being distracted by this narrative that Maori are incapable of achieving on merit because of events that unfolded two hundred years ago.

Yes, New Zealand can do better in protecting the vulnerable and improving outcomes but this takes serious conversations by intelligent people. And, despite Kelvin’s protestations, being Maori or not has nothing to do with your competency to find solutions.  

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Even with the strong public support we consistently see for the equal treatment of all New Zealanders, regardless of race, the mainstream media are working harder than ever to stifle important debates in our society by reducing these issues to purely concerns of race, rather than democracy and equal citizenship.

Simon Wilson wrote in the Herald, calling the opposition to Maori Health Authority and Three Waters, "straight-out racism," while failing to address any of the good faith arguments made against those policies.

Read the Simon Wilson article here

ACT’s leader, David Seymour, has continued to speak strongly and responded appropriately to the flawed and naïve arguments put forward by the NZ Herald when he said:

"Our best future is a modern, multi-ethnic, liberal democracy. Each of those words matters. We should be a leading society with an equal place for all. Nobody should be born special, nobody should be born a second-class citizen. It’s a sad sign of the times that you can have a regular column in the country’s largest paper, and think such beliefs are “racist”."

Labour continues their attempt to distance themselves from the He Puapua Report, which delivered the cocktail of initiatives to separate Kiwis on race - the actual racist agenda in New Zealand. But Willie Jackson, promising public consultation on the new “Draft Plan” to realise the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, has deferred the public release of his new approach.

It is likely that there is much that in this new draft plan that will further outrage New Zealanders, motivating Labour to keep it under wraps until the controversial Three Waters legislation works its way through the select committee process.  

The deadline for submissions on the Three Waters legislation, called the Water Services Entities Bill, is Friday, 22 July 2022. Submit at either the Parliamentary Submission Link or the Taxpayers' Union website Stop 3 Waters.

Meanwhile, the Minister responsible for this Bill is trying to avoid the controversy by claiming that any challenges regarding her many potential conflicts of interest are merely underhanded political attacks. Again, the media collaborate by alluding to a racist attack, rather than seeking the answers that are reasonable for the public to demand. In fact, Jack Tame played into the narrative by asking Minister Mahuta “Is it [the attacks] because you are Maori?”

More than the usual politicians' "nothing to see here", the approach now is to go on the offensive and call racist all those attempting any of the previously standard scrutiny.

Read and watch Nanaia Mahuta's interview here

Maori Health Authority

The co-governance model for public health services, in the form of the Maori Health Authority, was launched on 1 July, 2022, at Waitangi. Despite public health services not coming into existence for any New Zealander until 1938, the Government considered the site of the signing of the Treaty, over 100 years earlier, the appropriate venue.

The new Authority has given rise to more questions than answers on how health outcomes will be enhanced. In fact, the only matter to come to light so far is a $100 million budget for traditional Maori medicine, including practices based on the phases of the moon. Tipa Mahuta, who is both Nanaia Mahuta's sister and the co-chair of the Authority, has been notably absent from any public statements and the allegations of nepotism and conflicts of interest have been dismissed without any adequate explanation.

The Prime Minister has defended the co-governance structure of Health on the grounds of poor Maori health outcomes, but this bureaucratic change won't get a single extra doctor or nurse into work and the impact on how services will be allocated is yet to be seen.

With our health system struggling to meet the expectations of many New Zealanders, this divisive new structure will be the subject of further investigation by Hobson’s Pledge.

Virtue Signalling and Wokeness

Government agencies continue to be compromised by an agenda of virtue signalling and wokeness. They commit more and more funding to counter spurious claims of racism or bias, rather than selecting the most effective funding options.

While the Government leaves unanswered the heart felt pleas from business owners having their livelihood destroyed by increasingly brazen criminals, Police are spending $2 million to research racism. 

The NZ Transport Agency takes the prize for political correctness gone mad, by calling for tenders to investigate how the Agency could “give expression to the treaty partnership by identifying Māori experiences, expectations and priorities for transport, to inform the development of key agency responses and help build capability within agencies.”

Click here to see the tender

For example some of the research areas are:

• What are Māori expectations and priorities for transport, now and in the short, medium, and long-term future?
• What are the gaps between Māori expectations and priorities for transport and their current experiences?
• What are the gaps in data and other evidence that can be used to characterise Māori experiences and impacts on them of the transport system?
  
  

The use of public money to deliver on an agenda that continues to differentiate the treatment of New Zealanders based upon ancestry must be challenged and we will continue to fight for equal treatment of all New Zealanders.

Thank you for your support.

Casey Costello

Trustee
Hobson’s Pledge

Hobson's Pledge Trustee Casey Costello spoke at the Taxpayers' Union Stop Three Waters Roadshow event in Auckland on 30 June 2022.

 

First and foremost, thank you for being here and taking an interest in the challenges we as a nation are facing.

In the interests of full disclosure, I would start my speech by confirming that, according to our new Minister for Broadcasting and Media, and Minister of Maori Development (based upon his assessment of anyone who does not advocate for Maori in a manner that he agrees with) I am a “useless Maori”.

In addition, despite my ancestry I do not believe I have the right to speak for ALL New Zealanders who identify to their Maori whakapapa or ancestry.

But I do, however, believe that “useless” or not I have the right to point out that there is a reasonable expectation that the role of Government is to advocate for better outcomes based upon true, factual and rational information.

It is this failure to recognise that we are able to debate important, constitutional shifting issues without it being from a position of racism that is so concerning.

My reason for speaking today is to encourage the debate, to scrutinise poor policy and legislation for what it is and not allow the discussion to be shut down because the Government has inserted a race component where it does not belong.

The mere suggestion that you question the concepts of co-governance is enough to send many into a spin.

We should all be engaged in this discussion; we should be demanding this debate. If it is a logical and rational position, then those advocating for it should be able to present the evidence of where it has succeeded and demonstrate the benefits.

But instead, the request for debate is devolved into name calling and hostility.

 

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Despite the absence from your in-box, Hobson’s Pledge have been toiling away - kept busy by a Government determined to divide New Zealanders based upon ancestry.

This month alone this Labour Government has:

• Introduced the Water Services Entities Bill (which implements the Three Waters reforms) and taken it through the First Reading
• Proceeded with the Canterbury Regional Council (Ngai Tahu Representation) Bill, which has completed the second reading
• Received Royal Assent for the Pae Ora (Healthy Futures) Bill, which implements, among other things, the Maori Health Authority

Behind these issues, we cannot lose sight of:

• Coastal claims under the Marine and Coastal Area Act
• Efforts to implement co-governance over the Hauraki Gulf removing council elected representation
• The review being conducted by the Department of Conservation as to the status of roughly one third of the public conservation estate, which is “stewardship land”.
• How the history curriculum will influence New Zealand’s education system

Hobson’s Pledge continues to work to expose these issues to greater public scrutiny, as we were able to do with the Rotorua District Council (Representation Arrangements) Bill.  

The separatist agenda has been given momentum by the He Puapua Report that this Government, despite commissioning the report in 2019, has attempted to distance themselves from.

Willie Jackson, the Minister for Maori Development, (and now Broadcasting) announced in April we had nothing to fear from co-governance and that a new report to realise the objectives of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People (UNDRIP) had been commissioned.

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