Controversial bill that sparked Maori rights protests heavily defeated in New Zealand parliament
A controversial bill that had set off New Zealand’s largest-ever Maori rights protest was heavily defeated in parliament amid fears it would erode indigenous rights.
The Treaty Principles Bill died in its second reading with 112 votes to 11 on Thursday, a crushing defeat that had been widely anticipated.
Politicians on the floor and in the gallery broke into waiata, or song, as they celebrated while speaker Gerry Brownlee tried to maintain control and even removed one man from the gallery.
The proposed law sought to redefine the terms of the nation’s founding treaty between Māori tribes and the British Crown signed 180 years ago.
The bill gained wide attention after a video of the nation’s youngest legislator tearing up a copy of the proposed legislation and leading a haka dance in parliament went viral.
Massive protests against the bill saw tens of thousands of New Zealanders gather outside the parliament on 19 November.
“This bill hasn’t been stopped, this bill has been absolutely annihilated,” Hana-Rāwihti Maipi-Clarke, the Maori member who led the haka during the first reading of the bill in November, said.
“We had two choices: to live or to die. We chose to live.”
The bill was proposed by the rightwing Act Party to define the principles of the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi, considered New Zealand’s founding document for upholding Maori rights. The treaty promised the tribes broad rights to retain their lands and protect their interests in return for ceding governance to the British.
The bill aimed to replace long-established principles created by courts and the parliament to guide the relationship between the Crown and Maori tribes with a new set of rules.
Act Party leader David Seymour had said the bill was “an opportunity for parliament, rather than the courts, to define the principles of the treaty, including establishing that every person is equal before the law”.
The party argued the current principles misrepresented the original intent of the 1840 treaty, creating a two-tier system where Maori had distinct political and legal rights compared to non-Maori.
Act Party’s were the only members to vote in favour of the bill on Thursday.
Mr Seymour vowed to continue the fight. “I believe this bill or something like it will pass one day because there are not good arguments against its contents,” he said on social media.
