He Puapua is being implemented, however all is not lost_

He Puapua is being implemented, however all is not lost https://winsleys.wordpress.com/2023/04/08/he-puapua-is-being-implemented-however-all-isnot-lost/ Also published on the NZCPR website. Posted on April 8, 2023 by Peter Winsley The Prime Minister is committed to “bread and butter” issues and has dropped or put on hold some government work programmes. However, Tiriti-related work is still being pushed hard, and He Puapua, Three Waters, and the new curriculum are well underway. He Puapua and other initiatives have been undertaken in secret, without significant consultation or public debate and without an electoral mandate. In relation to Three Waters, probably less than one percent of the non-Māori population are aware that the Te Mana o te Wai statements that iwi and hapu issue are powerful enough to give tribes effective control of New Zealand’s water resources. Te Tiriti o Waitangi is now at the core of many New Zealand statutes, constitutional and policy documents. It is disquieting that neither the current nor former Prime Minister, when asked, were able to state all three Tiriti Articles. Te Tiriti confers on the Crown governance powers (kawanatanga), including the ability to make and enforce laws, and to uphold the rule of law. It protects Māori property rights (tino rangatiratanga or chieftainship), consistent with Magna Carta and with common law. It also makes Māori subjects of the Crown with all the rights and obligations inherent in this. Te Tiriti protects all New Zealanders, not just Māori. As an international treaty a domestic government was needed to deliver on Te Tiriti within New Zealand. This was given effect to through the NZ Constitution Act 1852. New Zealand’s constitution and government system evolved, leading to the NZ Constitution Act 1986. This Act reduced the Crown’s role to the symbolic and procedural and conferred on the elected Parliament the full power to make laws. However, in recent times power has been shifting away from Parliament to the judiciary, the Waitangi Tribunal, and to other agencies with delegated powers and no (or very little) accountability. In 1975 the Waitangi Tribunal was set up to investigate and make recommendations on claims of Crown breaches of Te Tiriti. These claims became more and more expansive, such as the Wai 262 claim relating to ownership of flora and fauna. The Waitangi Tribunal has expanded beyond its original brief. It now focuses on developing new sources of dissension as well as on final settlements – if finality is possible in Tiriti claims which can be extended or relitigated. From the mid-1980s Te Tiriti became subject to judicial activism that created some tension with Parliament’s law-making role. The “Lands case” in 1987 saw Te Tiriti as akin to a partnership between Māori and the Crown, despite the absence of partnership principles in the 1840 text. ‘Taonga’ meant real property in 1840, while now it is claimed to include intangibles such as language, cultural ‘property’, water, and broadcasting spectrum. In 2014, the Tribunal opined that Ngāpuhi rangatira did not give up their sovereignty when they signed te Tiriti in 1840. There are concerns that the Tribunal’s processes may become