NZ First and ACT plans for the Waitangi Tribunal, explained
Lady Tureiti Moxon says plans by coalition parties to abolish or limit the Waitangi Tribunal are an attempt to "bury" a body that exposes Treaty breaches.
She spoke to RNZ in an interview published on 28 September. She said the Tribunal gave Māori an important way to challenge Crown decisions that breached Te Tiriti o Waitangi, according to RNZ.
New Zealand First is campaigning on abolition. Its policy, 'Ending the Waitangi Make-Work Industry' and attributed to Winston Peters, proposes legislation in the first 100 days after the election to abolish the Tribunal and replace it with a 'Treaty of Waitangi Completion Commission', according to New Zealand First.
Abolition would need a change to the law. A replacement body would also need its own legal basis. The policy presents both as actions to take after the election, not as changes already made.
ACT proposes a different path. It would end the Tribunal's power to inquire into present-day Crown policy and conduct, confine it to historical claims filed by the legal deadline of 1 September 2008, and close it when that work is finished, according to ACT.
In practice, one plan removes the Tribunal altogether. The other keeps it for a defined group of historical claims but removes inquiries into current issues.
The Tribunal is a standing commission of inquiry set up under the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975. It investigates alleged wrongdoing and makes recommendations to the Government. A claim is an allegation that the Crown has breached the Treaty of Waitangi through an action, a failure to act, a law or a policy, according to the Waitangi Tribunal.
Its work includes recommendations on claims brought by Māori about legislation, policies and actions. It can also examine and report on proposed laws — like an independent check before Parliament decides. After an inquiry, it writes a report to the relevant Minister or Ministers and the claimants.
Moxon has direct experience of that process. She was a lead claimant in the Tribunal's inquiry into the disestablishment of Te Aka Whai Ora, the Māori Health Authority. That report found the Crown breached several Treaty principles and showed reckless disregard for the Crown-Māori relationship.
The broader context here is familiar in the Press Gallery. Historical claims have a closed filing date. Contemporary claims test live policy and proposed legislation. For Ministers, officials and lawyers, where that line is drawn affects where a challenge is heard, when it is heard and what the legal risk is.
In my view, the next questions for the Beehive are procedural rather than rhetorical. What law would carry abolition or a limit on its powers. What would happen to claims already filed or being heard. What functions, if any, a Completion Commission would take over. None of those details are settled in the campaign policies as published. They would need to be set out in a bill, in coalition talks, and in instructions to the lawyers who draft laws.
