New Zealand rejects rights bill after widespread outrage

A controversial bill seeking to reinterpret New Zealand's founding document, which established the rights of both Māori and non-Māori in the country, has been defeated at its second reading.

The Treaty Principles Bill was voted down 112 votes to 11, days after a government committee recommended that it should not proceed.

The proposed legislation sought to legally define the principles of the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi - causing widespread outrage that saw more than 40,000 people taking part in a protest outside parliament last year.

The bill had already been widely expected to fail, with most major political parties committed to voting it down.

Members of the right-wing Act Party, which tabled it, were the only MPs to vote for it at the second reading on Thursday. Act's leader David Seymour has promised to continue campaigning on the issue.

"I believe this Bill or something like it will pass one day because there are not good arguments against its contents," he wrote on social media.

Tensions were high during a parliamentary debate on the bill in November. Labour MP Willie Jackson was told to leave after refusing to withdraw a comment he made calling Seymour a "liar".

Labour leader Chris Hipkins said the proposed legislation would forever "be a stain on our country", while Te Pāti Māori (The Māori Party) MP Hana Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke - who gained international attention for starting a haka in parliament at the bill's first reading - said it had been "annihilated".

"Instead of dividing and conquering, this bill has backfired and united communities across the motu [country] in solidarity for our founding agreement and what it represents," Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson later said in a statement.

The second reading came after a select committee, which had been looking into the proposed legislation released its final report - revealing that more than 300,000 submissions had been made on it, the vast majority of which were opposed.

It is the largest response to proposed legislation that the New Zealand parliament has ever received.

While the principles of the Treaty have never been defined in law, its core values have, over time, been woven into different pieces of legislation in an effort to offer redress to Māori for the wrong done to them during colonisation.

Act's proposed legislation had three main principles: that the New Zealand government has the power to govern, and parliament to make laws; that the Crown would respect the rights of Māori at the time the Treaty was signed; and that everyone is equal before the law and entitled to equal protection.

The party said the bill would not alter the Treaty itself but would "continue the process of defining the Treaty principles". This, they believe, would help to create equality for all New Zealanders and improve social cohesion.

Among those backing it was Ruth Richardson, a former finance minister for the centre-right National Party, who told the select committee that the proposed legislation was "a bill of consequence whose time has come".

She argued that while the Treaty itself could not be disputed, the idea of its principles was a "relatively modern matter", and that these principles had so far been largely defined by the courts, rather than parliament.

"There is a new imperative in New Zealand on the cultural front, the necessity to address and correct Treaty overreach that has increasingly and evidently become wayward and wrong," she said.

Opponents of the bill, meanwhile, believe it would be detrimental to Māori and create greater social divides.

Sharon Hawke, the daughter of the late Māori activist and MP Joe Hawke, spoke to the select committee on behalf of the Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei hapū [sub-tribe] - telling it that the legislation "strips the fabric of where we've been heading for in the last three decades at improving our people's [Māori's] ability to gain education, gain warm housing, gain good health".

She added that the bill "polluted" the idea of all New Zealanders having a future together.

"We will continue to show our opposition to this," she said.

Key issues identified by members of the public who made submissions to the select committee included that it was inconsistent with the values of the Treaty, and that it had promoted equality with equity - not taking into account social disparities, such as those created by the legacy of colonisation.

There were also concerns about the extent to which the bill complied with international law, and whether it would negatively impact New Zealand's reputation internationally.

Submitters who supported the bill, meanwhile, referred to a current lack of clarity and certainty about the principles of the Treaty, and of the importance of equality for all.

They also said that it was important to hold a referendum to facilitate a national conversation around the Treaty - something David Seymour believes is still needed.

The Treaty Principles Bill passed its first reading in November, with support from National - the dominant party in New Zealand's ruling coalition - who had promised to back it as part of a coalition agreement with Act, but not any further.

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, who is also leader of the National Party, previously said there was nothing in the bill that he liked. He was not in parliament for its second reading, but remarked earlier in the day that it was time to move on from it.