SHOULD TAXPAYERS PAY FOR BUILDING A CHURCH?

By John McLean

In the wake of the 1815 Battle of Waterloo, which ended once and for all the centuries old French threat to England, the British Government, in gratitude to God for Wellington’s victory, provided a million pounds to the Church of England to build churches in newly developing areas. These were known as the “Waterloo churches”. To this was later added another half million in 1824.

Since then governments have followed the sound policy of not using taxpayer/ratepayer money for building churches that, by their very nature, are for the benefit of believers of one sect only. In other words, if believers want a church, the religion and its members should pay for it. However, this wise and fair policy is being jettisoned in respect of the potential rebuilding of the Church of England’s cathedral in Christchurch which collapsed in the 2011 earthquake.

Already the rebuilding fund has received or been promised $25 million by the Ardern government in 2018 (a $10 million grant plus a $15 million interest free loan), and another $3 million from the Christchurch City Council. And now Winston Peters, for no other purpose than to buy votes in Christchurch with taxpayers’ money, has said that, in the event of re-creating the coalition government after the election, he will INSIST on the Government coughing up another $15 million to the Anglican Church for this purpose.

He has been in politics for so long that he seems to regard taxpayers’ money as a slush fund for him and his party to dip their hands into for their own political purposes, e.g. the utterly worthless Provincial Growth Fund that he got Ardern to agree to – a billion dollars a year – and which his colleague, Shane Jones, dished out to areas that had voted for NZ First or which were being targeted by that Party for the future. If Mr. Peters, not a noticeable churchgoer, is so keen to see the cathedral rebuilt, then why doesn’t he dip into his own millions and make a personal donation?

The cathedral (either whole or fallen down) and the land it stands on is owned by the extremely rich Anglican Church. If they failed to insure it, then they should bear the loss themselves and not expect the hard-pressed taxpayer to cough up.

A further reason why public money should not be used in its rebuilding is that hardly anyone goes to church these days and so why is such a large and expensive new building needed? And the reason why they no longer attend church is because the Church of England – as well as other organised mainstream “Christian” churches – has been taken over by too many “woke”, Left-wing, socialist clergy who prefer to preach politics rather than religion from the pulpit and so one may as well stay at home on a Sunday morning and read the Bible for an hour rather than subject oneself to Left wing indoctrination that is more and more the antithesis of Christ’s message and biblical teaching.

The drift of true believers away from mainstream churches began in the 1960s and 1970s when both the World Council of Churches (which includes the Church of England) and the Vatican started supporting violent revolution against the governments of Rhodesia and South Africa. Instead of preaching salvation in Christ, they started preaching salvation from capitalism and from what their little Left wing minds regarded as “political oppression”. It was called “liberation theology”, which the Catholic Church practised in Latin America as well, with the ever troublesome and Protestant-hating Jesuits in the vanguard. In Nicaragua the Marxists of the Sandinista movement were joined and often directed by Jesuits, three of whom became Ministers in the revolutionary regime. The bloody Sandinista revolution led to c. 80,000 deaths out of a 1979 population of only 3,164,525. The newly invented “Catholic Social Teaching” is simply Marxism in clerical garb.

Resisting governments of any kind has no foundation in Scripture – quite the contrary. In his epistle to the Romans (13.1-2) Saint Paul wrote: “Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake: whether it be to the king as supreme, or unto governors” while Saint Matthew’s gospel (22.21) states: “Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s”. At the time the government of the Roman Empire in which these words were written was absolute and not always fair.

The height of this Left wing, anti-Christian crusade by clerical wolves in sheep’s clothing was reached in 1966 when the Archbishop of Canterbury, Michael Ramsey, in violation of the Fifth Commandment “Thou shalt not kill”, started screaming for Britain to declare war on the settlers in Rhodesia, which would have involved British people killing British people. Fortunately, the then Labour Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, showed that he had a better understanding of the Ten Commandments and he rejected Ramsey’s hate-filled suggestion.

The Anglican Church is committed to supporting acts of violence against so-called “right wing” governments that get up the nose of its bigoted bishops. The Lambeth Conference of Anglican bishops in 1988 declared that it “understood” those [the terrorists who were committing brutal murders in the black townships of South Africa] who “after exhausting all other ways, chose the way of armed struggle as the only way to justice”. (Natal Witness, 8 August, 1988) Among the crimes that their dear terrorists were committing were “necklacing” (murder by putting burning rubber tyres around the necks of their fellow blacks whom they regarded as “stooges” of the government). In the intervening years the Anglican bishops of New Zealand have never renounced this violent affront to the Fifth Commandment and yet these are the ones who are now screaming for decent, peace loving New Zealand taxpayers to cough up for their vanity project in Christchurch.

A further reason why taxpayers and ratepayers should not pay a penny to the Anglican Church for rebuilding their cathedral is that the Church itself, never having paid tax like the rest of us, is RICH beyond all imagination. Having been operating in New Zealand since the beginning of settlement it managed to obtain vast tracts of land from early Governors for either a very small payment or no payment at all – always claiming its “charitable” status.

It owns large tracts of land in Auckland’s rich eastern suburbs as well as schools, farms, forests and other investments all over the country. True, it has offered $38 million from its own funds towards the Christchurch cathedral rebuilding but its wealth would enable it to pay the whole lot without apparent difficulty.

However, the main reason why the proposed new cathedral should not receive a penny of public money is that the upper hierarchy of the Anglican Church in New Zealand consists largely of dishonest liars who are doing immense damage to New Zealand’s social fabric. Their revised church constitution of 1992 introduced a form of apartheid into their own organisation as they divided their Church into three race-based segments, each with equal authority:
Maori
“tikanga Pakeha” (Europeans)
“tikanga Pasefika” (presumably New Zealanders of Pacific Islands blood)

The Church of England is now trying to impose this form of race apartheid on the whole country in various ways, e.g. supporting race based “Maori wards” on local body councils.

Furthermore this 1992 constitution under which their Church operates has formally adopted the principle of “partnership” in relation to the Treaty of Waitangi even though it was a treaty of cession and never a “partnership”, that word not being mentioned in the document and in fact not even having been dreamt up until the 1970s. Article 1 of the Treaty states: “The Chiefs of the Confederation of the United Tribes and the other chiefs who have not joined the confederation, cede to the Queen of England forever the entire Sovreignty[sic] of their country”. Couldn’t be clearer.

The Church is so unsure of itself in propagating this lie that, in their Submission to ACT’s Treaty Principles Bill, they had to resort to the further lie that they “reject the notion that the underlying principles of Te Tiriti and its current interpretation [“partnership”] are a recent invention”. Which is exactly what they are.

And anyway why should a Church become so involved in what is a political and legal matter? In the grounds of Saint Mary’s Anglican Cathedral in New Plymouth they even had a big billboard urging people to “Oppose the Treaty Principles Bill”. By way of explanation it should be pointed out that this particular church has long been a hotbed of hatred against white civilisation and colonisation in general. It seems that they would have preferred the Maoris of New Plymouth to continue being the victims of tribal warfare, slavery and cannibalism. Anything except the rule of the horrid “white man”.

By trying to drive the knife of separatism through our society the Church of England is one of the least deserving institutions to receive taxpayer dollars – especially since it doesn’t pay any tax itself. In its present state much of its hierarchy – especially the upper clergy – are liars and hypocrites who are causing untold damage to our society by advocating racial division and giving virtually unlimited support to every greedy, race-based demand of the tribal elite regardless of its merits. Of course, not all Anglican clergy are of this stripe. There are many good vicars who are more interested in preaching the gospel than playing politics but these are not usually promoted to the higher and better paid positions because they are not considered “safe” by the woke elite who have well and truly taken over the upper echelons of the Church.

It is an insult to every taxpayer or ratepayer to give money to this socially destructive organisation and the $25 million that the government has committed should be revoked forthwith – as should the $3 million from the spendthrift Christchurch City Council.

Christ owned only the clothes that He wore and the tools in His carpenter’s shop, and the extreme wealth of the Anglican Church (and other Churches) is an affront to Christianity. Apart from an opening ceremony the proposed new cathedral would never be filled. The people of Christchurch would be better off living their lives according to the Bible instead of listening to biased and often hate-filled political sermons inside a half empty, $220 million building financed largely by unwilling taxpayers – both Anglican and non-Anglican. It is time to pull the plug of public money for this unnecessary monstrosity. Let it be built with the Anglican Church’s own money and not ours.

THE GROWING PROBLEM OF ISLAM

By Ron Asher

In 1974 the Labour government of Norman Kirk/Bill Rowling made a major change to New Zealand’s demographics by replacing the existing immigration policy that, since the 1840s, had favoured the immigration of people from the British Isles and northern Europe with a “non-discriminatory” policy so as to let in all sorts of odds and sods from the emerging Third World. Big mistake!

There was a reason for encouraging immigration from Europe and discouraging it from societies with which we have very little in common, and that reason was so that we could continue with a largely homogenous society in order to avoid all the problems of racial division, mistrust, alienation and ethnic competition for resources that are part and parcel of a “multi-cultural” society.

At the time the population of New Zealand was a little over two million. There was plenty of space for everyone and virtually jobs for all. New Zealand did not need an influx of aliens just to satisfy the self-indulgence of the growing “liberal elite” of Wellington busybodies who seemed to have an unnatural dislike of their own kind matched by an inordinate love of people with darker skins and more alien features. In the intervening years, of those who have been waved in as citizens there is probably no group with more alien and unattractive beliefs and practices than Muslims.

Islam has many threads but none more basic and widespread than its poor treatment of women. In the words of the wisest statesman of modern times, Winston Churchill, “The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must BELONG to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men”. (The River War, Vol. II, P. 249)

As Abul Kasem points out in his book, Muslim Women, “With the influx of Muslims into Western countries and their demands for special rights, it is now just as vital for Westerners to understand the terrible truths about how Islam treats women”. (P. 10) For example, their “holy book”, the Koran, sanctions wife beating: “Men are protectors and maintainers of women; women must be devoutly obedient; if not, then beat them”. (Sura 4:34) So, how does this fit in with the criminal law and Bill of Rights of Western countries?

Wife beating derives from the practices of sixth century Arabia and is unacceptable in the modern world. The self-declared “Prophet”, Mohammed, was a wife beater. In the words of his poor little wife, Aisha, “He struck me on the chest, which caused me pain, and then said ‘Did you think that Allah and his Apostle would deal unjustly with you’?” (Shahih Muslim 4.2127) Such were the tender mercies of the character whom Muslims continue to worship as their “Prophet”.

Islam regards women as inferior to men in almost every respect. Koran 2.282: “Women’s witness is half of men”. Women’s evidence is unacceptable in Islamic Sharia courts in matters of adultery, rape, theft, apostasy, etc. Any such evidence by a woman or women must be corroborated by that of four adult Muslim men. And Koran 4.11-12: “Rules on inheritance. Women get half of men”. So, a son gets twice as much as his sister.

The most visible symbol of oppression is the way that Muslim women are forced to wear ugly, shapeless black clothing and to cover all or part of their faces with a head scarf, veil or worse. Of course, such clothing also serves to cover up any bruises that their husbands might have inflicted on them in obedience to Sura 4:34 (supra) of the Koran which allows men to beat their wives. When that fair-weathered “feminist”, Jacinda Ardern, started prancing around in front of the cameras in Muslim clothes in the wake of the Christchurch mosques massacre in 2019, she was reinforcing the inferiority and oppression of Muslim women.

The Koran also subjects women to the humiliations of polygamy. “Four free women wives at a time and any number of slave girls are permitted” (4.3044.003). Besides having four legal wives at any one time a man is permitted by Islam to have an unlimited number of concubines so long as they are slaves or captive women- “Sex with captive women or slave women is permitted” (Koran 23:1-6).

It is this polygamy that is the greatest threat to Western societies as a Muslim man can father so many children by the use of not one wife but four. In a 2007 DVD Sheik Abdul Raheem Green exhorted Australian Muslims to take control of Australia by having more children and thus outbreeding non-Muslims. By 2025 there were already 900,000 Muslims in Australia, constituting 3.4% of the population – and rising fast! “The real agenda of the Islamists is to Islamise the whole world by exploding the population bomb of Muslims,” continued Abul Kasem in “Muslim Women” (P. 42). “By either divorce or other means a Muslim man can simply re-organise his harem at any time he desires. He could divorce all his four wives in one sitting and replace them with new ones – just like replacing old cars with newer models”. (P. 53)

Muslims bring polygamy to Western societies. Auckland’s Mount Roskill area has the highest proportion of Muslims in New Zealand; just go to a school fair in that district and you are bound to see Muslim men walking around accompanied by two, three or four Muslim women – all of approximately the same age and appearance. In Canada the government even sends multiple welfare cheques to polygamous Muslim men who raise multiple families.

Islam allows the man to divorce his wife (wives) simply by saying three times: “I divorce thee; I divorce thee; I divorce thee”. However, the wife cannot divorce her husband except by a long, complicated and expensive process which has to be decided by a male Islamic judge. This is all done in underground Sharia courts which operate in great secrecy from the rest of us and in violation of the Bill of Rights. When Muslims – and others – acquire New Zealand citizenship they need to affirm that they respect such values as equal rights, including gender equality. In some cases they do so with a giggle to themselves as their Koran states: “Allah will not call you to account for thoughtlessness in your oaths, but for the intention in your hearts” (2.225). This is explained by the Islamic scholar, Shahih Bukhari in 84.64-5: “Lying is permitted in order to deceive an enemy”.

However, not one of New Zealand’s dumb little mayors who carry out these “citizenship ceremonies” with such bonhomie would be aware of this or even want to know about it as it is too far out of their petty comfort zones of municipal drains and having the correct gender ratios among council employees.

Another unfortunate mindset that Islam brings to the West is in relation to child brides. This practice goes back to the very founding of the ideology in the seventh century when Mohammed, at the age of fifty-four, had sex with a nine year old, his child-bride Aisha.

The rape of white girls by Islamic immigrants is a growing problem in Western societies. Lebanese Muslim gangs in the largely Islamic suburb of Lakemba in Sydney raped so many white girls that they were too scared to go out in the streets. And it takes a lot to frighten an Aussie sheila! It prompted the New South Wales Police Commissioner, Peter Ryan, to say: “I’ve never come across something like this before, where a particular, clearly defined, cultural group of attackers attack a very clearly defined cultural group pf victims” (Week-end Australian, 29 August, 2001).

The same in Sheffield and other cities in northern England where gangs of older men (almost exclusively Pakistanis) were grooming and abusing vulnerable girls (almost exclusively white) aged 11 to 14, befriending them on the streets. The police turned a blind eye to this mass criminality and it lay dormant for years until it was truthfully and patriotically exposed by the political activist, Tommy Robinson, who has a better understanding of Islam and its impact on British people than any of the fools at Westminster. So, what did the police do? Oh, they arrested Tommy and have hounded him ever since, even putting him in jail on trumped up charges whereas he should have been given an award in the New Year Honours.

Muslim immigrants have exacerbated the existing problems in New Zealand of giving special rights to certain privileged groups. For example, the Queen Elizabeth II swimming pool in Christchurch put up makeshift curtains so that Muslim women can swim out of sight of strangers- especially men. “This is great for us…thank Allah for the opportunity,” crowed one of the Muslim women, Wafaa Khalil (Dominion Post, 30 October, 2004). Yes, but not great for New Zealand when this kind of separate and privileged treatment for one group infects a democratic and secular society. Oh, and these cultural warriors insisted on having female lifeguards and swimming coaches.

Of course, appeasement simply breeds new demands. Three years after getting these special privileges at the Queen Elizabeth pool they were demanding their own exclusive pool, claiming that they needed it so as not to compromise their beliefs. “Their health is affected and they’re quite depressed”, bleated one of them, Naaz Shah. (Dominion-Post, 11 January, 2007) Perhaps they should return to the “Islamic paradises” from which they fled.

These incremental demands for special swimming pools to be provided by hard-pressed ratepayers for one small cultural group are part of what the American Islamic scholar, Daniel Pipes, warned against in respect of Australia. “When there is a difference between their approach and the Australian approach, they want Australia to become like them and not vice versa”. (Dominion Post, 12 August, 2015)

In the words of the former Labour Cabinet Minister, Michael Bassett, “Among our Muslim community there is a trend to lecture us on standards New Zealanders should adopt towards its members, not what behaviour their hosts can reasonably expect of them”. (Dominion Post, 12 September, 2010)

“A religion of jihad, honour killings and limb chopping is not the best to lecture others on morality. When the Taleban, seeking to impose ‘Islamic moral purity’, entered the Afghan city of Mazar-e-Sharif in August, 1998, the first thing they did was to rape all the women”, wrote Robert Stanmore in “The Fraud of Human Rights” (P. 124)

There are any number of “multi-cultural” bigots in the West who prefer separate and special rights for minorities at the expense of a fair society with equal rights for all. They even condone the operation of the brutal Sharia courts outside the law of the land. Nothing must ever get in the way of their cherished “multi-culturalism”.

Topping the list of fools – or, if you like, traitors – is the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, a self-opinionated idiot who could barely keep his own Church together but who came out in favour of Sharia courts to operate in Britain. Equally dangerous are some of the higher judges such as the former Master of the Rolls in England, Lord Phillips, who also is very favourable to the horrors of Sharia. Is the time tested English common law not good enough for him?

It was by entering other cultures and refusing to assimilate that Islam spread so fast and continues to do so. Mohammed’s aim was to conquer other peoples and forcibly convert them to his ideology. In his life time he fought forty-seven wars, which spread Islam by violence and terror. The current President of Turkey, Mr. Erdogan (the rigger of elections) has said that assimilation of Muslims into a Western country is “a crime against humanity” (Spectator, 20 August, 2016) To drive home his point he added: “The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets, and the faithful are our soldiers”. A religion of peace?

Islam is more an ideology than a religion as its aim is to bring the whole world under its bloody banner by fair means or foul. It encompasses or condones slavery, paedophilia, rape, the wars and terrorism of jihad, female genital mutilation, honour killings and always the subjection of women. It is also very hostile to any criticism, which is why Muslims too often react to criticism with violence rather than reasoned argument, e.g. the blinding of Salman Rushdie because he wrote a book criticising Islam, the murder of twelve members of the editorial staff of the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine in Paris which had drawn cartoons of Mohammed, and the brutal murder of Theo van Gogh in Holland because he had made a short film called “Submission” which exposed a real-life arranged Islamic marriage where the bride was abused sexually, physically and psychologically.

This undermining of free speech has wormed its way into New Zealand when the president of the New Zealand Federation of Islamic Associations, Hazim Arafeh, said that his organisation had brought pressure on the government to deny entry to New Zealand for two Canadian speakers, Lauren Southern and Stefan Molyneux, as it was thought that they might say something negative about Islam. In what respect? Treatment of women? Female genital mutilation? Jihad?

Why shouldn’t these two speakers or indeed anyone else talk about this ideology that threatens to take over the whole world? In a free and secular society such as New Zealand there is no place for any restrictions on free speech in the name of “Islamophobia” or “hate speech”. The threat of Islam can be dealt with only by plain speaking. Those, like Jacinda Ardern and Andrew Little, who oppose such free speech do a grave disservice to New Zealand, its people, its rights and its future.

Muslims have difficulty in critical thinking as they are indoctrinated from childhood into believing that Islam through its 6th century Koran has the answers to everything in the 21st century and so there is no need to inquire further.

Because of the Muslim Multiplication Table by which the several wives of a Muslim produce endless children the birth rate of Muslims is much higher than for the native born while their numbers are increasing at an ever accelerating rate. By 2026 there were 4 million of them in the United States and 2.1 million in Canada where they constitute 5.2% of the population. There are 6 million of them in France (9% of the population) and another 6 million in Germany (7%). The tiny Netherlands is home to 1.1 million of them (6%) while Belgium has 800,000 (7%). Italy has 2.7 million (4.9%) and Spain 2.5 million (5%). And yet in the Middle Ages the Spanish had to fight for centuries to free themselves from Muslim rule in their own country.

In 1954 there were 23,000 Muslims in Britain and to-day – only 72 years later – there are 4.5 million of them and they are causing no end of problems from underground Sharia courts in London’s East End and elsewhere to organising hundred thousand plus demonstrations in central London at week-ends, inconveniencing the general public.

And New Zealand? In 2026 the number of Muslims here is approximately 70,000, constituting 1.4% of the population. But don’t feel complacent as this is almost three times the number in Britain in 1954 and look at how the Islamic population has mushroomed there in the intervening years.

The New Zealand that we have to-day was built by the pioneers, who came mainly from Britain. It was their sweat, toil and courage that built such a wonderful country – safe and largely homogenous. We did not have Muslims in the building of this country and nor do we need them now. In the words of Professor Samuel Huntington of Harvard University: “Muslims in the West are an indigestible minority”.

New Zealand has enough problems dealing with a rampant and socially destructive multi-culturalism as well as the greed of the tribal elite, and ever more Muslims with their over-riding loyalty to Islam and their alien culture and habits, are a risk not worth taking. They are part of the Great Replacement theory which seeks to destroy European based Christian societies and replace them with something that is far less desirable.

It is not “radical Islam” that is the problem but Islam itself and we have good reason to fear it since its Koran is violently hostile to non-Muslims such as ourselves. Between 20 November, 1979, and 26 May, 2019, Islamic terrorists killed a total of 13,623 innocent persons in 286 attacks around the world (numbers calculated from Wikipedia) while in France alone there were in 2018 some 1,063 attacks on Christian churches and symbols (crucifixes, icons, statues) (Jihad Watch, 18 April, 2019) as part of Islam’s war against Christianity. None of this is surprising in view of what the Koran and other Islamic tracts encourage its believers to do. Some examples:

“Fight in the cause of Allah those who fight you….And slay them wherever ye catch them” (Surah 2: Al Baqara 190-3)
“Fighting is prescribed for you” (Koran 2.216)
“Soon shall we cast terror into the hearts of the Unbelievers” (Koran 3:151)
“But if they [friends] turn renegades, seize them and slay them wherever ye find them” (Koran 4.89)
“The disbelievers are ever unto you open enemies” (Koran 4.101)
“Remember when your Lord inspired the angels….I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Therefore strike off their heads and strike off every fingertip of them” – justification for beheading and limb chopping (Koran 8.12)
“And [if they still persist in unbelief and hostilities], fight against them until there is no longer disorder and oppression rooted in rebellion against God” – in other words, Fight until Islam is in total control (Surah 8.39).

Ah yes, we certainly have a problem and its potential for danger can only be exacerbated by allowing more and more Muslims to come here as immigrants. The above quotes give the lie to the ravings of politicians like Tony Blair and Phil Goff who would have us believe that Islam is a religion of peace and that there is nothing to worry about.

Books by Tross Publishing on this issue:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Muslim Women, Abul Kasem (104 pages). Price: $20 (including postage within N.Z.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jihad; Blood and Slavery, M.A. Khan (441 pages). Price: $50 (including postage within N.Z.)

Available from: www.trosspublishing.com

THE ONLY CONSTITUTIONAL ANCHOR; FORMAL NOTICE TO MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT

By Ivan Barnett

This document requires immediate and serious attention from ACT, NZ First, and National MPs.

It is not a partisan argument. It is a constitutional warning.

New Zealand is experiencing constitutional drift driven by: undefined Treaty terms, judicial reinterpretation, bureaucratic expansion, non‑statutory governance structures, opaque Crown–iwi negotiations, public funding of private entities without accountability.

These developments are occurring without public mandate, without statutory authority, and without democratic legitimacy.

Failure to address these issues will result in the continued erosion of parliamentary sovereignty and the entrenchment of unelected authority structures.

I. THE TREATY TEXT: THE ONLY CONSTITUTIONAL ANCHOR

The Māori‑language Treaty — the only version actually agreed to — contains:

kāwanatanga ceded to the Crown,

tino rangatiratanga guaranteed to individuals and hapū over their property,

nga tikanga katoa rite tahi — equal rights under the law.

It contains no partnership, no co‑governance, no shared sovereignty, no “principles,” and no requirement to “give effect to” anything.

The English text was not agreed to.

The “principles” doctrine was invented more than a century later.

The partnership doctrine has no basis in the text.

The Māori text is the constitutional foundation.

II. JUDICIAL REINTERPRETATION AND CONSTITUTIONAL RISK

The courts have expanded Treaty obligations far beyond the text, creating:

Partnership, active protection, shared authority, co‑governance, obligations to “give effect to”, obligations to protect “taonga” in an expanded sense. These expansions were not authorized by Parliament. They were not authorized by the Treaty.

They were created through judicial interpretation, often relying on the English text or later political developments.

This has created a parallel constitutional framework that Parliament never enacted.

III. THE LEGAL EXPANSION OF “TAONGA”

A. The 1840 Meaning

In the Māori text, taonga meant:

Property, goods, possessions, tangible items.

It did not include: political authority, natural resources, data, language, environmental governance, cultural veto rights.

The modern expansion is a post‑1980s invention.

B. Case Law Driving Expansion

NZMC v AG (1987)

Expanded “taonga” to intangible cultural values.

Broadcasting Assets (1994)

Declared Māori language a “taonga” requiring Crown protection.

Ngāi Tahu v DG of Conservation (1995)

Extended “taonga” into commercial regulation.

Ngāti Apa (2003)

Extended “taonga” into territorial authority.

None of these expansions are grounded in the Māori text.

C. Tribunal Jurisprudence

The Waitangi Tribunal has extended “taonga” into: flora and fauna (Wai 262)

intellectual property, genetic material, scientific knowledge, data sovereignty (Wai 2522)

political authority (Wai 1040)

These findings are advisory, yet government agencies treat them as binding.

D. Constitutional Consequences

Judicial policymaking replaces parliamentary lawmaking. Undefined Treaty terms override statutory clarity, Sector‑wide co‑governance claims proliferate, Equal citizenship is eroded. Parliamentary sovereignty is weakened.

IV. NONSTATUTORY GOVERNANCE STRUCTURES

A. National Iwi Chairs Forum (NICF)

Not created by statute.

Not elected. Not accountable. Not subject to OIA.

Yet Ministers attend its meetings and treat it as a parallel policy body.

B. Iwi Leaders Groups (ILGs)

Operate in: Freshwater, climate, resource management, health, data.

They draft policy frameworks and negotiate directly with government agencies.

C. Data Iwi Leaders Group (DILG)

Claims Māori data is a “taonga” requiring Māori governance.

Influences: Cloud First, AI governance, national data policy. This is policy capture by a private entity.

D. Funding and Accountability

These bodies receive taxpayer‑funded support through: departmental budgets, consultancy contracts, engagement payments, co‑governance participation funding, local government contributions.

Yet they remain: unaudited, unregulated, unaccountable, opaque. This is incompatible with democratic governance.

V. CONSTITUTIONAL RISKS TO NEW ZEALAND

Parallel authority structures. Loss of democratic accountability, Opaque decision‑making, Erosion of equal citizenship. Undermining of parliamentary sovereignty, Judicial expansion without democratic mandate. Policy capture by unelected entities, These risks are not hypothetical.

They are already occurring.

VI. REQUIRED ACTION BY PARLIAMENT

To restore constitutional clarity and democratic accountability, Parliament must:

1. Define “taonga” explicitly and narrowly

— as property and possessions in the 1840 sense.

2. Anchor Treaty interpretation in the Māori text

— not in judicially‑invented “principles.”

3. Affirm that NICF, ILGs, and DILG have no constitutional or statutory authority

— and cannot bind the Crown.

4. Require transparency in all Crown–iwi negotiations

— including OIA coverage.

5. Reassert parliamentary sovereignty

— only Parliament can make law.

6. Ensure equal citizenship under Article 3

— no parallel governance structures.

VII. RED LINE DECLARATION

No constitutional authority may be transferred, shared, or implied through: undefined Treaty terms, judicial invention, bureaucratic policy, non‑statutory negotiation, co‑governance arrangements ,partnership doctrines.

Tribunal findings. Only Parliament may legislate. Only the Māori text of Te Tiriti is binding.

Equal citizenship is non‑negotiable.

VIII. CLOSING CONSTITUTIONAL STATEMENT

This document is submitted to ACT, NZ First, and National with the expectation that it will be treated with the seriousness required of elected representatives. This is not a political dispute.

It is a constitutional inflection point. If Parliament fails to act: constitutional drift will continue, democratic accountability will erode, parallel authority structures will deepen, public trust will collapse.

The responsibility now rests with Parliament.

The public expects clarity, courage, and constitutional integrity.

This document has been compiled from a wide range of files, reports, and reference materials. It is provided to Members of Parliament for serious consideration. The content requires further research, careful evaluation, and informed discussion to ensure that the constitutional issues identified are properly understood and addressed

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