Jenny Shipley likens David Seymour to a ‘second-hand car salesman’ at Treaty bill hearing

Thursday, 20 February 2025

Former National prime minister Dame Jenny Shipley drops bombs at select committee hearing, saying Treaty Principles Bill threatens a “visionary relationship”.

Remember to count the people at the Hīkoi mō te Tiriti in submissions, says one of its Toitū te Tiriti organisers, Eru Kapa-Kingi.

Former ACT MP Stephen Franks supports David Seymour’s bill, saying we should trust politicians, not judges with Treaty decision-making.

Don’t buy this second-hand car from David Seymour, a former National prime minister has warned the justice committee about ACT’s Treaty Principles Bill.

Dame Jenny Shipley described Seymour as a “second-hand car salesman”, slammed ACT as audacious for proposing the bill with only 9% electoral support, and said it was simply not worthy of the Treaty.

The bill was unconscionable, she told the select committee hearing oral submissions on Thursday, and it threatened a “delicate, precious, creative, visionary relationship” by excluding an original partner.

“Great nations don’t break their promises. I think the promise of the Treaty was profound, and it doesn’t need some second-hand car salesman to try and divert us into some notion that, frankly, is not worthy of the promise of the Treaty.”

The salesman jibe appeared to reference ACT leader David Seymour, but Dame Jenny said she did not intend to get personal with “the promoter” of the bill.

Seymour is driving the bill - agreed to by National Prime Minister Christopher Luxon as part of their coalition deal.

On Thursday, Luxon - although not there in person - was visited by yet another ghost of National-governments’ past with Shipley’s appearance. She joined a National Party lineup of oral submitters including former education minister Hekia Parata, former Treaty negotiations minister Chris Finlayson and former MP Marilyn Waring.

Shipley said it was “heartbreaking” to have to deal with the bill: “I’ve lived through a generation where there were giants in Māoridom who as leaders stepped forward and created a vision that we now inherit today.”

Shipley, who was prime minister from 1997 to 1999, was one of a raft of bill opponents who spoke on Thursday.

Eru Kapa-Kingi spoke on behalf of Toitū te Tiriti, the group that organised last year’s Hīkoi mō te Tiriti, drawing record numbers to Parliament’s steps.

The bill, he said, was what those in the Māori world called “he moumou taima” - a waste of time. “Partly because we already did our big submission in November, when over 100,000 people stood right outside of where you’re all sitting now.”

That was the most Māori and most important submission - “so make sure you include those numbers in your count as well”.

Kapa-Kingi said he could give the most articulate and moving kōrero in his submission, but it would not change a thing.

Even with the indisputable truth on the side of Māori, their “harsh reality as tangata whenua” was that truth was not the same as having power.

“Power is a numbers game, and numbers can supersede truth, which is exactly what this bill does.”

‘It’s not brown-skinned people and white-skinned people’

Attacks on the bill came from all sides: Law professor Andrew Geddis saying it was “a solution in search of a problem”.

He rubbished the idea the Treaty was a race-based agreement - rather an agreement between “two ways of governing, two ways of ordering social lives”.

“It’s not an agreement as Māori as brown-skinned people, and Pākehā as white-skinned people, it’s ways of doing things in the world, and how those… have got to exist together.”

Meanwhile conservative political commentator Liam Hehir said while many opposed the bill from the left, there was a “good faith, very strong conservative or centre right argument” against it as well.

He said he opposed the bill because while courts were unsuited to giving effect to the Treaty relationship, so was a public referendum, “or by population writ large”.

Iwi voices against the bill grew louder as three of the four biggest tribes in Aotearoa spoke to the committee. The bodies representing largest iwi Ngāpuhi, Waikato-Tainui (fourth largest) and Ngāti Kahungunu (third largest) all spoke against the bill.

Ngāi Tahu, number five, spoke on Monday - warning about the possibility of legal action if the bill passed.

The bill did have its supporters on Thursday: Lee Short, chair of Democracy Action, thanking ACT for its “integrity and foresight” in giving New Zealanders a chance to have a say on the Treaty.

“The general public has never been given such an opportunity before now, despite the significant impact of the principles, defined by the Waitangi Tribunal and courts, are having on our constitution and rights.”

He said Sir Apirana Ngata himself had said the first clause of the Treaty handed over the mana and sovereignty to Queen Victoria and her descendants forever.

The existing governance system was “under serious threat”, said Short.

“There are moves afoot to transform the constitution of New Zealand, aiming to establish a system of two separate race-based governments operating under entirely different systems.”

Meanwhile former ACT MP Stephen Franks delivered a wide-ranging pro-bill speech to the committee. This included references to US abortion rights judicial decisions, courts sabotaging Brexit and immigration controls in the UK, Chinese most-wanted criminals in New Zealand, and a warning of possible power-sharing similarities to the Iranian government.

He said the principles should not be left to judges to work out, but politicians.

“I think judges are utterly unsuited to the role of determining constitutional issues.” However, the magic of democracy was that MPs “are always looking forward, trying to work out what will happen”.

There are numerous Treaty principles, developed through courts, the Government and Waitangi Tribunal over decades. Only decisions from the courts have created a binding precedent on Treaty principles. The principles are used to guide the Government on how to apply the spirit and intent of the Treaty.

ACT’s bill would replace them in law with the three found here. The law would need majority support in a public referendum to come into force.

Select committee hearings, where more than 16,000 applicants to speak were short-listed down to 80 hours of speakers, run till early March.