Kia kaha Kelvin Davis

Written By: - Date published: 10:13 am, May 12th, 2022 - 27 comments
Categories: equality, inequality, Kelvin Davis, Maori Issues, treaty settlements - Tags:

Do yourself a favour and spend six minutes watching this speech from Kelvin Davis.

Some highlights:

The Opposition says that they believe in equality, that Māori should be treated the same as all other New Zealanders. And do you know what? There isn’t a Māori who disagrees. That’s what we’ve been calling for for over 180 years. We’ve been wanting equal education outcomes. We’ve been wanting equal employment outcomes. We’ve been wanting equal health outcomes. We’ve been wanting equal housing outcomes. It would be nice if we could live as long as non-Māori and enjoy our superannuation for as long as non-Māori, given we too paid taxes for our entire working lives, although I hear that Shane Reti he wants us to be happy that we don’t die in our 30s as we did 182 years ago at the signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi. He and his party’s top aspiration for Māori is for us to be grateful that we are alive.

And his conclusion:

The Opposition fail to acknowledge that their prosperity was made off the back of my whānau’s misery. My hapū in the day were left with nothing. They could have done with a Ministry of Māori Development to help them get back on their feet. They could have done with Te Arawhiti, the Office for Māori Crown Relations, because I can tell you at that point the relationship between the Māori and the Crown was pretty sour. They could have done with the winter energy payment because they were made homeless when their pā was razed to the ground because they were made homeless at the start of winter. They could have done with the Human Rights Commission because their human rights were horribly violated and, as most of us are a product of our upbringing, the lack of equality through the generations has led to gross inequity.

Kia kaha Kelvin Davis.

27 comments on “Kia kaha Kelvin Davis ”

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  1. Tony Veitch (not etc.) 1
    12 May 2022 at 10:31 am

    Yes, as good and as telling a speech as any I've heard in parliament.

    Let me say, as a pale, stale and increasingly frail, male, I have no fear whatsoever of co-governance. For God's sake, after a hundred and eighty or so years, let us honour the Treaty of Waitangi.

    • Tiger Mountain 1.1
      12 May 2022 at 11:42 am

      yes

    • Patricia Bremner 1.2
      12 May 2022 at 1:08 pm

      smiley Those who have been disparaging of Kelvin Davis, notice has been served. He has warned the right he will fight their lies with the truth, without fear or favour.

    • GreenBus 1.3
      12 May 2022 at 5:17 pm

      T.V@2

      2nd para – same for me.

      What's good for our cuzzies is good for all of us, except the rich. Oh well who cares about them.

      The white man has made an utter mess of our one and only planet in the name of money. Worship money, make more money, more more more!

      Well time for a change aye. Could it possibly be any worse?

      Look at the state of things, everything is stuffed, exploited, polluted and all maxed out. FFS some rich dicks are looking for another planet to screw over. Madness.

      We badly need balance, to look beyond just money making and bring more ideas to the table to repair our broken planet. I believe pakeha would learn a great deal about equality and sustainability in coGov. Bring it on.

  2. dottie 2
    12 May 2022 at 11:32 am

    Now there is a competent Maori member of parliament

  3. Reality 3
    12 May 2022 at 12:07 pm

    Good to hear Kelvin Davis not sitting back politely any more and turning the other cheek. About time those facts were more widely known.

  4. dottie 4
    12 May 2022 at 3:04 pm

    There is a competent Maori member of Parliament,

    one who has researched our history.

  5. Ross 5
    13 May 2022 at 7:37 am

    We’ve been wanting equal education outcomes. We’ve been wanting equal employment outcomes. We’ve been wanting equal health outcomes. We’ve been wanting equal housing outcomes.

    Those are not comments I would expect an MP to make, let alone a senior Government Minister. Simply put, equal outcomes are impossible to achieve and reek of entitlement and envy. Equality of outcome assumes we all want the same outcome. Or that we should expect the same outcome. Some people are envious of others, to be sure, but others are more than happy with their lot.

    The late British economist Deepak Lal understood the problem when he discussed the ideology of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge.

    …Pol Pot's regime emptied the cities, abolished money, put everyone to work in the fields, separated families, fed the workers gruel in communal halls to meet unrealistic targets of exporting rice, smashed the skulls of educated professionals and intellectuals (to equalise human capital or "status inequalities" – see below), and forced mass marriages with the disabled and "ugly" (a la Amartya Sen's "capabilities approach" to equality). This was the ultimate socialist Utopia: an indentured agrarian state where all inequalities, including those inherited, had been abolished.

    An outcome can be equally good or bad. Who decides which it is to be?

    I suspect that Kelvin Davis was alluding to equality of opportunities but it is odd that he latched onto outcomes instead. Equality of opportunities is entirely different from outcomes. I look forward to him discussing the former.

    https://wap.business-standard.com/article-amp/opinion/deepak-lal-inequality-and-envy-114112101342_1.html

    • pat 5.1
      13 May 2022 at 7:46 am

      Pol Pot an extreme example but it was a strange choice of phrase….dont think anyone expects or even wants equality of 'outcome'….we may all end up politicians.

      Starving, naked and homeless politicians…..

      • Ross 5.1.1
        13 May 2022 at 8:06 am

        Pol Pot isn’t the issue, it’s the ideology behind his regime that is important (which was Lal’s point). If a politician wants to take an ideological position, that is fine. But they need to be clear what their position is and why they hold it.

    • Craig H 5.2
      13 May 2022 at 9:49 am

      That's a long bow to draw – obviously a government could create equal outcomes by wiping everyone out, but those outcomes would obviously be terrible. Davis isn't referring to equality of all individual outcomes either, nor is he referring solely to financial outcomes, he's referring to average outcomes by ethnicity using indicators like life expectancy and health outcomes.

      However, we don't have equality of opportunity in NZ, let along equality of outcome. Maybe when we reach the former, we can get closer to the latter.

      • pat 5.2.1
        13 May 2022 at 10:14 am

        That may depend on whether equality of opportunity is in deed the goal.

        • Craig H 5.2.1.1
          13 May 2022 at 12:03 pm

          Agree – in theory it's a Labour Party goal somewhere in its policy platform, not sure about other parties necessarily.

          • pat 5.2.1.1.1
            13 May 2022 at 12:12 pm

            What is the Labour Party goal?…..and the Labour Party goal is not necessarily the same as those promoting the idea if public statements are anything to go by.

            It is a policy fraught with potential perverse outcomes that will likely create far more problems than it solves.

    • Patricia Bremner 5.3
      13 May 2022 at 5:11 pm

      Ross you take an extreme view to the point of the ridiculous. To call his points envy says more about your ideology, than his.

      He wants better outcomes for Maori. Beginning with gaining a few more years of life to actually get time on the pension. To be allowed to build on their land, and to keep the gains they have made in housing and education. To have a say in governance.

      To have the history of loss of the North recorded and acknowledged, as has happened in Taranaki.

      For those who have gained by that to realise it, and not take advantage by using their majority and their laws to make things worse by removing supportive ministries.

      The racist divisive person is Act's provocative Leader David Seymour who threatens to remove all the mitigating ministries.

      A person who has rorted our democracy to have a seat at the table. He is furious that Maori generally have backed Labour.

      It appears you are as well, with your suggestion that Maori would behave as Pol Pot did out of "envy"

      • pat 5.3.1
        13 May 2022 at 5:35 pm

        As a Labour Party cheerleader what do you think the Labour Party’s goal is with co governance?

        • Patricia Bremner 5.3.1.1
          13 May 2022 at 6:24 pm

          "Cheer Leader" Oh right a mindless woman with pompoms!!

          I just called it as I saw Kelvin's speech. I said what I believe. Yes I have stated my bias unlike some.

          My understanding of co-governance is shared decision making, acknowledgement of a stake in the rules decided on. I am not privy to the inside .

          • pat 5.3.1.1.1
            13 May 2022 at 8:02 pm

            Shared decision making…disproportionate including budget setting?

            Are you also confident of the outcomes?

  6. Anker 6
    13 May 2022 at 9:32 am

    https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2022/05/13/history-lessons/

    a different point of view MS about Kelvins speech from Chris Trotter, who points out the devastation the Labour Party caused to Maori and NZ when they introduced Rogernomics.

    • Tiger Mountain 6.1
      13 May 2022 at 1:25 pm

      Yes, Rogernomics had a devastating effect on much of the working class actually including Māori obviously, and to some extent Chris may represent the denial of South Island and other NZ landholders as to how a hell of lot of provincial pākehā came to obtain the land their descendants still sit on.

      I remember the way Kelvin Davis was happy to accept NZ Labour largesse in the West Auckland end of Te Tai Tokerau electorate to help him defeat Hone Harawira–standing for Internet Mana– by around 900 votes in the infamous FJK election. Some other LECs were cash and resource starved while that happened, my partner was involved for Labour in Micky's electorate at the time.

      All the main parties including Greens turned on Internet Mana in that election. Shameful to this day.

      But whatever I think of eratic Kelvin (going by his public utterances) he makes some bloody good points in this speech.

    • Patricia Bremner 6.2
      13 May 2022 at 5:29 pm

      Maori are smart enough to know Roger was a renegade and behaved as a Trojan horse. They do not blame Labour for that, but they do blame National's Bill Birch and his Contracts Act driving a competitive spiral to the bottom, along with their Christian "Help yourself" mantra.

  7. Anker 7
    13 May 2022 at 6:50 pm
    • Not sure about Maori not blaming Labout. I think that is an overgeneralisation. It wasn’t just Roger Douglas, but other labour caucus members, including Helen Clarke, and I don’t think you could say the likes of Dame Turia forgave Clarke for the Foreshore and Seabed (thus we have the Maori Party). A lot of people including Maori joined the alliance.
    • Patricia Bremner 7.1
      13 May 2022 at 6:59 pm

      True, I accept that was a driver Anker. I am only going by my Maori family and friends. Helen Clarke made a grave error.

    • Anne 7.2
      13 May 2022 at 8:22 pm

      Actually you are wrong Anker. Helen Clark (not Clarke) was extremely anti-Roger Douglas and co. and it dated back well before the Lange government came to power in 1984. I was a close witness to the years between 1974 and 1984 when the covert manoeuvering inside the LP was occurring. Helen and her like-minded colleagues were outnumbered at the time, so they had no choice but to go along with the majority of the caucus. By the time Helen became prime minister, the neoliberal ideology was so entrenched within the political system, it was obviously going to take many years to reverse. She never got the chance to get very far with that reversal, but she did manage to improve some of the negative outcomes.

      Its very easy to pick holes in her years as the PM by those who never knew her nor have any idea what was going on behind the scene. It is only with the benefit of hindsight that I am able to recognise the reality, even though I was a first hand witness at the time. I have huge admiration for Helen being able to stick with it and in the end rising above it despite the viciousness she had to endure. And believe me it was vicious. Quite a few people – including me – ended up seriously impacted by that period but they are all separate stories and most have yet to be told.

      As for Dame Turia… without going into details, there were faults on both sides. In other words Tariana Turia was as much to blame for the outcome as Helen Clark and others over that Foreshore and Seabed debacle.

  8. Anker 8
    13 May 2022 at 7:01 pm
    • Fair enough Patricia.

    you come across as such a lovely person, I almost stopped myself from commenting back.