David Seymour reached even more absurd levels of idiocy this week with a suggestion that if he was alive Nelson Mandela would be an Act supporter.
From Amy Ridout at Stuff:
“Every country that has ever tried to do what this government has tried to do [regarding co-governance] has either ended in disaster, or successfully campaigned to reintroduce liberal democracy,” Seymour said.
“I daresay if Nelson Mandela was alive today he would be campaigning for ACT.”
To really appreciate the level of absurdity in this claim it assists to see what Act says about co governance.
From its website:
We are at a constitutional crossroad. In one direction is liberal democracy, the familiar formula that the country as we know it was built upon. In the other direction is co-governance, a prescription of power sharing between one ethnic group and all others.
Labour is pushing its co-governance agenda through a range of laws:
The Māori Health Authority means healthcare is being prioritised by race, not by need.
The Three Waters reforms still include 50:50 co-government of centralised water services.
Ngāi Tahu can appoint two voting members to the otherwise democratic Canterbury Regional Council.
Oranga Tamariki is required by law to honour the Treaty when making decisions about Māori children in state care.
Ethnicity is used to prioritise and even restrict access to healthcare services.
Where to start?
Healthcare is being repriortised because Maori and Pacific health is so bad in comparison to Pakeha health. Pakeha men and women live on average seven years longer than their Maori counterpart.
As I commented earlier during Covid the Auckland District Health Board’s Clinicians noticed that the list system did not favour Maori and Pasifeka and set out to address this problem. The primary consideration was still need. But extra points were awarded to those ethnicities in an attempt to ensure that the allocation process produced a statistically fairer result.
Jo Moir at Newsroom describes the background:
During Covid-19 medical professionals in Auckland identified that Māori and Pasifika were disproportionately waiting for surgery compared with other population groups and sought to fix it when operating theatres were back up and running after the 2020 lockdowns.
All the health data pointed to ethnicity being a significant factor, so alongside clinical need – how urgently someone requires surgery – Auckland hospitals started working its way through waitlists using those two criteria for routine surgeries.
When doctors decide who should be front of the queue, everyone is first and foremost put into a clinical priority category of urgent, semi-urgent, or routine.
Duncan Bliss, Te Toka Tumai surgical services manager, is part of the team who created the algorithm for a new equity adjustor score that was rolled out in Auckland in February.
He tells Newsroom he can’t stress enough that clinical need “always takes precedence and the equity adjustor doesn’t interfere with that”.
So the policy, created by clinicians, is rational.
And Sir Colin Tukuitonga has explained why results were so bad for Maori and Pasifeka and why an adjustment is appropriate. From the Herald:
Sir Collin Tukuitonga, a leading expert in Pasifika health, said Māori and Pasifika patients could be moved to the front of surgical lines due to the inequalities in the previous stages of the health system, such as the referral process.
“Māori and Pacific people tend to linger on the referral list… and inevitably, I think people will say that there’s also an institutional bias, possibly a racism that doesn’t put them where they need to be in order to get the surgery,” Tukuitonga said.
“The referral pathways are not that straightforward.”
Tukuitonga specifically used the example of bariatric surgery, which helps to aid those with morbid obesity, which he said was “much more” prevalent in Māori and Pacific communities than in Pākehā. He said this could be another reason why these patients are being brought forward in the waiting times.
“For most of the surgical interventions, Māori and the Pacific people don’t get to get the rates of interventions that might be warranted given their conditions,” Tukuitonga said.
He added: “In other words, it’s not acceptable to have a group in the population where obesity is a major problem and yet they’re not getting the physical intervention that they require.”
But hey why not engage in racist dog whistling instead of addressing what is an important issue.
As for three waters the phrase “50:50 co-government of centralised water services” does not make sense apart maybe to racists.
It also ignores the proposed structure.
And Maori have a special interest in water. Even National recognises this, belatedly.
It has been a strong supporter of Maori co-governance of water for many years. National itself passed the legislation that gave Waikato command over the allocation of the Waikato River and Waipa River. National also passed the legislation that gave local iwi command over the Taupo catchment in the 1998 Taupo Accord. National also prepared the legislation providing for the personhood of the Wanganui River. National also passed the 2014 legislation providing for full Maori control over the massive Uruwera water catchment.
As for Ngāi Tahu being able to appoint two voting members to the Canterbury Regional Council guess what National did in 2010 when Auckland super city was formed? You guessed it, they provided for Maori seats on Auckland Council’s committees. Although to be fair Act opposed that measure as well.
As for Oranga Tamariki being obliged to honour the Treaty well it is a founding document. The section is used to ensure that among other things family group conferences seek to restore the cultural mana of the young people the entity deals with.
Complaining about it is absurd as proposing the removal of cultural background reports. Absurd that is unless you are willing tear up perfectly good policy in your quest to seek the support of racists.
But getting back to Seymour’s claim that Mandela would have been an Act supporter.
Clearly the basic premise is that the moment you try to change policy settings to address clear imbalance based on race the attempt itself is somehow racist. Yep this is as bizarre as it seems.
But when you are the leader of a marginal party that normally needs to rely on life support from National to survive, seeking a position that most people will agree with is not a necessity.
I can confidently say that there is as much chance of Mandela supporting Apartheid as there is of him supporting Act.
He was committed to opposing privilege based on race.
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