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| The Equal Application Of The Laws: There is only so much a judicial system, or any other important part of the state apparatus, will stand before it moves to defend itself. Judges and lawyers cannot be expected to turn a blind eye to egregious breaches of legal norms. As Officers of the Court, it is their sworn duty to uphold the law. They cannot be asked to treat one category of citizen better or worse than another, nor are they permitted to stand back and see injustice done without taking steps to prevent it. |
WHEN DAILY BLOG Editor, Martyn Bradbury, says Labour’s lucky the country’s currently distracted by the Covid-19 Delta Variant, he’s right. Were New Zealand safe and out of Lockdown, it would be in the midst of a dangerously divisive row about Oranga Tamariki, the Judiciary, Race, and the Rule of Law.
Given that the matters at the heart of this controversy are sub judice (i.e. under the authority of the court) I shall forbear from discussing the particular case in question. What must be discussed, however, is the direction in which Māori-Pakeha relations are travelling, and exactly what it would take for this government to intervene.
There is only so much a judicial system, or any other important part of the state apparatus, will stand before it moves to defend itself. Judges and lawyers cannot be expected to turn a blind eye to egregious breaches of legal norms. As Officers of the Court, it is their sworn duty to uphold the law. They cannot be asked to treat one category of citizen better or worse than another, nor are they permitted to stand back and see injustice done without taking steps to prevent it.
Attempts to racialise New Zealand’s courts are bound to provoke significant public disquiet. So, too, will any attempt by the Crown to influence the outcome of trials, or civil cases, by exerting unwarranted pressure on judicial officers. Any government made aware of such behaviour has a duty to act decisively to uphold the Rule of Law. Those responsible must be held to account for their actions.
Though the mere mention of the He Puapua Report will elicit the usual protests from the usual suspects, the events highlighted by The Daily Blog’s editor raise vital issues about what inferences the Crown is allowing and/or encouraging Māori to draw from its recommendations.
Any failure to uphold the equal application of the laws, on the grounds that a separate Māori justice system will soon replace the long-established principle of “one law for all”, will be taken as proof that this government intends to change profoundly the constitutional and judicial arrangements of the New Zealand state.
Such a fundamental change to the manner in which justice is administered in New Zealand, especially one predicated on ethnic and cultural considerations, could have no legitimacy without having first secured the endorsement, by way of referendum, of a majority of New Zealand citizens.
To suggest that the articles of the Treaty of Waitangi in some way obviate the Crown’s need to obtain the consent of the New Zealand electorate before changing the way justice is administered, and by whom, is tantamount to suggesting that the Treaty legally entitles the Crown to extinguish democracy in the Realm of New Zealand without reference to its citizens and in defiance of its laws.
Such action would constitute a declaration of war upon the people of this country. Any government participating in such an open attack on the civil and political rights of its citizens would immediately identify itself as their enemy, and forfeit all claims to their continuing loyalty. It would be responsible for unleashing civil war upon New Zealand.
The Labour Government’s silence on these matters is indefensible. A clear statement of its determination to uphold the Rule of Law and protect the democratic rights of all New Zealanders is long overdue.
This essay was originally posted on The Daily Blog of Tuesday, 24 August 2021.
This story was originally published in the Dominion Post so there's not much that isn't in the public realm already. Karl du Fresne also wrote about it after the Dom Post article back on Saturday the 21st. https://karldufresne.blogspot.com/2021/08/the-disturbing-case-of-moana-and-judges.html
ReplyDeleteI nominate Simon Bridges and David Seymour as the spearhead of a new political movement where our constitution and democracy are foremost.
ReplyDeleteWhat constitution?
DeleteAgree wholeheartedly.
ReplyDeleteThat'he' co-incidentally did a strategic exit or
a DG coincidentally,quite salutary in my view too..
Jax
See here on One News
ReplyDelete"ultimately our desire is to foster acceptance and understanding of the partnership this country is in"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qepwhKIsdo0&t=142s
Means we can't enjoy public broadcasting in English they have to "keep pushing the uglies".
Dame Sian Elias launched the "Climate Action Network" with a speech at the University of Victoria Law School of Wellington in 2011, launching Generation Zero and what would become the others.
ReplyDeleteNow, Elias appears to be trying to bend the legal system to force judgments in alignment with the principles shared by those who belong to those groups.
All this is deeply elitist - almost nobody knows about Dame Sian Elias' involvement in all of this, which I think seriously calls into question her role at the time, and her political motivations since.
Shock horror Chris. We agree again
ReplyDeleteA child needs aroha, love foremost. And if possible a stable loving family.
ReplyDeleteWhat pill brains would deny that a child for any reason? A pox on them, huge ups for a brave judge who saw for the child and stood firm.
The only thing that makes sense to me right now is the lemonparty down old Chris Trotter's road.
ReplyDeleteOur constitutional arrangements and equality under the law are being subverted by stealth. Where all this will lead to God alone knows. Does Ardern not have the wit to understand the disaster she is creating? There has never been greater racial division in this country.
ReplyDeleteWhen I read the story in Stuff, my immediate thought was not that this is about a Māori justice system, but a Chinese one. Chinese judges regularly meet with officials of the Communist Party to be told how to run their current cases and what their verdict will be.
ReplyDeleteIn this story, I saw a senior public servant trying to protect his department and its staff staff from embarrassing questions. That was bad enough, but worse was that the senior judges were reported to have submitted to this pressure.
I don't much care whether the country is called New Zealand or Aotearoa, but I do care that it is run under the rule of law and not for the benefit of a self-protecting elite class. Our elites are no longer the capitalist bosses of Marxist theory, but the professional-managerial class in both public and private sectors. If this case is not unique, then New Zealand has already become a corrupt country where the interests of ordinary Kiwis, both workers and small business owners, are subordinate to the interests of those who run the new power structure. The modern elites are both Maori and Pakeha, and are found in businesses, iwi organisations, local government and central government. The rule of law seems to be one of the few protections that are left to ordinary people.
Listen to the start of this: the world view of the Maori Studies Department (in a poem).
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSX_4FnqXwQ
My unfortunate experience, and as a former lawyer, is that lawyers can be involved in breaches of the rule of law. The Nuremberg laws were also laws of the state and the officer corps of the SS was largely made up of lawyers. There is no magical incantation (though pronouncing the words "rule of law" might approach such an incantation) or wand waving that makes probable lawyers as guardians of the rule of law. If it were so the Noe marxist "feminists judgments project, with its intersectional mummery, would have been canned long ago. Alos there would not have been censorship in Law Talk of Jordan Peterson. The rule of law, by the way, is not, as Professor Niall Ferguson says, the rule of lawyers. Yet it is a good start.
ReplyDeleteThere is a greater dynamic at play here. It also features in the "hate speech' proposals. The present rule of law system is based on individual rights not collectivist Neo marxist ones. Social Justice is NOT legal justice as it is an imposition of prejudice and liability. There is no possible interface. Woke Social justice determines in advance by one's membership to a group one's guilt (sub nom "privilege'). I know of Judge Callinicos, who is a competent and very experienced family law judge as he was as a practitioner, who would have focused on the interests of the child which are paramount, not an a priori presumption pertaining to CRT.
What we have here is a striking example of the corruption of the Clerisy (as with the MoEd and possibly MSD)- which has adopted critical race theory- and raises the issue, which I raised in my submission on hate speech, has our current weltanschauung been subverted and over thrown by Neo marxism? Most lawyers are anti intellectual and won't see the issue as it really is as such their role of guardians of the rule of law is in question. There would have been a lawyer arguing for the social justice CRT position.
I totally agree with your comments and assertions . As this govt is now drawing up sides , civil unrest is not far down the road . Unfortunately , the reciprocation of anger and blame dwelling , will fall on the heads of those visible 15% by the also visible 85% . The true steerers and stirrers of our current wave of racialism , will go untouched , as they prefer to be the suppliers of bullets rather than the shooters . It now appears it is all about money . We have only to look at Lake Taupo . Now that a local iwi have control of the BOTTOM of the lake , they now control what is above the lake bed , and that is water , and above that air . So , recently that same iwi was given the right to charge for the USE of the water . No doubt aircraft will follow suit . It was NOT about culture and heritage , it was ALL about money . So too was the right of iwi for control of a few miles of beach on the east coast . I think we should withdraw ALL our lawyers from assisting any ethnic group from attempting to usurp control of our countryside . (but lawyers are also given to be money hungry beggars and asking them to give up lucrative work is like asking a human to quit breathing .) We must not forget , each application before the Government and Waitangi Tribunal , is paid for by the Govt , OR taxpayer . Settlements are not cheap , even if we , the 85% are , benefitting by way of legal issues , at our own expense . Sounds rather silly !
ReplyDeleteLabour Must Uphold The Rule Of Law
ReplyDeleteWhy? The rule of law in this country is simply a power structure for Pakeha. What are needed are alternative power structures, specifically one for Maori that will truly incorporate their cultural truths rather than something imposed from the outside world and extending all the way back to the Greeks and Romans, peoples who themselves are even more foreign than colonisers of this age.
Ok, I'm being sarcastic, but this is the endpoint of post-modernism, which has proved to be far more powerful a force than Marxism in tearing down our society, as it was intended to. As this comment noted:
Everything is power and the only way forward is to disrupt power and everything else is subordinated to that root concept. Your way is wrong because it isn’t my way and there is no way you can you prove your way is right because there are infinite interpretations of reality and yours is no better than any other. The arc of history proves that you’re wrong and I’m right and therefore anything I do is justified and proper and nothing whatsoever that you do is justified or proper.
The concern seems to be to give the child a suitable cultural upbringing. As the child in all likelihood has two cultures present perhaps we need to follow Solomon's decision. Split the child in two, one half being raised in each cultural way.
ReplyDelete