February 05, 2018
PM in call for change at Waitangi
Prime Minister Jacinta Ardern has called for change in treaty relationships.
Speaking from the porch of the Whare Runanga on the Treaty Grounds, the first woman prime minister to do so, Ms Ardern said treaty settlements are not the end of the relationship nor of the crown’s responsibility.
On a day with no protest evident, she said peaking frankly and honestly was not a sign of failure but a sign of the health of the nation.
She said she hoped her child will know that we have the power to change and we must change.
Some of the changes needed could be seen in the inequality between the peoples, like the gap between the Whare Runanga and the old homestead on the Treaty Grounds.
The distance between here and here is unemployment, it's the rangatahi who don't have hope for the future, it's the poverty that exists amongst whanau, it's those rangatahi who don't have access to the mental health services who take their lives, it's the fact not everyone has a decent home or place to live, it's the incarceration of Maori people disproportionately to everyone else. That is the distance between us," Arden says.
The change will require crown and Maori working together.
Security was tight as the Prime Minister and MPs from the Government coalition parties as well as for National came through the grounds to the Whare Runanga, but there was no sense there might be any disruption.
Ngapuhi elders decided last year the move to the upper marae was the only way to break the cycle of chaos and disruption that had been a feature of recent years.
Their choice was a reminder of the majesty of the site overlooking the Bay of Islands.
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