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Waatea is receiving reports that Tikanga is being withdrawn from University Law Degrees. If accurate it comes off the back of a report from @RNZ :
“A select committee has largely rejected a complaint over regulations requiring law schools to teach students about tikanga (tradition), but recommended changes based on a related concern.
First made public in 2023 and taking effect from the start of 2025, the regulatory changes would require a compulsory law course on tikanga Māori under the legal education curriculum, as well as the inclusion of relevant content on tikanga Māori in existing compulsory courses.
The committee said requiring tikanga be taught as a mandatory part of other subjects – rather than only as a separate compulsory course – was unusual and unexpected, and should be changed.”
Last night the Parliament removed Tikanga in a motion put by a National MP. “
JOSEPH MOONEY (National—Southland): I move, That this House disallow the following provisions of the Professional Examinations in Law Regulations 2008: (a) regulation 1(3), definition of “Tikanga Māori Requirements”, paragraph (a); and (b) regulation 3(1)(a)(ii). The motion of disallowance that I have filed, which the Business Committee has determined should be debated, is in accordance with the majority decision of the Regulations Review Committee. It regards the Professional Examinations in Law (Tikanga Māori Requirements) Amendment Regulations 2022, which were made by the Council of Legal Education under the delegated authority given to them by Parliament, and which came into force at the beginning of this year. “
Standing against the motion was Labour MP Arena Williams:
“Tikanga Māori is the first law of New Zealand. The report sets out why and is unanimously endorsed by the committee. The only point of contention at the cross-partisan committee that is the Regulations Review Committee, and the reason for Labour’s vote No at the end of this debate, is about the very narrow grounds for whether tikanga Māori was rightly required in compulsory papers studied by students at law schools.”
Meanwhile respected Law Firm Minter Ellison has said on its website:
“The application of tikanga in Parliament during the passing of laws was an area of public division and debate as 2024 closed out. But away from the political and legislative stage, the steady recognition and application of tikanga by the Courts across a growing range of issues in dispute has continued much as anticipated over the past 12 months.”
And
“We expect this trend will continue, particularly in the context of disputes involving interpersonal issues. As some orthodoxy starts to emerge for consideration of tikanga – where relevant to the context – to resolve relational disputes, 2025 is also lined up to further test the boundaries for application of tikanga in situations involving potential torts and fiduciary duties. As a developing area of law, the case for all organisations understanding tikanga principles and how tikanga may apply to day-to-day interactions and to resolve disputes is becoming increasingly persuasive.”
Meanwhile Casey Costello said the following (in support of the motion):
Tikanga is not, as was put forward previously, the first law of this land. Tikanga was—if you go back to those principles—an individual belief system within each iwi and hapū. It was not a collective identity across the country, and, therefore, you choose to select how you promote this position.
MARIAMENO KAPA-KINGI stood against the motion: “arrested and convicted than any other group in Aotearoa….Though we make up just 20 percent of the population, we represent 37 percent of those that are proceeded against by police, 45 percent of all people convicted, and 52 percent of the prison population. So with all of those numbers, “Driving While Brown” is a thing.
If we accept the facts, if we know that Māori disproportionately pass through the judicial system, then it becomes essential that those trained to operate within that system—our lawyers—are equipped with an understanding of tikanga Māori. Without such training, our systems will continue to oppress our people and exacerbate the reality that Māori are one of the most incarcerated peoples in the world. That isn’t an accident; that is deliberate, and that is all what I’ve shared before—particularly to the one on the left, don’t know whether he’s listening. At the very least, lawyers trained in tikanga will be better practitioners, attuned to the needs of the people without the shackles that come from operating within a legal framework that has enforced its own version of what is tika since its arrival in this country. To label this and the teaching of tikanga Māori into law as “cultural indoctrination” is hypocritical. It is a disservice to all those who have endured the cultural indoctrination of the current law curriculum, if that’s the way we want to be viewing education. It is a limited way of thinking, it’s backwards, and it’s bad for our health, Joseph, it is bad for our health.”
More to come
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