Brash ‘Mistaken’ over Treaty

Media Release 01 October 2006

Brash ‘Mistaken’ over Treaty

A comment by National Party leader Dr. Don Brash implying that the parties to the Treaty of Waitangi no longer exist has been rubbished by a leading Treaty expert.

Professor Paul Moon, of the Auckland University of Technology, says that Dr. Brash would benefit from some basic training on the Treaty. ‘The Treaty of Waitangi was not signed between two ethnic groups, as Dr. Brash implies’, says Moon, ‘but between two sovereign states. Therefore, it is governed by international laws dealing with inter-state relations, and not the ethnicity of the signatories’.

Moon claims that the issue of Maori and European intermarriage in New Zealand – which Dr. Brash cites to question the relevancy of the Treaty – is mischievous. ‘This has absolutely nothing to do with any treaty’, says Moon, ‘and I am surprised that Dr. Brash or his advisors could possibly come to this conclusion as it flies in the face of all the evidence we have about the Treaty, both historically and in international law’.

ENDS

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