The bill received significant backlash from the public, activists, lawyers and the Waitangi Tribunal.
Parmar said she was sent Dunworth’s comments by a student and spoke out about it on Facebook last week, quoting the professor as saying: “The Act Party has a red line saying that when we get into power we will get rid of this [Treaty] principles nonsense … cleanse the statute book of references to the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi.
“It’s not like David Seymour was genuinely, constitutionally curious, right? He just wanted to get Māori to go back inside their box.”
The university confirmed to the Herald that Dunworth made those comments, “or comments close in nature”, during a lecture for the LAW121G Law and Society course.
“The lecture covered the proposed Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi Bill [Treaty Principles Bill], building on earlier material covered in the course on the Treaty itself and the courts’ development of the principles of the Treaty,” a university spokesperson said.
“As a member of academic staff, professor Dunworth is protected by academic freedom, which in relation to teaching includes the freedom to state opinions on potentially controversial topics.
“The exercise of academic freedom aligns with the university’s role as critic and conscience of society expressed in the Education and Training Act.”
Act MP and tertiary education spokesperson Dr Parmjeet Parmar. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Parmar told the Herald that her issue with what Dunworth said was about “the facts”.
“I’m standing up against the spread of disinformation from a partisan professor,” she said.
“You can debate or compete any ideas, that’s totally fine. You could challenge any views, that’s totally fine. You can discuss any controversial topics. But you should not be twisting or distorting any facts; that is wrong.”
Parmar said her party’s goal was to “clearly define” the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi, not to “cleanse” it.
Asked about her accusations of “brainwashing”, Parmar said students “regard their professors as a credible source of information”.
“It’s important that scholarly and academic integrity is maintained by people who are in these positions.”
Asked to respond to criticism from many of her followers that an Act MP was going against her party’s purported support of free speech, Parmar said: “We definitely support free speech and academic freedom, but academic freedom does not mean freedom to misrepresent facts. That’s the main problem here.”
Parmar said “it would be nice” if Dunworth “explained herself”.
Dunworth declined to comment when contacted by the Herald.
Many of Dunworth’s former and current students have also come to her defence, with one saying on social media that she is “fantastic and constantly encourages people to speak up and disagree with her”.
“She makes it really clear that she is going to add her own opinion into what she teaches, and that we should form our opinions.”