{"id":115964,"date":"2025-11-03T17:52:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-03T17:52:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/115964\/"},"modified":"2025-11-03T17:52:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-03T17:52:08","slug":"treaty-and-schools-government-to-remove-requirement-for-boards-to-give-effect-to-te-tiriti-o-waitangi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/115964\/","title":{"rendered":"Treaty and schools: Government to remove requirement for boards to give effect to Te Tiriti o Waitangi"},"content":{"rendered":"

In June, Stanford was subject to what she called \u201ccomplete, utter garbage [and] lies\u201d<\/a> amid an attack campaign from lobby group Hobson\u2019s Pledge over the clause. The group wanted it removed.<\/p>\n

At the time, she said there were \u201clegitimate questions\u201d to be asked about whether that clause was necessary, but said it would be included as part of the Government\u2019s wider review of Treaty clauses. Her coalition partners in Act argued it should be removed immediately. <\/p>\n

An Official Information Act (OIA) response released to the Herald in July showed the Ministry of Education had provided no advice to the minister on removing the requirement at the time. <\/p>\n

\"EducationEducation Minister Erica Stanford says the Government “does not believe it\u2019s fair and reasonable” for parents and volunteers to bear responsibility for giving effect to the Treaty in schools. Photo \/ Mark Mitchell<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, she said the Government\u2019s review had questioned whether \u201cit was appropriate for school boards to be held accountable for meeting the Crown\u2019s obligations under the Treaty\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Government does not believe it\u2019s fair and reasonable to pass this duty on to parents and volunteers,\u201d Stanford said. \u201cThe Crown, not parent volunteers, must be accountable for it.\u201d <\/p>\n

Stanford has legislation going through the House that makes multiple changes to how the education system is governed. Within this bill, there are amendments to Section 127, which outlines the objectives of school boards. <\/p>\n

The current law already contains objectives, including the one to ensure \u201cthe school gives effect to Te Tiriti o Waitangi\u201d.<\/p>\n

Stanford\u2019s legislation initially continued to include this, but it will be removed. The change will be made at the Committee of the Whole House stage of the legislative process.<\/p>\n

Her legislation also says the \u201cparamount objective\u201d for a school board is to \u201censure that every student at the school is able to attain their highest possible standard in educational achievement\u201d. <\/p>\n

There are several \u201csupporting objectives\u201d in Stanford\u2019s bill to assist with this. Many of these are already in the current law but are referred to as the boards\u2019 \u201cprimary objectives\u201d. <\/p>\n

They include ensuring a school is \u201cphysically and emotionally safe for all students and staff\u201d, \u201cinclusive of and caters for students with differing needs\u201d and acts to \u201celiminate racism, stigma, bullying and any other forms of discrimination\u201d. <\/p>\n

The new legislation also makes explicitly clear a school must \u201ctake all reasonable steps to ensure that the school\u2019s students attend the school when it is open\u201d. <\/p>\n

In the current law, there are various ways a school board can give effect to Te Tiriti, such as ensuring local curriculum \u201creflect local tikanga M\u0101ori, m\u0101tauranga M\u0101ori, and te ao M\u0101ori\u201d and making instruction available in te reo M\u0101ori. <\/p>\n

Stanford said her legislation will still make clear that school boards must \u201cseek to achieve equitable outcomes for M\u0101ori students\u201d.<\/p>\n

Boards will also have to \u201ctake all reasonable steps to provide for teaching and learning in\u202fte\u202freo\u202fM\u0101ori to students whose parents and caregivers request it\u201d and\u202f\u201censure that the policies and practices for its school reflect New Zealand\u2019s cultural diversity\u201d. <\/p>\n

There are more mentions of Te Tiriti in the legislation \u2013 such as stating the education system should honour it – but not relating to school boards\u2019 objectives. These may be included in the Government\u2019s wider review, for which decisions haven\u2019t been announced.<\/p>\n

\"ElliotElliot Ikilei called for the clause regarding schools giving effect to the Treaty to be removed. Picture \/ Richard Robinson<\/p>\n

A war-of-words between Stanford and Hobson\u2019s Pledge<\/a> happened in June after the lobby group claimed the minister was sneaking the \u201cradical\u201d clause into legislation. She hadn\u2019t introduced it, but initially didn\u2019t remove it.<\/p>\n

Hobson\u2019s Pledge trustee Elliot Ikilei described Stanford as National\u2019s \u201cwokest\u201d minister. A website set up by the group alleged the clause was \u201cStanford\u2019s Sneaky Sell-out\u201d. <\/p>\n

They believed the clause represented \u201cone of the boldest attempts yet to entrench co-governance and identity politics in the classroom\u201d.<\/p>\n

Stanford said she received \u201cemails and messages and all sorts of things telling me what an awful person I am, but all based on complete and utter rubbish, complete lies\u201d. <\/p>\n

Act\u2019s David Seymour told the Herald at the time that his party wanted the clause removed right away and people shouldn\u2019t \u201cbe forced to learn about a set of spiritual beliefs or culture because somebody else thinks it\u2019s important for them\u201d. <\/p>\n

Labour leader Chris Hipkins said in June it was a \u201cgood thing\u201d for school boards to \u201cbe asking the question, \u2018why are M\u0101ori kids not achieving at the same level as non-M\u0101ori kids?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Jamie Ensor is a senior political reporter in the NZ Herald press gallery team based at Parliament. He was previously a TV reporter and digital producer in the Newshub press gallery office. He was a finalist this year for Political Journalist of the Year at the Voyager Media Awards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In June, Stanford was subject to what she called \u201ccomplete, utter garbage [and] lies\u201d amid an attack campaign…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":115965,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43699,95,34702,3470,13492,82486,2082,14154,266,5812,2720,111,43,139,69,82487,28875,82485,4062,6649,11925,3271,6100,3767,8690,8229,46802,61,38961,27704,1533],"class_list":["post-115964","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-achieve","tag-and","tag-boards","tag-clear","tag-effect","tag-equitable","tag-for","tag-give","tag-government","tag-make","tag-mori","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-outcomes","tag-remove","tag-requirement","tag-school","tag-schools","tag-seek","tag-should","tag-still","tag-students","tag-te","tag-they","tag-tiriti","tag-to","tag-treaty","tag-waitangi","tag-will"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115964","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115964"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115964\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/115965"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115964"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115964"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115964"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}