{"id":428976,"date":"2026-05-15T13:09:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-15T13:09:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/428976\/"},"modified":"2026-05-15T13:09:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-15T13:09:12","slug":"waitangi-tribunal-crown-in-breach-over-education-treaty-clause-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/428976\/","title":{"rendered":"Waitangi Tribunal: Crown in breach over education Treaty clause review"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Waitangi Tribunal has found the Crown breached the treaty principles of partnership, active protection and good government in their approach to changing legal obligations to the Treaty in education, causing prejudice against M\u0101ori.<\/p>\n

The report came about in the wake of the government\u2019s sweeping review of legislation containing Treaty clauses<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The inquiry into proposals to amend treaty provisions in the Education and Training Act 2020 was filed by Ng\u0101ti Hine, Te Kapotai and education union NZEI Te Riu Roa.<\/p>\n

The tribunal found that Cabinet moved on the proposals despite repeated advice from officials that there was insufficient time for an in-depth analysis, that not enough was known about the potential impact of the proposed changes, and that an underdeveloped regulatory impact statement was insufficient for ministers to make an informed decision.<\/p>\n

Why the Waitangi Tribunal’s urging Govt to pause Treaty clause changes – Watch on TVNZ+<\/a><\/p>\n

Recommendations<\/p>\n

The tribunal recommends the Crown halts the advancement of proposed reforms \u201cimmediately\u201d to repair the M\u0101ori-Crown relationship, and engage meaningfully with M\u0101ori in the co-design of treaty provisions if changes are then \u201cobjectively needed\u201d to the Education and Training Act 2020.<\/p>\n

The tribunal noted Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith\u2019s approach to the National Iwi Chairs Forum and said engaging with a \u201csingular national M\u0101ori body\u201d was a \u201ctreaty-inconsistent course\u201d. <\/p>\n

The tribunal said the Justice Minister\u2019s view that select committee was a sufficient opportunity to provide input was inadequate and an insult to M\u0101ori, and that the Crown demonstrated a \u201creckless disregard\u201d to its relationship with M\u0101ori.<\/p>\n

In response, the minister said the government stands by the approach it has taken.<\/p>\n

The Tribunal\u2019s stage two report will be focused on the removal of schools boards\u2019 treaty obligations and the curriculum reforms.<\/p>\n

Treaty references amended<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

(Source: 1News)<\/p>\n

Overall the Government is set to amend 19 pieces of legislation to ensure references to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi are “clear and consistent”, Goldsmith confirmed today.<\/p>\n

Goldsmith said the decision<\/a> was made to achieve more consistency.<\/p>\n

“Over the last 30 or 40 years, Parliament has made all sorts of references to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi. Sometimes it\u2019s \u2018honour\u2019, or \u2018have regard to\u2019, or \u2018give effect to\u2019, or \u2018take into account\u2019,” he said in a statement today.<\/p>\n

“We need to create some consistency here, in the interests of increasing certainty and supporting compliance. A core foundation of our success as a nation is predictability in the law.”<\/p>\n

He previously told 1News he didn’t accept that the proposed threshold was too low.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Waitangi Tribunal has found the Crown breached the treaty principles of partnership, active protection and good government…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":428977,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,4432,43,135,76216,40,38,41,39,10872],"class_list":["post-428976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-maori-issues","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-te-tiriti-o-waitangi","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-torangapu"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428976","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=428976"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428976\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/428977"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=428976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=428976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=428976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}