Tim Dower: The Break From Waitangi Day Drama Is Over

Waitangi celebrations this year promise to be the most, shall we say, spirited that we've seen in quite a while. To be honest, I've enjoyed a break from some of the drama of the mid-90s - the jostling of a Prime Minister with his arm in a cast, the Prime Minister reduced to tears, the mud throwing. For a little while now the scenes on the TV news have had been more of a festive feel to them with PM's on the BBQ rather than hiding in the toilet. But this year, that's changed again. Judging by the intense powhiri for Kīngitanga, and thanks to considerable rarking up by Te Pati Maori, strong feelings are already being whipped up. Te Pati Maori obviously intends to keep running this three-headed taniwha line as their way to describe the coalition. I'm guessing that whatever he says publicly, the Prime Minister isn't really looking forward to tomorrow and he'll be glad when it's over. But it really is an opportunity to straighten a few things out and maybe, just maybe, defuse some of the rhetoric and tension that's been going on. Labour and the Greens are allowing themselves to be dragged into it and it really does them no credit. Talk by MPs of a "fight" against the Government on behalf of Māori and the need to uphold Te Tiriti o Waitangi is misleading at best, downright dishonest at its worst. And for Labour to claim gains were made for Māori under its time in office... well, if it wasn't such a whopper it would be laughable. Māori went backwards on pretty much every metric under Labour. So the opportunity for Chris Luxon is to set things straight and somehow dispel this idea the coalition is anti-Māori and hose down the notion anyone wants to rewrite the Treaty. He's been saying the right things to the media, and in person too, and I believe he wants to deliver the right things, but fronting at Waitangi to do exactly the same is a necessity. Even if it means suffering a little indignity to show you mean what you say.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.