O'Rourke Denis: Oaths and Declarations (Upholding the Treaty of Waitangi) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
O'Rourke Denis: Oaths and Declarations (Upholding the Treaty of Waitangi) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 07 November 2012. Volume:685;Page:6407. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First) 
: 
 New Zealand First opposes the Oaths and Declarations (Upholding the Treaty of Waitangi) Amendment Bill. We think it is a piece of legislative nonsense. It would make no substantive contribution to actually upholding the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi. New Zealand First understands the sentiments and why the Maori Party has proposed this but we suspect that it is not much more than a political stunt. It is not a bill to be taken seriously and we do not think for a moment that many New Zealanders would. However New Zealand First does believe that the Treaty itself certainly needs to be taken seriously and performed as a contract by the Crown. This bill will make absolutely no contribution to that concept whatsoever. 
I read the purpose of the bill and it states: “The purpose of this Act is to: (a) provide for any person taking a statutory oath to in addition to repeating the words of the oath elect to state that they will uphold the Treaty of Waitangi;”. The first thing that you note about that is that it is in addition to the oath. So this is something in addition to the oath. What is in addition to the oath? It is an election to state. So there is something different between the words of an oath and a simple statement. Is that intentional? It certainly is we think. What it means is that it is something less than the oath itself and that does not seem to be appropriate in an oath. People can of course and do make statements of support any time they wish and so they should but there is absolutely not one iota of reason why such a statement is appropriate in this particular oath. 
The oath is about upholding the laws of New Zealand and it is about loyalty to the head of State of New Zealand as a whole. It has got nothing whatsoever to do with contracts such as the Treaty of Waitangi or any other document. The point is this: in the law the Treaty is a contract between the Crown and the united tribes of New Zealand. So you would have to ask as a result of that how an individual person can uphold the Treaty when they are not individually a part of it anyway. It is utterly illogical for a person to swear an oath to uphold something that they have no power themselves to do. It is utterly ridiculous to put in such a thing when swearing an oath of this kind. 
Another point is this: it would be utterly meaningless for a person to do so because we do not even know what these principles of the Treaty are. We had one judge Justice Cooke who defined some principles then we had Sir Geoffrey Palmer while he was Prime Minister define another five principles but nobody yet knows which of these are—or whether others are—the principles of Waitangi. How can an individual in that circumstance swear to or make a statement to—and that is what they would actually be doing—uphold the principles of the Treaty when they do not even know what they are? So in practice it is unacceptable to add this even as an election. If it was appropriate to do so then why would it not also be appropriate to state that a person wished to uphold the Universal Declaration of Human Rights the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act the Magna Carta the United Nations Charter or even the constitution and rules of the Waipukurau rugby club or any other thing that somebody held dear? 
Finally this bill would degrade the oath itself. It would mean that we would be introducing extraneous and inappropriate words to the oath. It would take attention away from what the oath is really about and we think it would be disrespectful to New Zealand and to the head of State. This bill should not pass.