Is David Seymour NZ’s most dangerous man?

Former National PMs Jim Bolger and John Key share little in common. Bolger was a farmer, an Irish Catholic and a social conservative. Key was a former currency trader, an agnostic and a social progressive.

But one political decision unites both men and it was, in part, the making of their respective governments: both made their peace with the Treaty of Waitangi.

Under the Fourth National Government, Waikato-Tainui and Ngāi Tahu signed settlements for historic wrongs committed against their tribes while paniwi negotiations were entered and agreed over issues as diverse as fisheries and broadcasting frequencies.

Under the Key government dozens of settlements were made for historic wrongs, and negotiations were entered into over issues including freshwater and marine reserves.

But a Sixth National Government could set fire to that legacy. And the arsonist? David Seymour.

The ACT leader promises a referendum on the principles of the Treaty, the abolition of the Māori Health Authority and Māori representation in local government, and redirecting public services on the grounds of “equal opportunity according to robust statistical evidence instead of racial targeting”.

That three-point programme would reverse tremendous progress made in the relationship between Māori and the Crown over the last three decades. For Seymour, this is possibly the price of his support for a National-led government. And for Māori, this is the cost of that potential government.

Even a left-wing partisan would admit public services providing “equal opportunity according to robust statistical evidence instead of racial targeting” is enticing. Who would disagree with public services according to need as the data identifies it?

The trouble is that need and race are often a function of each other. For example, Māori record higher rates of heart disease than non-Māori, and this ethnic disparity still holds.

That implies high rates of heart disease are, in fact, “race-based”. The consequence of Seymour’s needs-based standard, then, is that public health services directed at preventing and treating heart disease would arrive at the very destination Seymour wishes to avoid – “race”.

Serious politicians understand this is why the Māori Health Authority and iwi health providers exist. Disparities between Māori and non-Māori are too often only explainable with reference to one’s Māori identity rather than one’s income, wealth, educational status or other socioeconomic measure.

The racist explanation for that heart disease finding is that ethnicity is the controlling factor because – to phrase it as bluntly and stupidly as a racist would – Māori eat like s.... But decades worth of accumulated research finds the issue is structural.

Across disease categories Māori adults and children are less likely to be referred to a specialist than non-Māori.

In the actual lives of individuals that means Māori are more likely to die younger than Pākehā and from easily preventable disease.

That’s a moral and political outrage.

Is a Pākehā baby born at the same time and in the same place as a Māori baby entitled to a statistically longer, healthier life simply because of their ethnicity and the privileges that confers in the level of diagnosis, referral and treatment?

Of course not, and the vast majority of New Zealanders would agree. But Seymour’s ACT is committed to abolishing one of the most significant reforms to help prevent that moral and political outrage in the form of the Māori Health Authority.

Cynical commentators might allege that ACT is pursuing abolition for electoral reasons only. They might secure the votes of the country’s proudest (and usually loudest) know-nothings.

But a slightly less cynical commentator might credit ACT with a degree of philosophical coherence.

As Seymour explains, the important article in the Treaty of Waitangi, at least for ACT, is Article III – the addendum promising Māori the rights and privileges of British subjects.

For ACT this is a charter for nondiscrimination implying that non-Māori enjoy no greater rights than Māori and conversely Māori enjoy no greater rights than non-Māori.

Seymour is hardly a constitutional scholar, but that understanding is broadly defensible on the text. The trouble is Seymour often cites Article III to support the notion that “co-governance”, often in the form of institutions such as the Māori Health Authority, confers greater rights or advantages upon Māori.

That view collapses under the weight of even the lightest interrogation. In health, it’s Māori who suffer disadvantage on a population level for the simple fact of being Māori. That disadvantage holds across other government categories too, including crime.

JustSpeak’s research finds that a Māori person apprehended for committing the same crime as a Pākehā person is seven times more likely to be charged than the Pākehā person who was apprehended.

Again, this is only explainable with reference to ethnicity and not criminal severity, implying the issue is structural and thus only amenable to structural solutions.

Whether for reasons of political opportunism, cynicism or (charitably) genuine belief, ACT’s policies reject this evidence for fairy tales of policy independent of ethnicity. That belief in the magical might make David Seymour the most dangerous man in New Zealand politics.