Prime Minister Christopher Luxon speaks at Waitangi on Thursday.
Photo: RNZ / Mark Papalii

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has faced sustained heckling and had to fend off questions about a revived Treaty Principles Bill as he returned to Waitangi this year.

ACT leader David Seymour predictably attracted his own jeers, and NZ First’s Winston Peters focused on a return serve.

The opposition was not spared criticism either, with Labour accused of backstabbing, and Te Pāti Māori given a stern word to sort out their internal problems and finish the work it started at Parliament.

But Luxon was clearly the one attracting the most ire.

Even before MPs walked onto the upper Treaty Grounds, a group of 40 or so protesters led by activist Wikatana Popata gathered as he made a rousing speech beneath the flagstaff – calling the coalition “the enemy”.

“These fellas are accountable to America, they’re here on behalf of America e tātou mā. Don’t you see what my uncle Shane [Jones] is doing? My uncle Shane, he’s giving the okay to all the oil drilling and the mining because those are American companies e tātou mā. So wake up.

“We’re not quite sure who our enemy is, well let me remind us: those people that are about to walk in, that’s our enemy… we’re not scared of your arrests, we’re not scared of your jail cells or your prisons. We’ve been imprisoned… we kōrero Māori to our tamariki at home, we practise our tikanga Māori at home, so you will never imprison us.”

The group performed a haka in protest of the politicians’ presence amid the more formal haka welcoming them to the marae. A small scuffle broke out as security stopped some of the protesters – who were shouting ‘kupapa’, or ‘traitor’ – from advancing closer.

Speaking from the pae in te reo Māori on behalf of the haukāinga, Te Mutunga Rameka paid tribute to retiring Labour MP Peeni Henare and challenged Māori MPs working for the government, asking “where is your kotahitanga, where is your unity?”.

The next speaker, Eru Kapa-Kingi, acknowledged the protesters outside – saying he had challenged from outside in the past and now he was challenging from within the marae.

“Why do we continue to welcome the spider to our house,” he asked.

“This government has stabbed us in the front, but others stabbed us in the back,” he said, referring to Labour.

“Sort yourself out,” was his message to them, and to Te Pāti Māori, which in November ousted two of its MPs. Kapa-Kingi was arguably a central part of those ructions, however, having been employed by his mother Mariameno – one of those ousted MPs – and leading some of the criticism of the party’s leadership.

His criticism of Labour highlighted the departure of Henare, who he said had been – like his mother – silenced by his party.

Henare soon rose to his feet, saying according to custom those named on the marae were entitled to speak – and he spoke of humility.

“We must be very humble, extremely humble. And so that’s why I stand humbly before you… Parliament kept me safe over the years.

“We have reached a point in time where I have completed my work. And so I ask everyone to turn their thoughts to what was said this morning: the hopes, aspirations, and desires of our people.”

Henare and his soon-to-be-former boss, Labour leader Chris Hipkins, have both batted away speculation about other reasons behind his departure – not least from NZ First deputy Shane Jones.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins faces the media following the formalities of Waitangi 2026.
Photo: Mark Papalii

Hipkins himself acknowledged Henare in his speech, saying “our hearts are heavy today. We know we are returning you to your whānau in the North, but you are still part of our whānau . And we know where to find you”.

He later told reporters Kapa-Kingi was talking “a lot of rubbish”, that the last Labour government did more for Māori than many others, and Labour had already admitted it got the Foreshore and Seabed legislation wrong.

Seymour was up next and spoke of liberal democratic values; dismissing complaints of colonisation as a “myopic drone”; and saying the defeat of the Treaty Principles Bill was a pyrrhic victory because – he believed – it would return and become law in future.

David Seymour at Waitangi.
Photo: RNZ/Mark Papalii

Defending his comments on colonisation later, he said it had been more good than bad, as “even the poorest people in New Zealand today live like Kings and Queens compared with most places in most times in history”.

Conch shells and complaints about growing sick during Seymour’s speech clearly fired up the next speaker, Winston Peters – who said he did not come to be insulted or speak about politics.

“There’s some young pup out there shouting who doesn’t know what day it is,” he said, calling for a return to the interests of “one people, one nation”.

As the shouting started, Peters repeated his line there would come a time where they wanted to speak to him long before he wanted to speak to them.

Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson then rose to speak from the mahau, echoing the words of the late veteran campaigner Titewhai Harawira, urging the Crown to honour the Treaty, “it is not hard”.

Green co-leaders Chlöe Swarbrick and Marama Davidson sit alongside ACT’s deputy leader Brooke van Velden.
Photo: MARK PAPALII / RNZ

The party announced during the events on Thursday it would be standing candidates in three Māori seats, including list MP Huhana Lyndon, lawyer Tania Waikato, and former Te Pāti Māori candidate Heather Te Au-Skipworth – and Davidson staked out her party’s claim to those seats.

“When the giants, the rangatira of our Green Party – before the Pāti Māori was even formed – were the only party in the 2004 Foreshore hīkoi to meet the people, the masses, to uphold Te Tiriti,” she said.

With the government trampling treaty and environment while corporations benefit, she said giving land back was core.

While her speech was welcomed with applause, the government’s hecklers soon turned up the noise for the prime minister’s.

After skipping last year’s pōwhiri amid tensions over the Treaty Principles Bill, he began by saying it was a tremendous privilege to be back, someone already shouting “we’ve had enough”.

Christopher Luxon at Waitangi.
Photo: RNZ/Mark Papalii

He spoke about the the meaning of the Treaty as he saw it, and the importance of discussing and debating rather than turning on one another.

“It speaks so highly of us that we can come together at times like this, but it is also relevant on Waitangi Day as we think about how we’ve grappled and wrestled with other challenging issues as well,” he said.

Shouts and jeers could be heard throughout, but he ploughed on undeterred.

“… I think we have the Treaty to thank for that, because that has enabled us to engage much better with each other and we should take immense pride in that.”

One person could be heard yelling “treason” as Luxon spoke. He later said it was “typical of what we expect at Waitangi … I enjoyed it”.

Asked if his government was honouring the Treaty, he said “yes”.

“We take it very seriously. It’s our obligation to honour the Treaty, but we work it out by actually making sure we are lifting educational outcomes for Māori kids, we work it out by making sure we are lifting health outcomes, we work it out by making sure we’re making a much more safer community.”

Luxon has been rejecting the idea of a revived Treaty Principles Bill since the day after it was voted down, but his coalition partner Seymour has been pledging its return for even longer.

The prime minister has reiterated his stance several times in the lead-up to Thursday’s pōwhiri, and did so again: “David can have his own take on that but I’m just telling you, it ain’t happening,” he said.

Ahead of the 2023 election, he had said redefining the Treaty’s principles was not his party’s policy and they did not support it, that a referendum – as the bill proposed – would be “divisive and unhelpful”, and a referendum would not be on the coalition table.

He was asked, given that, how ironclad his guarantee could be with an election campaign still to come and governing arrangements yet to be confirmed.

“We’ve been there and we killed it, so we’re done,” he said, clearly hoping for finality on the matter.

Te Tai Tokerau kaumātua and veteran broadcaster Waihoroi Shortland bookended the speeches.

Beginning with a Winston Churchill quote – that democracy is a bad form of government but the others are worse – Shortland said it was easy to remark on how divisive Māori were “when you all live in the most divisive house in the country”.

He called for Henare to be allowed to leave politics with dignity, but extended no such luxury for Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi.

Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi.
Photo: MARK PAPALII / RNZ

“Rawiri, I cannot allow you to come away. Your work is not done. It is crushing to see and to hear what the House does kia koutou, kia tātou, ki te Māori – but we sent you there nevertheless, and that work is not done. Find a way.”

Waititi had spoken earlier, thanking Eru Kapa-Kingi for what he had said.

“I can hear the anger and I can feel the pain. And the courage to stand before the people and say what you had to say,” he said.

He said the party wanted to meet with Ngāpuhi but had been “scattered” when invited to a hui in November, and indicated an eagerness to meet.

“We are still eager to gather with you but we must make the proper arrangements before we can,” he said.

“It’s alright to have problems. But we must experience those problems in our own house. If those problems go outside, the horse will bolt.”

He said the current government was “nibbling like a sandfly” at the Treaty, and there was “only one enemy before us, and it is not ourselves”.

But that fell short of what Mariameno Kapa-Kingi had hoped for, telling reporters she initially thought an apology was coming.

She said she was disappointed Waititi did not fully address their stoush in his speeches, and she was committed to standing in Te Tai Tokerau – presumably, regardless of her party affiliation.

“I’m not going anywhere until our people tell me otherwise. I’ve got much to do.”

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