New Zealand needs a cultural shift to tackle corruption
We keep punishing the people who ask questions, and rewarding the people who dodge them.
My family arrived here before the Treaty. They watched the New Zealand Company buy what is now Dunedin in 1844, then on-sell it to the Free Church of Scotland’s Otago Association.
The Free Church had broken from a corrupt establishment. Dunedin was meant to be a fresh start, a world away from the corruption they had fled.
But the sellers were crooks.
The Wakefield brothers built the New Zealand Company on a kidnapping. Edward Gibbon Wakefield abducted a fifteen-year-old heiress and tricked her into marriage at Gretna Green, earning three years in prison. Freed, he and his brothers bought vast tracts of New Zealand for a handful of blankets and trinkets.
Governor Hobson appointed William Spain to check the Company’s land claims. Spain knocked most of them back, including deals by missionaries — even Henry Williams, who drafted the Treaty itself.
The Wakefields tried again anyway, and were massacred at Wairau for it. The Crown’s own inquiry sided with the chiefs. Governor FitzRoy found the settlers had provoked it.
Then FitzRoy did something stranger. He suspended the Crown’s exclusive right to buy Maori land and let the Company purchase directly.
The Otago Purchase of 1844 was the first deal done under it, promising a tenth of the land back to Ngai Tahu.
That tenth never came.
Australia was settled by convicts. New Zealand was settled by conmen.
The trouble with unpunished wrongdoing is that it attracts more of the same.
Remember the kid at school whose father was an old boy, who could get away with anything? Nobody much liked him. Everyone still wanted to be his friend.
Unaccountable power doesn’t need to be liked, only obeyed.
New Zealand First was founded in 1993 on the promise of an independent anti-corruption commission “to enable New Zealanders to have confidence that their institutions are working properly.” Winston Peters has held the balance of power more than once since. The commission has never been built.
When New South Wales set one up, the first person it went after was the minister who created it.
The New Zealand First Foundation aped National’s but the Serious Fraud Office went after them over undeclared donations. Two men were charged and acquitted — twice, on appeal too. No conviction followed.
Peters’ superannuation overpayment was leaked to journalists before the 2017 election. One minister briefed under the “no surprises” rule told her own husband and sister about it. Three journalists were subpoenaed and refused to name their source.
Nobody has ever been held responsible for the leak. Peters didn’t trust the State Services Commission to investigate. People given the information got name suppression. A judge found Peters’ privacy had been deliberately breached, recent precedents suggested journalists would require them to reveal their source, but the judge instead ordered Peters to pay $320,000 in costs because Peters couldn’t prove who did it.
One of the ministers who shared the overpayment now chairs Transparency International New Zealand, and was sent to clean up a council sacked for dysfunction. The other left Parliament for a real estate ‘strategic’ advisory role, running National’s fundraising machinery.
Instead of combating dirty politics, Winston Peters allowed Cameron Slater to boost his profile, then the chair of the Taxpayers’ Union got the number three slot on his party list.
The Greens, Te Paati Maori and Opportunity all want an anti-corruption commission. They need either National, Labour or ACT on board to make it happen.
That effectively comes down to a conscience vote. I doubt many politicians want to dismantle a system that serves them so well. The revolving door between media, lobbyists and ministers’ offices. Donors chasing fast-track approval. Fundraisers appointed to chair state monopolies. Ministers steering money to friends’ projects. Promoting officials who did them favours while in opposition.
I drafted the legislation almost a decade ago. Winston Peters has been queen, then king maker since. Meanwhile, the Police have no inclination to prosecute their mates. An under-resourced media has been distracted by silly sideshows.
We like to think we’re a fair country, allergic to airs and graces. But forgiving the connected and punishing the people who ask questions isn’t fairness. It’s condoning and capitalising on a corrupt culture.
Grant is a former hearings commissioner who has worked for National and Act.
