The Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975 set up the Waitangi Tribunal as a permanent commission of inquiry to examine any claim by Maori over any law, regulation, or acts, omissions, policies, or practices of the Crown that may have given offence. It was an attempt to provide an avenue for Maori grievance and get Maori nationalist protest off the streets. The Act was passed a couple of days before the Maori Land March led by Dame Whina Cooper delivered a 60,000-signature petition to Prime Minister Bill Rowling.

The act also gave a handful of un-elected tribunal members the exclusive authority to interpret the treaty. The Act was the first legal recognition of the treaty.

The Act aimed to examine current policies and practices against principles of the treaty but it did not allow the tribunal to investigate historical breaches. In 1985, Justice Minister Geoffrey Palmer enabled the Waitangi Tribunal to investigate claims back to 1840.

Claims started to trickle in, began to multiply, and became more complex. In 1882, chiefs had just nine grievances that they took to England. In contrast, a total of 2034 claims were registered with the Waitangi Tribunal by June 2009. Since more than 2000 claims came into existence after a naïve government created the opportunity to make all manner of claims, it appears that the Waitangi Tribunal is in fact somewhat of a claims magnet.

The Waitangi Tribunal should be abolished. There are seven reasons why it should go:

1. As a permanent, for-Maori-only complaint body, the Waitangi Tribunal creates a race fault line.

2. The tribunal rewrites history for financial gain.

3. The tribunal is not a dispassionate, fact-finding body. It is heavily biased towards Maori claimants.

4. Tribunal activities undermine private property rights

5. The tribunal has failed to meet public expectations because while it has been in existence, Maori protest

has escalated, settlement proceeds have been captured by tribal elites, and Maori under-privilege

appears to continue unabated.

6. The tribunal has created a ‘gravy train’

7. The tribunal is used to extract benefits for tribal interests.

The Waitangi Tribunal could be abolished by repealing Sections 4-8 of the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975, leaving any final historic settlements that are still in the pipeline to be negotiated directly with the Crown - since more and more tribes are choosing to do that anyway.