300,000!

Over the holidays, there was a rising tide of calls for people to submit on National's repulsive, white supremacist Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi Bill, along with a wave of advice and examples of what to say. And it looks like people rose to the occasion, with over 300,000 submissions received so far:

Initial estimates showed that over 300,000 submissions have been lodged online. The committee said more than half of those submissions came on Tuesday, which caused the site to crash.

The previous record for submissions was just over 100,000 on the conversion therapy legislation in 2021.

Assuming that they're all kiwis, and not foreign MuskBots, that means more than 5% of the population of Aotearoa felt strongly enough about this bill to speak up about it. Which is a massive level of mobilisation.

We don't know yet - and won't know for months, given the numbers - whether the balance of submissions favour or oppose the bill. But Luxon's hopes of being able to vote this down at second reading and put the issue to bed quietly are clearly dead. No-one is going to be talking about anything else for as long as this bill is before the house, and even once it is voted down or voted through, people are not going to forget. Especially if it is voted through, because there's clearly enough of a motivated base of activism here to drive a significant anti-government protest movement if National passes this law, and to push for it to be reversed (I'm less concerned about the other case, because while there are clearly some motivated racists - the National and ACT caucuses, for a start - its not like there were a hundred thousand of them in front of parliament calling for the Treaty to be abolished).

Given the numbers - three times the previous record - its no wonder the parliament website melted under the load. The good news is that the Justice Committee has done the right thing, and extended the submission deadline for another five days. So, if you haven't already, Submit!. History is watching, and like the Tour, people in twenty or forty years time will want to know which side you were on. Are you going to do your part, or stay silent in the face of white supremacy?