Back in April, Teanau Tuiono's member's bill to undo a historic crime and restore citizenship to Samoans stripped of it by Muldoon unexpectedly passed its first reading and was sent to select committee. That committee has now reported back. But while the headline is that it has unanimously recommended that the bill proceed, that masks a very ugly compromise.
The purpose of the bill was to undo Muldoon's historic crime. Lest anyone forget, in 1982 the UK Privy Council - then our highest court, because colonialism - ruled that Samoans born in Samoa between 1924 and 1949 were and always had been New Zealand citizens (and therefore could not be deported). Muldoon's response was to pass a law - under urgency of course - stripping them of that citizenship, unless they were presently in New Zealand. Tuiono's bill was meant to undo that: not just the effect, but also erase the infamous law from the statute book. While its effects would continue, but be ameliorated by a grant as of right, that evil law declaring Samoans to never have been citizens would be gone.
But that was a bridge too far for the political establishment. So instead, a bill aimed at erasing a crime will now perpetuate it, by explicitly retaining Muldoon's racist law while amending it to add the grant provision and a reference to it. The citizenship gained will very explicitly only apply from when it was granted (rather than being recognised as having always been held and never removed), and unlike "normal" citizenship, won't be able to be (and, more importantly for the government, will not have been) passed on to children born outside Aotearoa. Its explicitly called a "citizenship of special nature" for Samoans; a second class of citizenship, if you will. And of course New Zealand can't be expected to make even this limited restitution for our crimes for free, so every single person who wants this second-class citizenship will have to pay for the privilege - albeit at the reduced price of $204.40. The Department of Internal Affairs has to cover its costs, you know! But given the number of surviving victims - maybe 3,400 still alive - the amount of money is utterly trivial to the government: less than a million dollars. They could simply appropriate it and cover the costs as a goodwill gesture. But like full, uninterrupted citizenship, even that was apparently too much for the racists in Parliament.
Both the Greens and Labour wanted the bill to go further, repealing Muldoon's racist law (the diplomatically important section 7 could simply have been moved to the Citizenship Act, where it belongs), eliminating fees, and extending eligibility to descendents born before Samoa became independent in 1962. But NZ First, whose support provides a majority for the bill, said no. The resulting compromise is an improvement on the current situation - some people will have a form of citizenship recognised! Huzzah! - but its also ugly, nasty, and petty. Rather like NZ First, really. It is a long way from what we ought to do, or what submitters expected. About the best that can be said for it is that its something that can be improved upon in future. And that's... not enough.
So, its one cheer for Teanau Tuiono and his bill. I'm sure this is the best he can do at the moment with the Parliament we've got, but no-one should pretend that this is decent, or honourable, or enough. Like everything else happening this term, the next government will have to fix this. Fortunately, Labour has publicly committed to a position. Now we have to hold them to it.
