Waitangi Day 1970s - Waitangi Day
NZ Day 1974 - souvenir booklet cover
Monument at Te Tii marae
Early 1970s: Protest
1971 was the United Nations year for the elimination of racial discrimination, and there was talk among Maori of an appeal to the UN. Waitangi ceremonies were disrupted by incidents organised by the Auckland-based group Nga Tamatoa; the following year Nga Tamatoa staged a walk-out.
The gap to be bridged in mutual understanding can be gauged by the Governor-General's ill-chosen comments: 'I just do not believe that racism or discrimination exists in this country', said Sir Arthur Porritt, who considered that Maori-Pakeha relationships were being dealt with adequately through intermarriage.
Continuing protest owed much to the activities of new urban-based groups and organisations, mainly centred in Auckland and influenced by the university's Maori Studies department. At the same time long-established Maori organisations were challenging the government through submissions critical of the country's failure to give effect to treaty rights. Events outside New Zealand were influential too. Strategies were learned from the struggles of indigenous groups elsewhere, notably in Canada and the United States. Other factors stiffened resolve: the post-colonial independence of new nations, the Black Power movement in the United States, and United Nations work on human rights.
A Change of Name and a National Holiday
The call to make 6 February a nation-wide public holiday continued. A new Labour administration under Norman Kirk made the most of Waitangi Day 1973, with Kirk announcing that from 1974 it would be a national holiday known as New Zealand Day.
A few weeks later the New Zealand Day Bill was introduced by Henry May, the Minister of Internal Affairs, whose department would administer the legislation. A private member's bill on a New Zealand Day had been introduced by Matiu Rata in 1971 and, during debate on the new bill, Rata, now Minister of Maori Affairs, indicated the government's intentions: The day, he said, was to be neither 'a symbolic nor religious occasion' but a day for each New Zealander to enjoy as they saw fit, and the forerunner of an effort to achieve a 'full sense of nationhood'. It would always be observed on 6 February and would not be 'Mondayised'.
At the time Rata was working towards making legislative provision for the Waitangi Tribunal in the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975, and saw that it would be advantageous to separate the struggle over treaty claims from the issue of a national day. The two acts were intended to be complementary. A New Zealand Day, still on 6 February and with a wide appeal, might in itself build public support for Maori treaty rights, especially if communities became more informed about the treaty's part in New Zealand history.
For Norman Kirk, the change of name implied a diminishing of neither the treaty's place nor the Maori role in the nation's history. The change was simply an acceptance that New Zealand was ready to move towards a broader concept of nationhood. For some years overseas diplomatic posts had marked the day, and it seemed timely in view of the country's increasing role on the international stage that the national day be known as New Zealand Day. Somehow, too, it seemed to him to make the country unique in that while other nations marked their national day on the anniversary of a violent event - a revolution, the end of a war, a successful coup - 6 February 1840 marked the beginning of a peaceful agreement between two peoples.
The bill was supported by the National opposition, in part because it was likely to shift the focus away from treaty problems. Although a paid holiday along with a name change was a popular move, there was no great groundswell for a day to mark national identity.
New Zealand Day 1974
Prime Minister Norman Kirk wanted the first New Zealand Day (which involved a royal visit) to acknowledge the country's multi-cultural identity. A two and a half hour extravaganza - Aotearoa - depicted the country's journeying towards nationhood and the part played by peoples of many cultures on this great voyage of discovery.
The arrival of Kupe (played by Howard Morrison) was followed by English, Irish and Scots (to the tune 'Prepare ye the way of the Lord'), Dalmatians, Danes, Dutch, and other European races, as well as by Pacific Islanders and Indians.
Some of the country's successes and troubles were captured in adaptations of well-known melodies, which added a touch of either humour or poor taste. Viewed at Waitangi by 20,000 spectators, and on television (as was becoming a tradition) by one of the biggest audiences of the year, the event drew some criticism.
'Imaginative pageantry or tasteless vulgarity?', asked the New Zealand Herald. 'Had [viewers] seen a superb, imaginative translation of orthodox history to a modern (and musical) idiom? Or was it an embarrassing, superficial, even excruciating attempt to mix cabaret (or music hall) with ceremony?' Certainly there had been something for everyone: Maori groups, the Royal Navy, a sort of white robed Greek chorus, choreographed dancers, fireworks, national dancing and singing, mime and pantomime. One especially memorable piece was a giant moa that laid an enormous egg on the spot where the treaty was signed.
Important symbolic touches were not overlooked: the New Zealand flag replaced the Union Jack at the top of the Waitangi flagpole, a replica of the 1834 flag was flown, and the great canoe, Ngatokimatawhaorua, was relaunched. Kirk's spontaneous gesture when he took a small Maori boy by the hand as he moved to the speakers' rostrum somehow became a symbol of New Zealand's hope for the future. Almost overlooked in all the fuss were incidents - a bomb was laid, and fires were lit.
Back to Waitangi Day, 1976
New Zealand Day 1975 passed quietly at Waitangi, perhaps because of Norman Kirk's recent death. Elsewhere there was little of the celebration of the national day by local communities that Labour had hoped for. Government funding was not made available and, beyond the odd ministerial letter of exhortation, local bodies were left to their own devices. Moreover, the concept of a national day needed time to take root, and it was not to be given this by the National government that took office at the end of 1975.
The Waitangi Day Act 1976 reinstated the name Waitangi Day, the government arguing that a number of representations had emphasised that the name recognised the significance of the treaty and its spirit. It seems too that Prime Minister Robert Muldoon, who had not liked the name change, saw this as a way to make some mark on the Waitangi front. Matiu Rata was probably right to see the move as part of an attempt to avoid creating a Waitangi Tribunal under the Treaty of Waitangi Act passed at the end of Labour's term.
Whatever the reason, the change of name had brought no great advantage. The concept of fostering a sense of nationhood through a New Zealand Day - though in its infancy - was lost in a little-debated political manoeuvre. Also lost was Rata's concept of a complementary relationship between a New Zealand Day (with a diminished focus on treaty issues) and an appropriate forum where treaty issues could be effectively addressed.
The name change repositioned the public holiday as a Maori-Pakeha event - no matter what the content of commemorations - and underscored the likelihood that Waitangi would continue to be the focus for any protests. From 1975, the organisation of annual events reverted in the main to northern groups and the day was very much a northern affair, despite the national holiday. The pattern at Waitangi had become well established: activities at the marae were followed by an event at the treaty grounds.
Given the direction of government policy on Maori issues, renewed protest was predictable, and this was not limited to Waitangi Day. During National's term of office (1975-1984), protest was expressed in stands taken at Bastion Point and Raglan over land disputes. The Waitangi Tribunal had finally convened briefly in 1977, only to go into recess for some time.
Next page: Waitangi Day 1980s 
