EEO meets the Treaty: Equality and Partnership
July 2005
Reconciling EEO and the Treaty of Waitangi is sometimes viewed as a challenge for New Zealand business. Framework for the Future, the benchmark report on the status of EEO in New Zealand, published by the Human Rights Commission, recommended that:
“Future EEO legislative initiatives, policy development, and implementation activities should be preceded by reflection on how best to reconcile EEO as a philosophy and practice with the Treaty of Waitangi.”
The ‘narrow’ EEO focus on anti-discrimination/diversity workplace policies can be seen to fit in to the equality of individuals protected by the Treaty Articles 1 and 3 regarding governorship, or kāwanatanga, which grant Māori all the rights and privileges of British subjects. Meanwhile, the broader social aims of EEO policy fit within the equality of Treaty partners, and concept of undisturbed rangatiratanga, or self-determination within Article 2.
Here are two views from the corporate and union sectors about reconciling EEO and the Treaty, and incorporating Treaty-based practices and Tangata Whenua status into the workplace.
Union voice
Sharon Clair, Māori Policy Analyst for the New Zealand Nurses’ Organisation, said: “What we’re working on with CTU and NZNO is EEO for individual Māori within the main-stream labour force. Economic development and economic autonomy is something we’re also supporting.”
Clair believes greater incorporation of Māori voice and cultural influence into the mainstream, is now playing out in the unions. “Both the NZNO and the CTU are Treaty-based organisations. As a consequence of that, within NZNO and within the CTU we have runanga set up, and those [two] councils have in them the basis of the treaty partnership between Tangata Whenua and agents of the Crown.” The CTU and NZNO have incorporated runanga into governance and decision-making over Māori issues.
NZNO is using a Treaty-based model called Positive Action in Unity and Aroha (PAUA), a 3-year strategy to support Māori workforce development, and introduce more kaupapa Māori into nursing policies and practices.
Clair believes that this Treaty-model of EEO “will increase and enhance productivity, because basically, if you treat people right, everything will follow.”
Corporate voice
Westpac is an industry leader in supporting diversity and EEO. June McCabe, Manager of Corporate Affairs, supports embedding EEO for Māori into the Treaty, rather than vice-versa. She believes that Māori shouldn’t be lost in the diversity-mix, nor the Treaty minimised. “It’s about Tangata Whenua status and the need to make that visible and create the icons and symbols. The symbolism is really important.”
McCabe pins workplace policies onto personal responsibility and grasping the initiative: “Tangata Whenua status and staking your ground. It’s up to me [as Māori] to do that, and to drive it. And you want more people like me in one organisation. You can’t do it on your own!” If Māori are “confident about our Tangata Whenua-ness, we will look for that change. I don’t think non-Māori can do it for us.”
In her work on the Hui Taumata Taskforce, McCabe has emphasised the need for affirmative action that has the goal of raising Māori participation in sectors where they are under-represented, through making those workplaces more attractive to Māori. In terms of her relative isolation as Māori at Westpac, she says “the perception of banks is ‘ooh, we wouldn’t want to work there, it’s boring, mundane or scary.’”
For McCabe, Māori grounded in tikanga and with real wairua, are the key to transforming business culture, investing in “corporate soul”. “There is a requirement for us to understand how to be profitable, but there’s also the tikanga and the cultural practice and how you would preserve that if that’s a desire within your business.”
Westpac is an industry leader in supporting diversity and EEO. June McCabe, Manager of Corporate Affairs, supports embedding EEO for Māori into the Treaty, rather than vice-versa. She believes that Māori shouldn’t be lost in the diversity-mix, nor the Treaty minimised. “It’s about Tangata Whenua status and the need to make that visible and create the icons and symbols. The symbolism is really important.”
McCabe pins workplace policies onto personal responsibility and grasping the initiative: “Tangata Whenua status and staking your ground. It’s up to me [as Māori] to do that, and to drive it. And you want more people like me in one organisation. You can’t do it on your own!” If Māori are “confident about our Tangata Whenua-ness, we will look for that change. I don’t think non-Māori can do it for us.”
In her work on the Hui Taumata Taskforce, McCabe has emphasised the need for affirmative action that has the goal of raising Māori participation in sectors where they are under-represented, through making those workplaces more attractive to Māori. In terms of her relative isolation as Māori at Westpac, she says “the perception of banks is ‘ooh, we wouldn’t want to work there, it’s boring, mundane or scary.’”
For McCabe, Māori grounded in tikanga and with real wairua, are the key to transforming business culture, investing in “corporate soul”. “There is a requirement for us to understand how to be profitable, but there’s also the tikanga and the cultural practice and how you would preserve that if that’s a desire within your business.”