Re: ‘NZ must become a nation of one people’, (Letters page 25, The Weekend Sun September 26, 2025 edition).

I respond to ‘NZ must become a nation of one people…’ and ‘no country is a country with split cultures fighting for supremacy’. Curiously, there is much we miss when we hold our single story of culture, harmony, equality, supremacy.

British historians offer challenge and insight into single stories. That termed the Doctrine of Discovery, the notion of one early visitor’s entitlement to supremacy. The Doctrine arrived via James Cook declaring he had discovered New Zealand.

Contrarily, this land was already richly known, cultured, cherished by hapu Māori. Māori did not denigrate his inability in not speaking Māori, and overtime generously sought a Treaty (Te Tiriti o Waitangi, 1840) alongside the British Crown to enable new settlers to be welcome within respect for agreed philosophies, tikanga; that Māori held the same privileges as British, respect for the practices of hapu Māori and their sophisticated ordered social political economic systems. Among Te Tiriti agreements lies respect for taonga, treasure of language, the reo Māori which many of our Irish Scottish Danish settler families find enriches our relationship with hapu Māori, land, spirituality and legacies. May this world embrace and enable recognition of partnership for your writer rather than experiencing ‘fighting for supremacy?’ Mauri Ora.

Dr Merrill Simmons Hansen, Avenues