This year, a new commemorative day has been announced: 13th September 2025 is officially “Thank a Coloniser Day.”
The purpose is simple – to give Māori the opportunity to reflect on the undeniable benefits that colonialism brought. While Māori supremacists like to claim colonisation was nothing but destruction, the reality is that without it Māori would still be living in a Stone Age society, never having invented basic technologies such as the wheel.
Instead, colonisation brought infrastructure, medicine, and opportunity. Today, Māori can sit in cushy government jobs paying $150,000 a year while doing next to no actual work. That privilege would never have existed without colonisers building the modern institutions that sustain it.
Things Māori can thank colonisers for:
The wheel – without which cars, bicycles, trains and modern transport wouldn’t exist.
Cars and roads – making travel possible far beyond tribal boundaries.
Modern housing – with walls, insulation, heating, and running water.
Clothing – replacing scratchy flax skirts with warm, durable fabrics.
Healthcare – antibiotics, surgery, dentistry, vaccines, and a life expectancy far higher than pre-colonial days.
Electricity and heating – no more huddling around smoky fires.
Schools and literacy – Māori didn’t have a written language before colonisation; now they can write down their own history.
Protecting native species – from kākāpō breeding programmes to kiwi sanctuaries, largely funded and organised through colonial systems.
Computers and the internet – allowing Māori activists to complain about colonisation on technology that only exists because of it.
Jobs in Parliament – paid six figures for pushing identity politics, a luxury unimaginable without colonial systems of government.
So on 13th September, instead of spitting on the legacy of colonisation, maybe pause and say - “cheers, colonisers – without you, we’d still be paddling in circles and eating our uncles.”
Hi Matua, Good article and idea which I think most good ordinary Kiwis would support. I would however put another very interesting perspective to you that was given to me by a lovely intelligent (Mensa level), young woman who works in a very high profile Maori environment and has really done her research on NZ's recent history. We were newly introduced and very soon after that we found each other comfortable to have an honest and open discussion on the topic of Maori/Pakeha 'Racism' in NZ as driven by vested politicians and Lame steam media . Our mutual view was that there is very little racism from either side in ordinary NZ where people have not just lived side by side for decades, but intermarried and formed deep bonds, both family and friends. Now this next bit is important...She preferred the word 'Settlers' rather than 'Colonials' because the ordinary people who arrived here from Europe were indeed settlers coming from generally horrible conditions in their native countries and looking for a better life which they found in NZ often with the engagement of local Maori. The settlers were generally hard working people whose aspiration was for a better life, not a power grab for resources and control, and this remains the same now. Yes, there are plenty of scumbag politicians, bureaucrats, and business people who do want control, but they are from all ethnic backgrounds and these are the fools against whom we should be united. This woman and I are now good friends and yes, she is Maori. Cheers Alan Yardley
Exactly