Talk:New Zealand

Pronunciation of "New Zealand"

I feel that the phonetic rendition of the pronunciation of "New Zealand" is incorrect. Although this pronunciation is common among non-New Zealanders, particularly Americans and British people, I believe that the New Zelander pronunciation is more along the lines of "/nju: 'zɛlənd/". Please correct me if I'm wrong! -Jordan 11:37, 6 November 2014 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.126.197.68 (talk)

Semi-protected edit request on 14 October 2014 - Please add Geology of New Zealand

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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Geology of New Zealand New Zealand is a section of Zealandia, a much larger submerged continental landmass. Zealandia extends a significant distance east into the Pacific Ocean and south towards Antarctica. It also extends towards Australia in the north-west. This submerged continent is dotted with topographic highs that sometimes form islands. Some of these, such as the main islands (North and South), Stewart Island, and the Chatham Islands, are settled. Other smaller islands are eco-sanctuaries with carefully controlled access. The submerged landmass of Zealandia The New Zealand landmass has been uplifted due to transpressional tectonics between the Australian and Pacific plates (these two plates are grinding together with one riding up and over the other). To the east of the North Island the Pacific Plate is forced under the Australian Plate. The North Island of New Zealand has widespread back-arc volcanism as a result of this subduction. There are many large volcanoes with relatively frequent eruptions. There are also several very large calderas, with the most obvious forming Lake Taupo. Taupo has a history of incredibly powerful eruptions, with the Oruanui eruption approx. 26,500 years ago ejecting 1170 cubic km of material and causing the downward collapse of several hundred square km to form the lake. The last eruption occurred c.232CE and ejected at least 100 cubic km of material, and has been correlated with red skies seen at the time in China and Rome. The subduction direction is reversed through the South Island, with the Australian Plate forced under the Pacific Plate. The transition between these two different styles of continental collision occurs through the top of the South Island. This area has significant uplift and many active faults. As you can imagine, large earthquakes are frequent occurrences here. The most powerful in recent history, the M8.3 Wairarapa earthquake, occurred in 1855. This earthquake generated more than 6m of vertical uplift in places, and caused a localised tsunami. Fortunately casualties were low due to the sparse settlement of the region. Recently, the area has been rattled by the M6.5 Seddon earthquake, but this caused little damage and no injuries. New Zealand’s capital city, Wellington, is situated bang in the middle of this region. The subduction of the Australian Plate drives rapid uplift in the centre of the South Island (approx. 10mm per year). This uplift forms the Southern Alps. These roughly divide the island, with a narrow wet strip to the west and wide and dry plains to the east. A significant amount of the movement between the two plates is accommodated by lateral sliding of the Australian Plate north relative to the Pacific Plate. The plate boundary forms the nearly 800km long Alpine Fault. This fault has an estimated rupture reoccurrence interval of ~330 years, and last ruptured in 1717 along 400km of its length. Worryingly, it passes directly under many settlements on the West Coast of the South Island and shaking from a rupture would likely affect many cities and towns throughout the country. The rapid uplift and high erosion rates within the Southern Alps combine to expose high grade greenschist to amphibolite facies rocks, including the gemstone ‘pounamu’ (jadeite). Geologists visiting the West Coast can easily access high-grade metamorphic rocks and mylonites associated with the Alpine Fault, and in certain places can stand astride the fault trace of an active plate boundary. To the south of New Zealand the Australian Plate is subducting under the Pacific Plate, and this is beginning to result in back-arc volcanism. The youngest (geologically speaking) volcanism in the South Island occurred in this region, forming the Solander Islands (<2 million years old). This region is dominated by the rugged and relatively untouched Fiordland, an area of flooded glacially carved valleys with little human settlement. Since the end of 2010, several large (M7, M6.3, M6.4, M6.2) and shallow (all <7km) earthquakes have occurred immediately beneath Christchurch. These have resulted in 185 deaths, widespread destruction of buildings and significant liquefaction. These earthquakes are releasing distributed stress in the Pacific plate from the ongoing collision with the Australian plate to the west and north of the city. The earthquakes have significantly altered the city, forcing the demolition of many commercial and residential buildings.

Independence

I thought I should explain why I changed the list of key events in New Zealand independence. I removed the reference to the Constitution Act 1986 and inserted instead a reference to the New Zealand Constitution Amendment Act (UK) 1947. The 1947 act gave the New Zealand parliament the ability to amend its own constitution, removing the final limit on its legislative power. After this act came into effect, New Zealand had full legislative independence. Britain could not unilaterally pass laws for New Zealand and New Zealand could pass any law it wanted.

The Constitution Act 1986 has only minor significance in the story of New Zealand's independence. It is notable only for two relatively minor reasons: it was symbolic as a rewrite of the core constitutional legislation and it cut a minor tie between the two parliaments that had no remaining practical signifiance. Britain still technically had the authority to write law for New Zealand—but this authority could only be exercised at New Zealand's request. After 1947, New Zealand's parliament could pass any law in its own right so by 1986 the legislative connection to Britain was nothing more than an anachronism.

It's worth noting that the situation was different in Australia. While New Zealand had acquired full de jure independence in 1947, Britain retained the legal authority to legislate for Australia states until the passage of the Australia Act 1986. It's possible that a previous editor included the Constitution Act 1986 in the list of independence events in New Zealand because they saw it as a parallel of the Australia Act. While both acts repealed the Statute of Westminster, the New Zealand act had no impact on New Zealand legal independence and didn't require British participation. By contrast, the Australia Act extended the powers of the Australian parliament and required the law to be concurrently enacted in the United Kingdom.

tl;dr The Constitution Act 1986 act tidied up and clarified a lot of constitutional provisions, but it didn't make New Zealand any more independent. It was the events of 1947—culiminating in the UK parliament passing the New Zealand Constitution Amendment Act—that gave New Zealand full legal independence.

Ben Arnold (talk) 03:50, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

I've just noticed that the date for responsible government was wrong. It said 30 June 1852 but the correct date is 7 May 1856. This is in the linked article. I found a few encyclopaedia articles online that confirm this date but only in passing, not as the substantive topic of the article so I couldn't find a nice neat reference.

The other date (30 June 1852) is the day on which the New Zealand Constitution Act 1852 received royal assent. This provided for elections and a local legislature, but the colony didn't have responsible government until 1856. Before that date there was no premier, just a colonial governor who continued to have executive responsibility. Before responsible government the executive council was made up of civil service appointments with a strictly advisory purpose—responsible directly to the governor, not to the New Zealand Parliament.

Ben Arnold (talk) 12:30, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

I do not believe that it is correct to say that New Zealand obtained de jure independence on 10 December 1947. There is academic debate on the topic, and frankly no consensus.Royalcourtier (talk) 21:23, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Protection & Pakeha?

I was going to tweak the reference to pakeha - from "The Māori loanword Pākehā has been used to refer to New Zealanders of European descent, although others reject this appellation" to "The Māori loanword Pākehā has been used to refer to New Zealanders of European descent, but others consider the term highly offensive" and discovered the page has been protected for years! Anyone able to explain why\tweak said sentence? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 118.208.5.146 (talk) 01:40, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 29 June 2015

Citation 138. ^ Offshore Options: Managing Environmental Effects in New Zealand's Exclusive Economic Zone (PDF). Wellington: Ministry for the Environment. 2005. is a broken link.

The working URL content is (link to PDF on right of this summary page) 202.36.137.5 (talk) 04:02, 29 June 2015 (UTC) 202.36.137.5 (talk) 04:02, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, I've updated the link.-gadfium 06:07, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Official languages

According to http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/The-New-Zealand-Curriculum/Official-languages, the only official languages in New Zealand are Maori and Sign Languages, English is just a de facto official language due to its widespread use. Should be corrected.