20 July 2004
The subject of New Zealand's national flag surfaces every few years, usually in quiet news times, says The Daily News.
Ironically, the latest attempt to spark debate was launched during what should have been such a time – last January, when most people, including news-generating politicians, were on holiday.
However, one wasn't. Don Brash delivered a speech to the Orewa Rotary Club and in its 1000 lines were a couple about modern New Zealand's patronising and, in his opinion, unnecessary delivery of preferential treatment for the descendants of the original Maori – and the face of New Zealand politics changed overnight.
The subsequent headlines swept everything else aside for weeks, including Wellington businessman Lloyd Morrison's opening bid to begin another campaign aimed at updating the country's flag.
Curiously, both messages are linked, although in the manner of a cork riding on a tidal wave. New Zealand's flag, like countless others that have stitched together embellishments of history, is an accident.
A British law of 1865 decreed that its colonies must fly the blue ensign, with the Union Jack in the upper-left hoist quarter and a distinctive regional symbol opposite.
For New Zealand, the allocated distinction comprised the four main stars of the Southern Cross. Australia added a background fifth star to the same constellation, as well as the Commonwealth Star in the lower hoist quarter.
It is debatable just how many folk in either country are aware of the precise difference, and it would take someone with a strong gambling streak to wager which group was the more numerous.
If that neighbourhood confusion were not enough, the colonial-era ensign lingers among numerous other former territories and institutions – all the way down to the Aberdeen Harbour Board.
Quite apart from the New Zealand-Australia confusion, there is a gathering momentum to ditch the Union Jack and the long-since severed bond it represents.
No doubt this will be as offensive to some as the adoption of the Maori sovereignty flag will be to just about everyone else, but talking about it can't do any harm. The national emblem is important.
It should be recognisable, and not only to Kiwis after a quick count. Certainly it can echo the past, but the future is much bigger and more important.
Its emotional elements should inspire admiration and loyalty from those who salute it, which can hardly be said of the flag we largely share with Australia.
The silver fern on a black background, as simple as Canada's maple, keeps surfacing as a likely replacement, but better designs – including the star(s), koru, sea and mountains or historical diagonals, etc – might be out there.
The time is right and debate, as always, clears the flag-flying air.
The Daily News
© Fairfax New Zealand Limited 2004