I'm writing in response to a, frankly, ignorant letter sent last week (The Weekend Sun, November 15, pg 37) regarding New Zealand culture.

New Zealand is absolutely NOT a monocultural society, the definition of which is: ‘a single, homogeneous culture without diversity or dissension'.

New Zealand culture is not British culture and our history is not British history.

Personally, my family came over from Shropshire in the late 1800s, does that mean that their culture is still my culture? I don't bloody think so.

My culture is one of diversity, where the local schools' kapahaka brings a tear to my eye, where a Sikh wedding makes me smile and a Tongan 'Chahoo!” makes me cheer!

A culture where my son knows how to say 'hello” in Niuean and Chinese, has mates of all different creeds and knows about his British heritage (including the problematic bits).

I'm proud that the descendants of British colonists, like myself, can recognise that reparations must be made for the wilful extermination of people and culture and the confiscation of land.

I'm proud that New Zealand as a nation has a system set up to address this.

Equality is about lifting those who are disadvantaged, teaching those who need to learn, using methods they can understand culturally (not just 100-year-old British ones) and recognising that 200 years disenfranchisement cannot be resolved by saying ‘hey did you get the memo? We are all equal now!' My New Zealand is a vibrant multi-cultural society which knows it still has a long way to go.

R Hopkins, Te Puke (abridged).