A distinction needed to be made between statues that were deemed offensive and those that were actually harmful, Servian said at the committee hearing for submissions on the council’s proposed public art and monuments polices. Christel Yardley/Stuff Up and away: The bronze statue of Captain Hamilton was disinterred from its position outside the Hamilton City Council in June last year, after threats were made to tear it down. “Not all controversies are equal ... Clearly, Captain Hamilton was harmful to tangata whenua, to mana whenua. To use the term ‘offence’ does not really cover it. To equate the feeling that mana whenua have of the tangible threat that Captain Hamilton represented, versus moral conservatives who didn’t like Riff Raff is not a good match.”