The student diversity in universities in Aotearoa (New Zealand) challenges these institutions to attain more equitable outcomes particularly for indigenous groups and ethnic minorities. In New Zealand, current Government policies favour strategies aimed at increasing the academic achievement of Maori and Pasifika communities and offer financial support to institutions to do so. This paper examines the opposition by academic staff within a university to the implementation of an intervention within one such strategy, on the basis that the intervention, an extra tutorial specifically for Maori and Pasifika students, was unethical. The paper argues that withholding opportunities to improve the academic progress of traditionally marginalized groups maintain existing inequalities and is an obstruction of social justice. (Contains 4 notes.)