"Just how fictional the Crown is would become obvious if we became a republic."

Colin James, addressing the issue of the Treaty of Waitangi, has this to say on the Crown:

...the Treaty is also a fiction, a court- created fiction of "partnership" imputing a duty on a fictional Crown to "partner" iwi. Parliament could renege on that partnership if it chose.

The Crown is, in practice, the Government: Mr Key, his ministers (including Dr Sharples and Mrs Turia) and officials (and the governor-general, for ceremony and as a putative constitutional backstop).

As Moana Jackson has previously argued, the "Crown" really means "Kawanatanga", that is the Government of the day - the Prime Minister and Cabinet.