Ngati Tama Claims Settlement Bill

, on behalf of the Minister in charge of Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations: I move, That the Ngati Tama Claims Settlement Bill be now read a third time. Today is a special day for the people of Ngāti Tama and the Crown. It is a further step in the journey towards reconciliation that will enable new pathways to be forged, further enhancing Ngāti Tama’s economic, social, and cultural well-being, and that will assist in fostering more effective, endurable relationships between Ngāti Tama and the Crown, based on goodwill and trust.

This bill will bring to an end the longstanding and significant grievances of Ngāti Tama, and settle all the iwi’s historical treaty claims. The historical background to the claims makes for sombre reading. It provides an account of New Zealand’s history wherein Ngāti Tama was faithful to the spirit of the treaty—seeking to build strong relationships based on mutual respect and trust with its treaty partner—but, sadly, the Crown did not act like that in return. The bill contains a formal apology to Ngāti Tama for breaches of the treaty acknowledged by the Crown.

Ngāti Tama has been in direct negotiations with the Crown since November 1996, when a deed of mandate was recognised. A heads of agreement, recording the main components of a settlement, was signed in September 1999. A deed of settlement, the formal Crown offer to Ngāti Tama to settle the claims under the Treaty of Waitangi, was then developed by the Crown and Ngāti Tama negotiators. The deed was signed on 20 December 2001 after first having been ratified by 97 percent of the people who voted.

This Government is totally committed to progressing the settlement of valid historical treaty claims. I know there are people who like to criticise the current treaty settlement process. Those people forget that settlement is a two-way process that seeks to restore and, in some instances, to activate relationships—a process designed to resolve all the historical treaty claims of a group of people. Settlement is the pathway to reconciliation from which each treaty partner can move forward with a shared understanding of the past.

Over the past decade the Crown has developed and refined a process for settling historical treaty claims. This process is now leading to a steady stream of comprehensive settlements. The Ngati Tama Claims Settlement Bill is the second bill enacting a settlement this year, with the Ngāti Ruanui claims settlement legislation being the first. Deeds of settlement have also been signed with Ngāti Awa and Ngāti Tuwharetoa ki Kawerau, and another will be signed shortly with Ngā Rauru.

The Crown has withstood challenges in the Waitangi Tribunal, and in the courts, over its policy approach to settlements. The Waitangi Tribunal inquired into Ngāti Maniapoto’s overlapping interests in this settlement, and I am pleased to tell the House that the inquiry found in favour of Ngāti Tama’s settlement proceeding. Members should all be assured that the Crown is certain of the validity of the claims settled by this bill, and has negotiated with the interests of all citizens in mind.

It remains for me to acknowledge all of those from Ngāti Tama and the Crown who, over many long years, have worked hard to arrive at this day. Their passion and commitment have greatly helped the process, which I know has often seemed daunting and arduous, and which has taken its toll.

I encourage all New Zealanders to read the historical account outlined in the Ngāti Tama deed of settlement. It tells a sad history, about which some of us have a general awareness but know little of the detail. It is a history all New Zealanders should be familiar with, so we can move forward together.

To the people of Ngāti Tama, their ancestors, their elders, their descendants, and their negotiating team, I, on behalf of the Minister in charge of Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations, extend best wishes for the future, whatever that may hold. The enhancement of their cultural, social, and economic development awaits them. I commend this bill to the House.

Those sacred and historic sites that formed the foundation of Ngāti Tama, including the fishing-grounds that Ngāti Tama arduously preserve through traditional conservation methods, have re-formed Ngāti Tama in their identification with the physical symbols that were historically theirs. New Zealand First supports the third reading of the Ngati Tama Claims Settlement Bill, and acknowledges the negotiating team’s efforts in bringing this legislation to fruition. With the Crown accepting the importance of the cultural, spiritual, traditional, and historic association of Ngāti Tama to those boundaries, I am positive that an atmosphere of cooperation and fellowship will be generated between all those concerned. I am sure the Historic Places Trust will work closely with tangata whenua in their quest for the preservation of sites that will contribute to the history of the area.

Common sense tells us that without close cooperation of the parties concerned, we in this House would not be at the stage we are at today. New Zealand First acknowledges the Ngati Tama Claims Settlement Bill, and supports it to the stage at which a positive agenda will be generated amongst the recipients of this claim.

I say to Ngāti Tama that it is important to New Zealand First that the taonga they worked so hard to reclaim will be at the forefront of their ambitions, and that their claims to the treasures of this world will be considered also as imperative to their further economical development. If that is not achieved, they should ask themselves whether all that hard work has been worth it.

In the end, New Zealand First is happy to support this bill. We are happy it is on the way to a conclusion, and that Ngāti Tama will reap the benefits under good administration.

It is with pleasure that I rise to speak on behalf of National in support of the Ngati Tama Claims Settlement Bill. This legislation is the result of a process that was started under the last National Government, and that has now gone on through two Labour terms in Parliament. It is with pleasure I see it finally coming to a conclusion. The questions are: why has it taken so long, and how long will it take Labour to settle the other Taranaki claims? Two iwi have now reached a conclusion to their claims in Taranaki. There are six more to go. That is a very slow process, and the Government is very slow when it comes to getting it done.

However, I wish to thank the Government for the work it has put in, in finally getting the bill to this stage, and I know that members and representatives of Ngāti Tama who may be listening are pleased we have finally got to this point. I say to them that this has been a very, very long journey for them. There is no question that, when one studies the history of New Zealand and some of the colonial atrocities—I guess that that is the word to use—inflicted on the native people of New Zealand, including Ngāti Tama, at the time colonisation took place, there is an issue to be resolved.

It is pleasing to see that resolution process. If one asks the question of why it is necessary to go through that process, one needs to look only at the disparity between Māori and non-Māori New Zealanders, and at how small minorities of New Zealand citizens have been treated—particularly in our early history—to understand there is a depth of feeling and a grievance that has gone on for far too long. It is great and pleasing to see that the State is finally acknowledging that, in terms of both financial redress and an official apology. I congratulate the Minister on finally getting there and making that happen.

I say to those who are now going forward after the settlement that they should make sure the proceeds of the settlement ensure that the wider membership of Ngāti Tama goes forward and prospers—that it becomes one in New Zealand and does well. There is an opportunity here in terms of education, financial benefit, and commercial opportunity, and in terms of redressing some of the problems that have held back not only Ngāti Tama but also iwi throughout the whole of New Zealand over that period. I look forward in anticipation to the prosperity I am sure will result.

I have met, and know, a lot of the people involved in the Ngāti Tama iwi. I have been to the marae. They are a very hospitable, progressive, and forward-thinking people, and I wish them luck. I know that they are working already—and have been for some time—in a range of areas to maximise their opportunities, and I hope they continue in that and are now able to fast track some of those projects. I look forward with anticipation to seeing the outcome of some of that work.

I also say that, without the leadership and the fortitude of people like Jim Bolger and Sir Douglas Graham who started this process, it would never have got going. There had been a lot of feeble attempts, I might say, by successive Governments over a long period of time to try to do something in that area. I hasten to add that Mr Bolger and Sir Douglas came from the wrong side of the political tracks with regard to where Māori political allegiance usually lies, but they saw that unless we found a way forward as a society to try to bridge the gaps that existed both culturally and economically—not to close them, as the current Government claimed it would do, and then hastened to widen them—we could not move forward as a nation.

I strongly believe that that is still the case to this day. Unless we bridge those gaps—unless we can agree to be different but one and the same as a country—we will never move forward. New Zealand simply cannot have something like 14 or 15 percent of its population—which is expected to grow to 20 percent in the next 10 or 12 years—so far behind the rest of the country economically and socially without having some kind of economic and social problem within the nation. So I say to those at the front of this process that they should go forward now and make this legislation a full, final, and solid resolution to the difficulties they have suffered over a long period of time. I acknowledge those who are here today, and I wish them luck.

I commend the bill to the House, in its third reading. I acknowledge the contribution made by the member for Taranaki – King Country. I want to raise a number of things, and the first is to acknowledge the undoubted and significant work of the Minister in charge of Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations, the Hon Margaret Wilson. It is right that in this House we do rise on behalf of our colleagues, and I express the merit, the capability, and the capacity that this Minister has brought to this very difficult task. I want to commend her, and place that commendation on the record.

The second point I want to make relates to the settlement process, per se. It is very important that our difficulties are told. It is very important that a healing process occurs—and it has, and this legislation brings it to a conclusion. But, more important, let us get over its victim-hood status. The true test in the next 10 years for Māori leadership, whether it is for Ngāti Tama, or elsewhere, will be how the rubber hits the road and how these assets are aligned with where our underperforming communities are. That is the true test, and we will be vigilant about that on behalf of the beneficiaries of these assets. It is about getting these assets linked to the many—not to the few.

This is a big test. It is a huge challenge, and it is now in the hands of Māori people, like those in leadership of Ngāti Tama, to ensure that the rubber hits the road so that, in the next 10 years when our babies are coming through, they are no longer the cabin boys in this ship, but the captains. Those are the sorts of key benchmarks we want, as a people. The challenge now is on our people’s leadership. The challenge now is not for the Government to make everything happen; the challenge now is not for Pākehā people to have a burden of guilt; the challenge now is directly on our leadership.

I look forward to the leadership of Ngāti Tama being a key exemplar of demonstrating quite clearly that these assets and these settlements will be linked with our performance, and that our performance will be a beacon as we start to produce the pride in ourselves we undoubtedly have, and release the potential we undoubtedly have. That is why this part of the process is a great part, and I commend the bill to the House accordingly.

Kia ora koutou katoa, he mihi nui ki ngā rangatira, he mihi nui ki a Ngāti Tama. The Greens have considered very carefully our support for the restitution of claims, along with our very deep concerns about the treaty settlement process, but we have in the end decided to support this bill. We acknowledge Ngāti Tama’s efforts to achieve some form of justice and restitution for the grievous harms caused to the manawhenua. We applaud the resilience of the iwi in getting through the difficult settlement process, and in achieving a settlement at all. We were pleased to see the comparatively high ratification rate, for example, for the deed of settlement.

However, we are deeply aware of the strongly felt opposition to this bill—from people who, like us, consider that the settlement process simply creates further injustice. The ratification rate for the governance entity was not good, and there were significant and compelling submissions that raised serious concerns about the exclusion of Ngāti Tama people from the process, and their obstruction. We urge the governance entity to take those concerns very seriously, if it is to manage and utilise the settlement assets for the benefit of every member of Ngāti Tama—as is its solemn responsibility.

The issues raised, and the fact that they remain unresolved, highlight the serious flaws in the settlement policy and process, which create a conflict, fail to manage that conflict, and then deny all responsibility for it. The settlement process selects the winners, disadvantages the others, and leaves the iwi, hapū, and whānau to pick up the pieces at the end.

There are steps, we believe, that could be taken to improve the process, which are necessary for a robust resolution of historical claims and the continuation of a healthy treaty relationship that does go into the future. The first is that the process should undergo a comprehensive review by those people who are affected by the process—that is, the iwi, the hapū, and the whānau. This settlement has shown another serious problem within the process, where a competent challenge to the mandate goes unsupported by the responsible State agency, while the challenged group receives support and funding.

We do not want to set a required level of support for the mandate that does not take into account the particular circumstances of the settlement and the iwi and hapū involved. We agree that it is not for the State to determine who is to be the governance entity or those responsible for the management of the iwi’s assets. That is a decision for the iwi and hapū alone. But, despite claims to the contrary, the Office of Treaty Settlements does interfere with that decision in ways that undermine the sovereignty and capacity of iwi and hapū.

It does that in the first instance by unilaterally determining the requirements for the structure and nature of the governance entity. That, in some cases, has led to an unjustifiable and unconscionable delay in the process to force iwi into a particular structure, and, secondly, as in this case, to fund one possible entity over another. The process of the Office of Treaty Settlements has failed the whānau whānui, and Ngāti Tama as a whole. That is why the process of treaty settlements needs a full-scale, independent, and comprehensive review. Such a review needs to engage specifically with the mechanics of the process, the mandate requirements, and, of course, the large natural groupings policy.

It is not sufficient for the Office of Treaty Settlements simply to say that with each new settlement the office learns more and therefore refines its process. That does not assist those iwi and hapū who have suffered a further injustice and indignity, simply because the office is on a learning curve. Neither is it acceptable to claim that the processes are generally acceptable to Māori because Māori engage with them. That is wilful blindness, and demonstrates a failure to understand the complexity of the social and economic milieu within which Māori operate.

Māori have never been involved in determining the best process for the restitution of their historical issues. That is the first fundamental flaw, and it has resonated throughout the whole process, leaving serious, ongoing injustices in its wake. The continual failure to review the process is simply another insult by this Government—that Māori should remain passive and grateful recipients of State benevolence. That is structural racism, and is not, and never will be, acceptable.

The time will come when historical claims have been done, reparation made—such as it is—and that part of this process is over. But there remains the need for the Crown to have developed an ongoing relationship under the treaty that is not property-based, but that takes into account the constitutional aspects of te tiriti. There are constitutional implications in article 2 that have not been properly considered by the Crown or the courts. There are a multitude of different views about what those constitutional implications are, but no Government has yet had the will to enable that dialogue to happen in any coherent way.

With each new settlement, a new injustice is created. This year the treaty settlement process has left open wounds within Tangāhoe, within Pakakohi, and now within a significant section of Ngāti Tama . Ngāti Maniapoto is also justly aggrieved in its belief that it has legitimate claims over areas included in the redress for Ngāti Tama. The Government’s treaty settlement process fails iwi, hapū, and the nation as a whole.

The Green Party is committed to an ongoing national dialogue that is grounded in te tiriti. We believe that this will both give effect to the relationship that it enshrines, and that it will build a high level of awareness among all citizens in Aotearoa New Zealand of the unique role of te tiriti in the evolution of our nation. The treaty is not a panacea, nor is it a weapon. What it is, and should be, is nation-building.

On behalf of the ACT party I am addressing the third reading of the Ngati Tama Claims Settlement Bill . The ACT party is certainly delighted at and acknowledges the process involved in hopefully bringing this claim to fruition. We certainly acknowledge the foul deeds that were done in the name of the Crown by the Governor in 1860 and the years thereafter, which dishonoured the Crown. That certainly demands a settlement, to anyone who believes in fairness. But having said that, I say the ACT party will not be supporting this bill at its third reading. I would like to share with the House the reasons for that.

ACT favours full, fair, and final settlements for legitimate treaty grievances. In fact, we have campaigned since entering this Parliament in 1996 for full, fair, and final outcomes. But there are provisions in this settlement, as outlined by the previous speaker, that are unresolved matters. We do have concerns that the settlement may well create further injustices and highlight some of those unresolved issues. We have heard mention of the exclusion and the obstruction of the Ngāti Tama people in the process of deriving this negotiated settlement with the Crown. I think the point was very well made that we risk a very serious situation if these settlements are to be nothing but examples of claimants becoming the passive recepients of State benevolence, because that is a recipe for revisiting the problems that we face. So, while we are delighted and pleased to see that the grievance has been addressed and a negotiated agreement reached, we do think there are real problems with the process that may well mean it is not final, and, in fact, that this very process may well be the trigger for further claims. That just exacerbates the perception we have in our society of a treaty grievance industry that is self-perpetuating. Where the Crown can ensure that remedies are full and final we will support it, but we are not convinced that is the case in this situation.

I also express the concern of the ACT party with regard to some of the language and the concepts that are interwoven into this settlement. In particular, the settlement confers special rights on the Ngāti Tama people over land that is not theirs. The amendments to the Resource Management Act and some of the language in this settlement confer privileges and rights over land that is not theirs and is not part of the settlement. That, in itself, is a recipe for ongoing litigation and conflict. Of course, that is now interwoven in much of our legislation—in particular, the Resource Management Act. I was surprised that New Zealand First is voting for this bill, because like ACT, Winston Peters has campaigned on and championed opposition to the principles of the treaty—those undefined principles—yet in this settlement legislation we have a lot of reference to the principles of the treaty. We do not know what they are. The Crown has never told us what those principles are, yet it keeps legislating for them. ACT is not prepared just to accept benignly legislation that perpetuates those sorts of problems.

So it is with some sadness that we cannot support this bill. We acknowledge the grievance, we accept the effort that was made in terms of reaching a negotiated agreement, but on conclusion we are not satisfied that this bill has got it right. I do think that the negotiated agreement is interesting in itself, because we know that there are some 750 claims before the Waitangi Tribunal. In the 25-odd years that the Waitangi Tribunal has been addressing these issues it has, on average, managed one settlement a year. [Interruption] The Government has just announced that it is stepping that up to two settlements a year, which is encouraging. But on the basis of one settlement a year, with 750 claims lodged, even if no more claims were lodged we would have another 750 years ahead of us of the self-perpetuating treaty industry.

That is why ACT consistently campaigns for full, fair, and final settlements. We must bring an end to the grievance industry, so that as a nation we can move forward. I reiterate the other point, which is that we firmly believe in one class of citizenship—one law for all. That is why we must oppose the provision in this bill whereby special privilege is given to a group of people, based on their race—and it is a privilege and rights over land that is not theirs, which is a breach of article 3 of the treaty. I think it would be wrong if this bill were to pass through this House without those issues being flagged.

United Future is pleased to support the third reading of this bill. I would like to start by correcting Mr Ken Shirley. It was a mistake that he was not alone in making, because I have heard Winston Peters, who I thought would have known better, make exactly the same mistake that Mr Shirley made. There are not 750 settlements to go. Each settlement resolves a number of claims that are before the Waitangi Tribunal, and the best estimates are that 45 or 50 settlements will be necessary in order to dispose of all the claims.

💬 Hon Ken Shirley: So we have only 50 years to go!

We want to speed up the process, and United Future has been pushing very hard to speed it up to a level of four or five claims a year, which we think is sustainable. I certainly concur with ACT, to the extent that I believe that the process needs to be pushed faster. United Future has succeeded in getting the Minister to commit herself to having 90 percent of the claims settled by 2015, and that is considerable progress on where both the previous National Government and this Labour Government were heading just 1 short year ago.

I congratulate Ngāti Tama on reaching what is a significant event, and its whānau, hapū, and iwi on reaching the point where they will now have a degree of self-sufficiency that has been denied them for nearly one and a half centuries, and a resolution of the grievances that have affected them over that time. I have no doubt that to them the apology from the Crown is at least as significant as, if not more significant than, the recompense they are receiving. The apology provides an opportunity for Ngāti Tama to let go of the grievances of the past, and to move forward in a new and positive relationship with the Crown and New Zealand in general. The bill provides a combination of an apology and a settlement, and that provides freedom—a freedom that is offered to the iwi to put the grievances behind it, and to move on and provide a positive contribution to its own people and to the wider interests of New Zealand.

For the Crown, a considerable indictment is conveyed in this bill, not only in terms of past offences but of continuing offences, and not only in terms of direct offences but also of bureaucratic offences that continued beyond the direct offences. It is important during the third reading to make some allusion to the grievances that were effectively created, so that they are put on the record at this time. In particular, unjustified hostile actions were initiated against the iwi in 1860. There were confiscations of land. Some 74,000 acres of land were confiscated with inadequate consideration around about 1865, and then there were the events at Parihaka in 1881, which we are well familiar with, and in which Ngāti Tama was also involved. That was followed by bureaucratic offences—the West coast commissions of 1880 returned limited land to the iwi, but the amount was small, and it was of poor quality and insufficient for its needs. That land was also placed under Public Trust control, whereby perpetual leases meant that by 1974—a very recent date—60 percent of the land had been sold and 26 percent was under perpetual leases. The Sim Commission of 1926-27 did not fully investigate the return of the land, let alone the return of wāhi tapu and other taonga of the iwi. An annuity of £5,000 was recommended for all the Taranaki iwi to split between themselves, and £300 for the Parihaka offences. Yet not even that amount was fully paid. There was no consultation with the iwi about that recompense, let alone an acceptance by them of that, despite the Taranaki Maori Claims Settlement Act of 1944, which claimed that there had effectively been such an acceptance. The Crown now admits that there was no such acceptance, but this redress has been reached after full consultation with and the approval of the iwi.

Ngāti Tama was a successful iwi before it was stripped of its self-sufficiency and its mana. I, and United Future, can only hope that with the passing of this bill, Ngāti Tama can regain its mana and a measure of self-sufficiency. I note that the settlement redress package includes not only the Crown’s acknowledgments and apology but financial redress of $14.5 million and a right of first refusal for a period of 50 years over certain Crown-owned land in the Ngāti Tama right-of-first-refusal area as designated, together with a site-specific right of refusal over the Tongaporutu recreation reserve. It also includes cultural redress, including the transfer of five sites of cultural and spiritual significance and including large areas of conservation land. In addition the package includes 11 statutory acknowledgments and seven deeds of recognition, protocols with five Government departments, appointment of the Ngāti Tama governance entity as an advisory committee to the Minister of Fisheries and the Minister of Conservation, and a right of first refusal for a period of 50 years over two species of shellfish—kina and surf clams—if they are introduced into the quota management system. Finally, there is an acknowledgment of Ngāti Tama’s customary non-commercial interest in pāua and in certain other species in the iwi’s area of interest. Those are significant areas of compensation, although like most settlements I am sure they will not represent the full value of what was taken. The fact that Ngāti Tama has been prepared to accept a less than 100 percent settlement, in order to resolve these matters and move forward, is to its credit.

It is also pleasing to see that with a 61 percent participation rate in the settlement mandate and a 97 percent affirmation of the terms of settlement, Ngāti Tama has provided one of the highest settlement ratification and participation rates to date, and that is greatly encouraging. The concern, of course, is that there was such a low turn-out in voting on the governance entity—a mere 32 percent—although 98 percent of those people approved the governance entity. In looking at the reasons for the low turn-out it seems to have been the view of the negotiator and the two rūnanga representatives that that was due more to apathy, because of the length of time the settlement process was taking, than to active dissent. They have raised an issue about possible confusion over two tick-boxes: one being for the governance entity, and the other for an advance payment of $250,000. They were also of the view that many Ngāti Tama voters considered they had expressed sufficient support when they ratified the deed of settlement. Those are matters that the Crown is addressing, with a view to trying to get a greater participation rate in future treaty settlements. One of the measures the Crown is trying to explore is the ratification of the deed of settlement and the governance entity simultaneously, and that would certainly improve the turn-out figures.

For the Crown and Ngāti Tama the passing of this bill today constitutes the end of the issue. However, for Ngāti Tama and Ngāti Tama Whānau Whānui, it is the beginning of the management of the new resources they have been given. In Māori culture we understand there is a strong measure of restorative justice, and that it is a better system than the Pākehā-inherited system of adversarial justice. There is now an opportunity for Māori among themselves to demonstrate the superiority of restorative justice principles, and to demonstrate that relationships between the different groups within Ngāti Tama can be resolved in a way that builds the relationships and actually reaches solutions. If New Zealanders can see that Māori can resolve their own internal grievances by that method, that will give us encouragement to change the nature of the New Zealand system to one that I, personally, believe would be preferable, in terms of restorative justice rather than adversarial approaches. Here is an opportunity to prove that. Personal rights and personal agendas need to be set aside for the sake of the iwi as a whole and the country as a whole, and respect needs to be given to all.

I congratulate Ngāti Tama again. United Future is very pleased to see this bill going through the House and to support the third reading. We wish the people of Ngāti Tama good fortune in the future, as they deal with these assets and as they relate together.