Financial Review Debate — Vote Treaty Negotiations, Non-departmental appropriations

This is such an important area that I think a brief statement by me on where we are at and how we are going is appropriate. I am disappointed that the Labour Party has not chosen to speak about this area, because it is so critically important. I am very proud of the Office of Treaty Settlements and the outstanding work that has been done by its very dedicated band of highly qualified and utterly professional civil servants. They are an outstanding bunch of people, ably assisted by some excellent Crown negotiators. The Crown negotiators, who number among them people like the Hon Paul Swain, the former Labour MP for Rimutaka, who is the chair of the Crown negotiators, do a wonderful job indeed. There is the former Labour member of Parliament for Tukituki Rick Barker, who has been doing some tremendous work for me up in Taranaki. There is John Wood, a former twice-appointed New Zealand Ambassador to Washington, who was responsible for negotiating the great and historical settlement with Ngāi Tūhoe and who has also been doing some tremendous work on the Whanganui River. So there are some really fine people who have been working with the Office of Treaty Settlements, and the reality is that they have made excellent progress in the last few years.

I was so proud to be with some of my parliamentary colleagues signing a deed of settlement with Ngāti Kurī. I want to also mention Pat Snedden, who did some wonderful work with the Te Hiku Forum iwi. I wondered whether we would ever get to the stage where we signed deeds of settlement in the far north, but we did. Four of the five Te Hiku Forum iwi have now signed deeds of settlement, and I believe that those iwi and that area will go from strength to strength.

As we come down the country, I, of course, have to mention the work that has been done by the Office of Treaty Settlements on the Ngāpuhi mandate. That really has been something in the nature of a Homeric epic. A couple of weeks ago I delivered to both factions the decision that we have made on the mandate. I really do endorse what the Hon Shane Jones has been saying in public that now is the time for the Ngāpuhi factions to come together for the negotiation, to see what they can do to get a good settlement, because one reads in the New Zealand Herald, for example, stories about the economic suffering in places like Kaikohe. Now is the time to negotiate a settlement so that those sorts of communities in the north can benefit economically and also socially, and they should talk to their whānau in the Te Hiku Forum iwi because they can see what can be achieved when you work together for a common aim.

I am very pleased with what is being done in Tāmaki and Hauraki. They are very complex negotiations. Of course, the House will soon be debating the Tāmaki collective legislation. Michael Dreaver, an outstanding Treaty negotiator, has been doing great work in Tāmaki and down into Hauraki, and I hope that before the end of the year we will have deeds of settlement with at least 11 of the 12 Hauraki iwi as well as two settlements with the Marutūahu collective and with the Hauraki collective.

I am so very pleased with the work that has been done in Taranaki. Again I have referred to the work of Rick Barker and Paul Swain. This really is bipartisan work. I have got those guys involved since they have left Parliament, and they have done a great job working with Te Ātiawa, Ngā Ruahine, and Taranaki. When those deeds are signed, that will leave Ngāti Maru and the collective settlement for that province, and that really is good.

I know that the member for Ikaroa-Rāwhiti will have more than a passing interest down the East Coast. Great work is being done with discussions with Te Tira, He Toa Takitini in Hastings, Rangitāne ki Wairarapa, and now with Ngāti Kahungunu ki Wairarapa. So there is a lot of work going on down there, and I would hope that in the very near future we are going to have some full and final settlements.

So this is very important work. We know that we are not dealing with full compensation, but Treaty settlements are about more than money. They do provide iwi with a strong economic base, but, importantly, they deal with acknowledging the historical wrongs, making that apology, and, as we see for example with Ngāti Whare, we deal with social accords as well. A town that really was the victim of the 1980s extremist policies of the Labour Government, a town that suffered greatly, was a town called Minginui. It always amuses me to hear the Labour Party members talk about poverty when for 9 years they did nothing about Minginui. I am on a steering group with the Mayor of Whakatāne and numerous others dealing with—

I am sorry to interrupt the honourable Minister. The time has come for me to leave the Chair for the dinner break.

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

Report noted.

Ministry of Social Development