Flavell Te Ururoa: Maori Purposes Bill — In Committee 
Flavell Te Ururoa: Maori Purposes Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:636;Page:6968] 
TE URUROA FLAVELL (Maori Party—Waiariki) 
: 
 Tena koe Madam Chair. Tena tatou katoa. E te Minita tena koe i tenei po. I want to make just a few points. 
Darren Hughes 
: Te wepu. 
TE URUROA FLAVELL 
: Tena koe e te wepu o tera taha o te Whare. Kia ora tatou. 
[ 
Greetings to you the whip on that side of the Chamber 
.] 
I will make a couple of points in respect of this bill. Firstly I repeat for the Minister that the difficulty with these sorts of bills for people like me is that we are pulling together a number of different things under one bill and we have to vote on a whole set of complex issues. It seems to me that pulling together provisions about fish Treaty claims and judges is a pretty difficult exercise to follow through and one would have hoped that we would split up these provisions. The difficulty with this sort of bill is that there are some good points that could be helpful to our people and there are some obviously that need a lot of work. That came through in the submission process. That is the first point. 
We want to comment on other points and I will run through them quickly. The notion of the appointment of judges and the lifting of the number of judges is a good idea. We support the notion in clause 4 and we have no problem with the notion in clause 5 of the Chief Judge and the Deputy Chief Judge working together where the powers of delegation are followed through. 
Metiria Turei and others have noted concerns in respect of decisions made by Judge Norman Smith and we support those comments. Georgina te Heuheu has raised those issues as well. The validation of his decisions creates a lousy precedent and we need to take heed in the future. I also support the notion that Metiria Turei raised in respect of the decisions already made. It seems that the Maori Affairs Committee gave the issue a fair bit of discussion and felt that there was no going back on those decisions. Suffice it to say the Maori Party signals a concern about this sort of precedent and hopes that it will not happen again. 
I draw the Committee’s attention to an amendment that the Maori Party has put on the Table for consideration. It is to do with the issue of the appointment of judges. Another amendment has to do with the extension of judges’ warrants so that they can practise not just in the Maori Land Court but also in the other courts. There is a recommendation on the Table relating to this and I would like members to look at that. It would broaden the judges’ scope and extend their warrants so that they can practise not only in the Maori Land Court but also in the District Court. The recommendation relates to clause 4. We suggest adding a new subsection (8) to section 7 of Te Ture Whenua Maori Act which clause 4 amends. The new subsection states: “(8) Any Judge appointed under subsection (1) may also preside in a District Court if agreed by the Chief Judge.” That is our recommendation. 
The reason is that we believe the judges’ expertise should not be limited simply to land issues. The judges bring a particular element of expertise in tikanga Maori that would also pay dividends in respect of their practice in the District Court. I would like the Minister and other members to consider this amendment. We feel that this amendment would enable a good spread of expertise across the court system and would allow us to use the expertise of those judges who in particular have an acknowledged background in tikanga Maori. 
 So those are some of the points that I put before the Minister. The main one of course is simply about supporting the concerns other members have raised. Secondly our concerns are basically about the pulling together of a number of bills into the one place when in fact some of them could have been separated out—in particular the various clauses around the Treaty of Waitangi that cause concern. We will be speaking to that issue shortly. 
Finally I put to the House the recommendation that is on the Table in respect of allowing the jurisdiction of Maori Land Court judges with the agreement of the Chief Judge to extend to the District Court. So I leave that recommendation for the Minister and hopefully he will provide some sort of response to it. Kia ora tatou.