Davis Kelvin: Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau Collective Redress Bill — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeDavis Kelvin: Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau Collective Redress Bill — Third Reading[Sitting date: 23 July 2014. Volume:700;Page:19496. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]KELVIN DAVIS (Labour):Tēnā koe e te Kaihautū. Tēnā koutou e ngā kārangaranga hapū iwi o Tāmaki-makau-rau. Tēnā rā koutou nā koutou i takahia mai pērā i a Ngāi Tūhoe i mua i a koutou i te ata nei. Nā koutou i takahia mai te tuarā o Te Ika-a-Māui ki a tātou i konei i Te Upoko-o-Te Ika ki te whakarongo ki tēnei te pānuitanga mutunga o tēnei pire tā koutou pire. Kua rongohia hoki i ngā ingoa i w’akahuatia e te Minita mō rātou i tīmata ai tēnei haerenga ā-tinana i ērā tau i mua ēngari hore kau kei konei ā-tinana ēngari kei konei rātou ā-wairua. Nā reira mihi kau ana ki a rātou te hunga mate rātou kua whetūrangitia. Haere e ngā mate ēngari hoki mai tātou ki a tātou anō te hunga ora.[Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker. Greetings to you the subtribal and tribal callings of Auckland. A real tribute to you collectively who like Ngāi Tūhoe ahead of you this morning travelled here. You traversed along the back of the North Island to us here in Wellington to listen to this final reading of this bill your bill. I also heard names mentioned by the Minister of those who personally attended meetings at the start those years ago but are not here physically today except spiritually. So I pay a tribute to them the dead who are no longer here. Farewell the dead but let us the living come back again to ourselves.]I would like to just carry on in the vein that the Minister has started in and acknowledge all the hapū and the iwi of Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau Collective: Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki Ngāti Maru Ngāti Paoa Ngāti Tamaoho Ngāti Tamaterā Ngāti Te Ata Ngāti Whanaunga Ngāti Whātua o Kaipara Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei Te Ākitai Waiōhua Te Kawerau-a-Maki Te Patukirikiri me ngā hapū atu o Ngāti Whātua tēnā koutou.This bill in its preamble explains what the Minister has just said—that this bill is separate to the Treaty claims. The iwi and hapū constituting the collective known as Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau have claims to Tāmaki-makau-rau based on historical breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi by the Crown. Those settlements are happening in a parallel process. But this bill redresses other issues around the maunga and the motu of Tāmaki-makau-rau. All the iwi have interests in these maunga and these motu of Tāmaki-makau-rau and they all have interests into the future.I would like to acknowledge also the words of the bill that say that “The maunga and the motu are taonga in relation to … the iwi and hapū …” and those iwi and hapū have always maintained a unique relationship and they have never forgotten their intergenerational role as kaitiaki. I think it is really important to explain that to the motu and to the country and to reiterate the relationship that we as Māori have with our maunga. We could relate it I guess to the Egyptians when they go out and build their own maunga by way of a pyramid or to the Incas building pyramids but we Māori are a bit smarter. We do not take 30 years and 20000 slaves to build our monuments. We have what the provider gave to us arā o tātou maunga and they have much significance to us.Therefore it upsets us greatly when we see that over the years such as in Tāmaki-makau-rau the maunga there have been quarried have been mined and have had structures built on them. It would be similar to our going over to Egypt and dismantling a part of the pyramids to build a bit of a road somewhere. People can understand that that would be a tragedy and would an insult to the Egyptian people and I hope that they understand that by quarrying away our maunga taking chunks out of them building bits of pieces out of them for roads for example it is an insult to us as Māori. We have this special connection. I do not think we have to justify our special connection; it is just the way it is for us. We understand it.This bill has taken a number of years to get to this stage. It started as the Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations said in July 2009 with negotiations between the Crown and Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau. A framework agreement was signed in February 2010 a record of agreement was signed in November 2011 another deed encapsulating a few things was initialled in June 2012 and on 8 September 2012 a deed was signed. But in order for that to all bear fruit this legislation had to be enacted and here we are. Of course legislation does not happen overnight. This bill has taken a number of years to be drafted to go through the process of the first reading the second reading the Committee stage and the select committee hearings and now we have reached this stage where the legislation is almost complete.The Crown framework agreement has some very valid points to it and I just want to find the particular part where it says: “The Crown recognises that the iwi/hapū members of Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau have legitimate spiritual ancestral cultural customary and historical interests in the maunga of Tāmaki Makaurau.” Earlier on I heard the Minister of Māori Affairs Pita Sharples say that we have come a long way in 10 years when we heard about the Minister talking about taniwha and I think it is fantastic that we are now hearing about legislation that is legitimising our spiritual our ancestral our cultural and our customary and historical interests. We have come a long way when we can talk about—and we do not have to justify to anybody else—our spiritual and cultural connections. It is part of what makes Aotearoa a beautiful place and a wonderful country to live in. I know that there will be knockers. I know that there will be people out there who do not understand that and who do not want to understand it but that is their loss.It was interesting to hear and to note in the bill that the motu will be given to Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau and then they will be vested back or given back to the Crown. That reminds me of a saying of an ancestor of mine who wanted to hold a patu pounamu of our tupuna. It was in the keeping of his relatives but he wanted to hold it one time in his lifetime. He said: Hōmai ki ahau kia puri kai e aku ringa i mua i tōku matenga—“Let me just hold it for a moment in my lifetime.” It is a similar concept to what is happening in this bill where the motu are being handed over and are then being handed back. I think it is honourable and I think Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau need to be acknowledged for that.Also I think we need to reassure New Zealanders and Aucklanders that when the maunga are vested to Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau there are parts of the bill that guarantee Aucklanders and New Zealanders access to those maunga. They will still be able to enjoy them. There will still be reserves that all the people of New Zealand can enjoy. This is not about exclusive ownership; it is actually about the gift of sharing. For that I thank you all for your generosity to us as a nation.I must also acknowledge the Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations. My dealings with Minister Finlayson in terms of all Treaty settlement issues have been only honourable and honest and open. I acknowledge you for the hard work that I know you put in Minister and I know that your hardest work is yet to come by settling our Ngāpuhi claims. With that I acknowledge everybody here. I thank the House and I am happy that the Labour Party supports this legislation. Kia ora.