Foreshore and Seabed Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee 
Foreshore and Seabed Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee 
[Volume:621;Page:16961] 
Tuesday 16 November 2004 
( 
continued on Wednesday 17 November 2004 
) 
Foreshore and Seabed Bill 
Second Reading 
Debate resumed. 
RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER (Labour—Napier) 
: 
 The staff of the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee deserve the thanks of the whole House for the work they did over and above the call of duty. Their attitude to the committee was tremendous. 
MITA RIRINUI (Labour—Waiariki) 
: 
 I stand to support the second reading of the bill. In doing so I want first to acknowledge the contributions of the Government members supported by the New Zealand First members to the processes of the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee. I acknowledge Russell Fairbrother for his strong chairmanship and also the contributions of my colleagues Dover Samuels Mahara Okeroa and Dail Jones who played a significant part throughout the whole process—unlike some who were there only during the hearings process. I have to say that that was more a case of political point-scoring than a genuine attempt to resolve many of the issues expressed by the submitters. The United Future member Larry Baldock often attended.  
The bill as amended acknowledges the unique relationship Maori have with the coastline. Our tipuna signed the Treaty of Waitangi to seek Crown protection. I am satisfied that the provisions contained within the bill honour their legacy. However there was an unrealistic expectation that the Government Maori caucus would deliver the entire foreshore and seabed to Maori ownership in fee simple title. That was never going to be the case. It was an expectation that required much more than we were able to provide. Some parties in this House have given Maori the impression that they are able to deliver that ownership.  
Maori caucus members have advocated strongly throughout the entire process for the recognition of Maori customary interests and the right of Maori to have their day in court. As a result of the proposed changes to the bill the High Court may grant a territorial customary rights order to Maori groups which may result in the establishment of a foreshore and seabed reserve. For those who seek reserve status the High Court will be able to direct them to the Crown to discuss redress options.  
We believe that the proposed amendments will recognise some of the fundamental issues that were raised during the select committee process. No fee simple titles will be awarded and this reflects the views of the majority of Maori who appeared before the select committee. We have been instrumental in strengthening the redress provisions around territorial customary rights. We recognise that this bill will not please the extremists or the purists. However we are confident that it caters to the wishes of the majority of Maori who take a more pragmatic view of progressing our development as a people. The Resource Management Act is currently being reviewed and will be strengthened to recognise more effective consultation with local Maori over coastal areas. We believe that this will provide stronger recognition of the traditional association of whanau hapu and iwi with the coast than the ancestral connection orders initially provided for in the legislation.  
During the select committee process many submitters sought a longer conversation on the foreshore and seabed issue. However we believe that would have stymied the aquaculture developments that many coastal iwi around the country are exploring. We Maori are very good at long conversations. The last one we had took 13 years. As Maori members representing a wide diverse range of views we could not allow this to happen. I heard in the House last night a speech advocating that we have a longer conversation. I wonder whether the many who came on the hikoi who were involved in aquaculture development would have agreed with that speaker on that particular point. I doubt it very much. In fact I have received many calls expressing great concern about that suggestion.  
Maori caucus members have played an active role in the discussion on aquaculture and the setting aside of 20 percent of all marine farming space for Maori interests. Therefore we believe that it is important that this opportunity not languish for another decade in much the same way as the Treaty of Waitangi fishing allocation process did. The consequence of a long conversation would have been a halt to aquaculture farming for years or even decades.  
In the very little time I have left I want to acknowledge much of the progress this Government has made in relation to Maori employment or unemployment. The first thing many Maori families think about when they wake up each day is their children and their mokopuna. It is interesting that the latest figures on unemployment among Maori are below 8 percent. Never in the 18 years since the records have been kept has this been the case. There are 40000 more Maori in work now than there were when this Government took office. In the mid-1990s one in three Maori did not have a job. Now under this Government fewer than one in 10 are unemployed. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS (Minister of State) 
: 
 When I woke up this morning I turned on the radio and heard claptrap and rhetoric. That is what I heard this morning on  
Morning Report 
 from a party that says it represents Maori and then I heard a representative from the Green Party in and out of hallucination. She said that the members of this House did not have the courage— 
Metiria Turei 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. It was difficult to hear the speaker. I am uncertain as to whether he referred to the Green Party member as “hallucinating”. If he did I take personal offence at that comment and ask that it be withdrawn and apologised for. 
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: Yes I think that that is inappropriate. The member has taken offence. Would the Hon Dover Samuels please stand withdraw and apologise. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS 
: I withdraw and apologise. I was just saying that the person who made those comments on  
Morning Report 
 this morning was in my view hallucinating—was somewhat under the influence. [ 
Interruption 
] I did not refer to the Green Party. 
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: The member has been called on the point of order. The Green Party member has taken offence. The member should not refer to that and insinuate the same point he made before. The member will withdraw and apologise. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS 
: I withdraw and apologise. 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. I just want to get this clear. Are you telling us that now as part of the record we cannot use the word “hallucinating”—that we cannot say that another member is “dreaming” or “hallucinating”? Is this a new standard that you from the Chair are saying is unacceptable in the House? 
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: No. The remark was a personal reflection on a member who took offence. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS 
: I support the second reading of the bill and I tell the House that I have a vested interest. It may very well be that I have a conflict of interest. Why? Because I am a Maori and I belong to a hapu. In the generations of my people my tupuna at Matauri Bay Ngati Kura there was never any recognition of any right given to their takutai moana—never in generations. I have never seen representation by any other party acknowledging that Maori have customary rights that have to be accorded and given effect to in the law. I have lived there for many years and my tupuna are there. I challenge the other Maori members of the House to show me anywhere in legislation that Maori customary rights have ever been given effect to. 
Those Green Party members who walked in and out of the select committee—who spent 5 minutes there—advocate on behalf of Maoridom and know nothing at all about customary rights. They know nothing about the relationship that Maori have with their takutai moana. 
I ask the members of this House to show me any legislation passed in the history of this House going back to the whakapapa or to 1840 where a Government and a party stood tall to recognise that Maori have customary rights to their takutai moana. This is the first time in the history of this nation— 
Gerry Brownlee 
: 1996. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS 
: It does not matter about the balderdash from that member across the other side of House who most of the time has his cellphone to his ear while talking to Don Brash and trying to justify his own existence instead of getting on with the business.  
I am proud of this Government and I am proud that this Parliament has finally moved to give recognition that whanau and hapu have customary rights over their foreshore and seabed. I say to the member opposite that this legislation finally gives me the opportunity as a member of the hapu to take my case to the Maori Land Court and to the High Court. Never before in the history of this nation have those processes been available to our people—never before. 
Along with my hapu I live by the sea. Some people would say that I have gills—not unlike my whanaunga there from Ngati Wai who lives by the sea also. I say to this House—and I think it is an important issue—that our customary rights have never been recognised in law—never! 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Of course they have. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS 
: I ask that member: where? 
Hon Member 
: The Fisheries Bill. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS 
: We are talking about the foreshore and seabed. That is how those members are so far out and away from reality. 
Never before have our rights been recognised in any legislation. I will ask the other party—the “Harawira Party”—to show me where they have been. I will ask the Green Party to show me if Maori customary rights have ever been recognised in legislation. My hapu my ancestors and my elders in generations right back—generations—have never had their customary rights recognised in the law of this land. Halleluiah to David; God bless; tihei mauri ora! 
It is no matter about the old humbug and claptrap from the members of other parties—the intellectuals the know-alls—who have never lived beside the sea and who would not know what the hell the difference was between a snapper a kahawai or a tadpole. They would not understand what it was. 
I do not tell lies. I go out there and tell our people the truth and I tell them this: they can go down to their rock and they can go and dive for kinas. They can still go and pick tuatuas they can still go and get a suntan—if they want to get browner than Parekura Horomia—and they can still go out and fish for kinas. They can do anything and everything that they have done historically—nothing will change. But there is humbug and claptrap out there and those people spreading mistruths amongst our people should be ashamed of themselves. Kia ora tatou. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Well done the trained seals. 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Deputy Prime Minister) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. That was an absolutely disgraceful interjection from the deputy leader of the National Party. I suggest that you require him to withdraw and apologise. You know exactly what he said. I will not repeat it in the House. 
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: Did the member make an offensive remark? 
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 Well it depends. If one is a trained seal being compared with the Labour Party probably would have been offensive. 
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: It was taken as an offensive remark. Would the member like to withdraw and apologise. 
GERRY BROWNLEE 
: For making the comment: “Well done the trained seals.” I withdraw and apologise. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the Foreshore and Seabed Bill be now read a second time. 
Ayes 65 
New Zealand Labour 50; New Zealand First 13; Progressive 2. 
Noes 55 
New Zealand National 27; Green Party 9; ACT New Zealand 8; United Future 8; Maori Party 1; Independent: Awatere Huata; Other: Mahuta. 
Bill read a second time. 
Instruction to Committee 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Deputy Prime Minister) 
: 
 I move  
That it be an instruction to the Committee of the whole House on the Foreshore and Seabed Bill that it take the bill part by part.  
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the motion be agreed to. 
Ayes 66 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Progressive 2. 
Noes 54 
New Zealand National 27; Green Party 9; ACT New Zealand 8; United Future 8; Maori Party 1; Independent: Awatere Huata. 
Motion agreed to. 
In Committee 
Part 1 Preliminary provisions  
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Part 1 includes clauses 3 to 5. 
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 This is where Parliament will start to untangle the extraordinary spin that the Deputy Prime Minister has put about in the last couple of days suggesting that this amended bill—because Supplementary Order Paper 302 is not really a Supplementary Order Paper; it is a fully amended bill—will solve and salve all the problems and concerns that many New Zealanders have. 
We see in it this tricky little idea of inserting a new clause 2A “Object”. That is a Dail Jones initiative and in it there is a paragraph that almost contradicts itself. 
Darren Hughes 
: It must have been written by the National Party. 
GERRY BROWNLEE 
: Mr Hughes the confused member on the other side of the Chamber is saying that it must have been written by a party other than Labour. It was; it was written by New Zealand First and frankly the New Zealand First member should be sitting in the Minister’s chair because this amended bill is his work. 
We have here a problem insomuch as whereas the object is supposedly to put the foreshore and seabed into Crown ownership for the people of New Zealand the Government equally wants to say that the foreshore and seabed can be dealt away in deals with Maori provided that the High Court of New Zealand agrees with that. That seems to me to be a very weak protection given the sort of judicial activism in this area that we have seen in the last few years. Is it not extraordinary that on a bill that is a result of just that sort of judicial activism we end up seeing an old lawyer Dail Jones trying to solve the problem by once again creating the opportunity for these things to go back before a court? 
It is a problem insomuch as this is the part of the bill that also makes it very clear to non-Maori New Zealanders that they have fewer rights to undertake activity on the foreshore and seabed of this country than Maori do. That is undeniable. That is quite undeniable because unless one is Maori one cannot go to the High Court to talk about a customary right or a customary use. 
Dail Jones 
: That’s not true. 
GERRY BROWNLEE 
: That is true. The bill excludes it particularly. [ 
Interruption 
] Here is a question for “Minister” Dail Jones to stand up and answer. This is his cunning out; this is his out on this argument. He is saying that I am wrong because if non-Maori were here before 1840 and they had established some sort of activity that continues today they could get a customary right but if one came after 1840 one can forget about it. The fact is the vast majority of people in this country arrived here after 1840—or their ancestors did—and their activities commenced after that time. These people think they are very clever by saying that anyone can go for a customary right provided that it happened before 1840. Well that is the divisive aspect of this bill that will do damage to this Government. I tell Mr Samuels that it is quite inappropriate in the year 2004 to tell New Zealanders that they cannot be considered equal to Maori in their love of the coastline of this country because their ancestors were not here before 1840. That is a nonsense. 
It is as big a nonsense as saying that Maori can claim the seabed out to the territorial limit which did not exist prior to 1967. That is another little piece that has been put in place by Winston Peters. Last night he was claiming that New Zealanders will thank him for his great work on this measure. Although we know that Mr Jones has done the work we know that Mr Jones would not breathe without Mr Peters telling him he can and the reality is that this measure very much will be sheeted home to him. He is the man who has decided that this Parliament will pass a bill that separates Maori and non-Maori when it comes to consideration of activities on the coastline of this country. 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Deputy Prime Minister) 
: 
 What a thoroughly confused piece of extended piffle that was from the deputy leader of the National Party! First of all let me make it clear to him that new clause 2A was drafted in consultation with my colleagues in the Maori caucus committee and with— 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Oh! 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: It is even worse my goodness me! A brown face has had something to do with drafting the bill and that makes it totally bad according to the deputy leader of the National Party. Horror show! It is a nightmare and Friday the 13th all in one go for the poor old deputy leader of the National Party that Maori have had something to do with the bill. Of course National members are not racist on this bill at all! No no no! They just do not want anything to do with Maori being involved in it—that is all. 
Clause 2A was put to the New Zealand First members and they agreed to it. They agreed as part of another set of arrangements that were entered into the bill. So let us absolve Mr Jones of the blame for new clause 2A; the Government accepts full responsibility. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: We don’t believe you! 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: I do not care what the member believes. The member’s brain is something I do not want to explore for more than a few seconds. 
What the member does not seem to understand is that common law rights are those rights that existed at the time that the Crown assumed sovereignty. The Court of Appeal found that common law rights had not been removed by the Crown’s assertion of legal ownership of the foreshore and seabed. That was not judicial activism; that followed any number of overseas judgments in that area. That member needs to front up and say whether he believes there are common law rights or not. What he is really saying is that if those rights are held by Maori they should not be allowed to exist. That is what he is actually saying. 
He is totally wrong when he says that this bill enables only Maori to go to the court. Pakeha can go to the High Court for a declaration of customary usage rights. The only difference is Maori go to the Maori Land Court in relation to customary usage rights and the reason is that there are tikanga issues that the Maori Land Court has expertise in. Both Maori and Pakeha have the right to go to the High Court on an equal basis in terms of the issue of territorial customary rights.  
Gerry Brownlee 
: What is the cut-off?  
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: The cut-off is what the law itself determines: the point at which the Crown assumed sovereignty. If those members do not like that then they are simply rejecting the entire jurisprudence on these matters not just here but in any other number of jurisdictions as well. 
This really emphasises how stupid the National Party is on this bill. It does not have an argument. National members are simply trying to wind up an issue around race to frighten people. And what confusion and contradiction there is! Other parties in the House claim we are taking everything away from Maori. The National Party claims we are giving everything to Maori. Georgina te Heuheu says we are taking everything away from Maori. The ACT party says it thinks there should be property rights but it does not think Maori should have any of them so it will oppose the bill on both grounds. And Metiria Turei exists in some kind of ethereal stratosphere; I have yet to understand what she is saying at all on the issue at this particular point. 
The Government’s position is clear: the Court of Appeal left us with a legal framework that would have led to results that were divisive and untenable from a public policy perspective—that is the transfer into private ownership of public foreshore and seabed. Firstly we reaffirm the Crown’s ownership of the public foreshore and seabed. Secondly we provide the mechanisms for the consideration of customary usage rights. Thirdly we provide the mechanism for redress where there might have been territorial customary rights established and to deal with the issue the member raises we place in statute the test that has to be applied by the court in the consideration of those applications. 
What bit of that can those members actually oppose in principle at all as opposed to trying to do an Orewa speech scratch-scratch job hoping somehow or other that people will think there is something in it? We need just listen to the media reports and just read the editorials; already they have nothing to say of any interest. Those members will bash their gums uselessly for some 15 to 20 hours to come saying nothing of any importance at all throughout this debate. They have nothing to contribute on this issue and they have not contributed to this issue at any stage. They have no argument of any substance do not understand the law do not understand the Court of Appeal judgment and do not understand the bill but that will not stop the National Party because it never has stopped it when it comes to issues of complexity.  
Dr WAYNE MAPP (National—North Shore) 
: 
 What an arrant bit of nonsense we have heard from the Deputy Prime Minister! It is typical of his arrogance in this place. It is a testament is it not that he himself has not read new clause 2A. It has to be read out because Mr Jones as usual has tried to deny the public the truth. What does this clause state?  
Dail Jones 
: I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. The member cannot say that I am in any way trying to deny anyone the truth as if I am involved in a lie. I take personal offence at that and I ask the member to withdraw. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: The member is right and he has taken offence at the comment. I ask the member to withdraw. 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: Speaking to the point of order I appreciate that— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: I have ruled on the point of order.  
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: I withdraw and apologise.  
Hon Richard Prebble 
: I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. Perhaps I should have risen earlier but I expected you to appreciate that to say that someone is trying to deny the truth of something is not to accuse that person of being a liar. In fact the rule cannot be that any member of Parliament can interrupt debate just by deciding that that person does not happen to like vigorous discussion. I say to you that you are setting a very bad precedent. I realise that the Speaker made a ruling yesterday which I think he now regrets but that is not in the rulings and I suggest that you consult with the Clerk and get on with the matter. Otherwise we will find that this debate will not be a robust exchange of views; it will be just a series of points of order breaking up speeches. I think the member ought to be allowed to start again.  
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: The member certainly does make a valid point but what I counsel members against is making imputations against other members. The member certainly did take offence at that. But the Hon Richard Prebble does make a point about robust debate. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. Do I take it that what you have just said is another ruling? 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: No. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Well I ask you whether it means we cannot have robust debate. Does it mean that if the reality is that the truth as one party might see it is being put in a way quite contrary to the way it is being put by another party we are not able to suggest that is what is happening? Everybody knows—and Dr Cullen has alluded to the fact that editorials and other articles in the papers have attested to this fact—that New Zealand First has been intrinsically involved in the development of the amendment bill that we now see before us and that Mr Jones himself has been very instrumental in putting together a number of the clauses here. In fact yesterday I overheard the Deputy Prime Minister congratulating Mr Jones on the fine work he had done on this bill.  
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: The member has made his point. I say to members that casting aspersions and attacking the member as against the point of view is what this is about and the member has clearly said he took offence. That is the end of the matter. 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: When a Supplementary Order Paper of 67 pages an amendment bill is denied to the public until the beginning of the debate how are members to know the truth of the contents of the material? They have almost no time to read it and that is the point I was making. 
The Government claims that new clause 2A will protect the Crown ownership of the foreshore and seabed. Then it goes on to state: “including the protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi with areas of the public foreshore and seabed.” What the Government is doing here is clearly preferring Maori above all other members of the community. The Minister in the chair Michael Cullen might deny it but that is what clause 2A actually states. Clause 2A for the benefit of Government members sets out the object of the bill itself. So it is very very clear that we have two classes of citizenship. Maori are in a preferred position. That is why the clause refers to protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi. I do not believe that those terms are intended to apply to all New Zealanders. Maybe they are—maybe the junior whip will tell us that they are terms for all New Zealanders—but I believe that they are intended for Maori alone. So that is a compromise. 
It is a derogation of the general right and the whole of the rest of the bill is intended to achieve precisely that. I am sure we will see Dail Jones get up and say that it is wonderful that the Auckland regatta is now protected and that one can apply to the High Court for a customary rights order. Well I ask Mr Jones whether there actually was a problem. Were the organisers of the regatta seriously troubled that they might not be able to hold the regatta in January 2005—the first time in 165 years that the organisers really feared they would not be able to hold it? We know that that is a nonsense proposition. The reality is that that customary rights order said by the Deputy Prime Minister and by Mr Dail Jones to be available for the general public is in fact of no value whatsoever. The only case that is ever mentioned is that of the regatta which does not need the protection. Frankly it is a tissue and a fabrication. 
On the other hand Mr Dover Samuels is correct. He says that Maori will get all sorts of rights and protections. Those will be deep and they will compromise the public interest. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (ACT) 
: 
 I rise at the beginning of the Committee stage on the Foreshore and Seabed Bill to say to the Committee that I realise I have been here only 26 years but I have never seen the House doing what we are now doing. We are now debating what is regarded by everyone I think as one of the most important pieces of legislation introduced by the Government and one of the more important pieces of legislation introduced by any Government. It is one of the few pieces of legislation that has caused a by-election so we can see it is important. This version of the bill was given to the Opposition only yesterday— 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: At 5.30. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE 
: —at 5.30 p.m. with the so-called redline amendments that we are now working from and there is no explanatory note—none whatsoever. 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: There is on the Supplementary Order Paper. Look at the back. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE 
: The Minister says so but perhaps he can refer me to the explanatory note on new clause 2A because when I read it I say to the Committee that it is incomprehensible. I realise I am just a mere lawyer but I do not understand what on earth it means. It states: “The object of this Act is to preserve the public foreshore and seabed in perpetuity as the common heritage of all New Zealanders in a way that enables the protection by the Crown of the public foreshore and seabed on behalf of all people of New Zealand”. I think I understand that. But then it states: “including the protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi with areas of the public foreshore and seabed.” What does that mean? 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: Gobbledygook. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE 
: Perhaps it is gobbledygook. What it appears to me to state is that we are protecting the whole of the foreshore but we are also protecting it all for Maori. Those two statements are in contradiction. A court is supposed to know what that means. I say to the Minister in the chair Michael Cullen that perhaps it is just flannel. I once said to Geoffrey Palmer when he said to me “It’s just window dressing” that the problem with window dressing is that a court will give it a meaning.  
It appears to me to be racist legislation. The Government is saying that “all New Zealanders” and “whanau hapu and iwi” are different. That is what that clause states. I would have said that “all New Zealanders” includes both Maori and non-Maori but not this Government. That is the heart of the problem in the bill. It is deeply racist legislation. I say to the Minister again that the ACT party would have left the matter to the courts. We have said that consistently. We are a party that believes in the rule of law and I took great exception although I did not raise a point of order to the member saying that we protect non-Maori property rights only. This party is in favour of property rights and we accept that there are some parts of New Zealand—not many but some—where Maori do have property rights on the foreshore. The ACT party stands for that. We do not get upset about that because they have had them since 1840 and it has not caused any trouble up until now and we would not have panicked. We would have said that they should go ahead with court cases. Let me make that clear.  
I object very strongly to Parliament passing provisions like clause 2A that no member opposite can explain. We tried to be parliamentarians. We said to the Minister that he could have unlimited time to explain the bill—a gift that most parliamentarians would accept. What did Dr Cullen do? He said no. He was the first person to say no and that was because he is not a fool. He realises that he cannot explain clause 2A. But on the face of it it is a deeply racist provision because it states that there will be protection on behalf of all people and then states that Maori are not all people—they are somehow different. I say to the Minister that “all people” ought to mean both Maori and non-Maori but that is not so under this deeply racist Government. As a parliamentarian I am appalled that we should be considering legislation like this. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: The member will be seated. He cannot say that.  
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE 
: I most certainly can! 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: The member knows that under the Speaker’s ruling by Doug Kidd he certainly cannot call the Government or a member “racist”.  
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE 
: I withdraw saying that the Government is racist. This is deeply racist legislation introduced by members who apparently are not racist. It has been introduced by members who say they would never be racist but it is deeply racist. We know it is. It is apartheid legislation. 
RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER (Labour—Napier) 
: 
 There is no surprise in new clause 2A for those who understand the principles on which the bill comes about. There is no surprise in it for those who have read any part of the Ngati Apa Court of Appeal decision. There is no surprise in it for those who have read anything about Mabo or the international law on aboriginal rights. There is no surprise in it for anybody who has read the Treaty of Waitangi. There is no surprise in it for anybody who understands the common law principles on which the House is built. The only surprise in clause 2A is that those who use the term racist to describe the legislation have that word in the forefront of their imagination.  
The bill will “preserve the public foreshore and seabed in perpetuity as the common heritage of all New Zealanders” and that is the position that has prevailed in New Zealand for 160 years and that has been assumed by everybody to be the actuality. The Court of Appeal pointed out that riding upon that also as a burden on the Crown’s radical title is an obligation by the Crown to recognise the aboriginal title that the common law recognised whereby indigenous people had rights until they were clearly taken away by statute.  
 New clause 2A does precisely that. The object is to preserve the public foreshore and seabed in perpetuity as the common heritage of all New Zealanders but it includes the burden that has always been on the Crown for the common law right of aboriginal title. To describe that as racist legislation is to describe a skateboard as a motorcycle. The House deals with the facts and the Opposition appears to be trivialising the matter because it is not prepared to recognise the intelligence and principled nature of this bill. The clause includes the protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi with areas of the public foreshore and seabed. That simply means that hapu whanau and iwi who have customary relationships that have continued since the assumption of sovereignty in 1840 can be recognised and will be recognised under this bill. There is nothing new about that nothing radical about that and nothing racist about that. But of course one cannot read clause 2A in isolation. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: Why not? 
RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER 
: The purposes clause elaborates on that. It is very convenient for Mr Prebble not to have read as far as clause 3 “Purposes”. The bill has been around only since July! It may not be an illustrated version— 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: How long has clause 3 been around? 
RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER 
: About 140 years if one reads the common law and reads about Ngati Apa. It has been here for a long long time; since the signing of the treaty in fact. If one bothered to read the treaty and recognised that it was bringing into this country the common law of England then one would not be asking that question. One would not be thinking in terms of “racist”. One would be saying that clause 2A is self-evident and not even worthy of debate because it is a simple fact on which this country is built a simple fact on which this Parliament is run and a simple fact that all people in this country be they Maori Pakeha or more recent immigrants are prepared to concede when one talks to them out in the street. If the member interviews his mirror he may see a different picture. 
Clause 3 vests the full legal and beneficial ownership of the public foreshore and seabed in the Crown. That is the clause that the Court of Appeal required to be stated clearly so that the assumption of sovereignty and the Acts of this Parliament could express that principle. Then it gives rise to the burden which is then dealt with in paragraphs (b) (c) and (d) of clause 3. It follows as night follows day that if we recognise that this country is founded on the common law—the treaty recognises those common law principles and the right of Parliament to make laws arising therefrom—then any objection one can take to clause 2A is illusory and brings into intellectual argument what Richard Loe brought to forward play in the All Blacks. This part of the bill really sets the parameters for the rest of the understanding. We will have an interesting debate over the next few hours if clause 2A causes as much difficulty to those who consider themselves worthy to take part in this debate.  
We move on to clause 4 “Interpretation” but nobody from the Opposition has bothered to mention it. Interpretations are fine— 
Gerry Brownlee 
: It’s early days yet! 
RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER 
: It has been around since July. Mr Brownlee should have gone to the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee and would have heard the submissions on the clause. 
Simon Power 
: I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. The Standing Orders and  
Speakers’ Rulings 
 state that members should not refer to anyone’s absence from the House or a select committee. Mr Fairbrother made a direct reference and you did not pull him up.  
RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER 
: I was saying what he would have heard in the select committee. Whether he was there I do not know—[ 
Interruption 
] 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: I give Mr Power one warning. When I am on my feet making a ruling I do not expect comment. I was about to rule in his favour. He is right; the same rules apply to the select committee and the House. I give all members another warning: when I am ruling on a point of order or when a member is speaking to a point of order there will be silence. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY (ACT) 
: 
 As my colleague has already pointed out in this debate Part 1 is racist legislation. But it is not only racist it is actually socialist as well. It is actually racist and socialist. Those members do not mind me calling them socialists—they actually smile and rejoice as I call them socialists. I am not allowed to call them racist we have established that but this Government is bringing both racist and socialist legislation to this Committee and I will explain why.  
This part essentially takes away the right of a group of New Zealanders even to pursue a possible property right through the courts. It takes away the right and strips them of due process. The ACT party defends all property rights and we say that if there are parts of New Zealand where people can establish that they hold a customary title then those people should have the right to pursue that. The point has been made that if they have held it since 1840 and there has not been any problem then what should we be fearful of. How can they answer that question?  
On the one hand this part strips away the rights of some people to pursue that property right but on the other hand it actually creates a tool that is very fearsome. Dr McHugh who was a key adviser to the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee made the point that this bill actually gives a lot more to Maori than they would have likely got through the courts. It creates a whole new regime across all the foreshore and seabed that is not confined to any basis of property right but which is race-based law. On the basis of skin colour or ethnicity a group of New Zealanders will have rights through the Resource Management Act to wield powers and controls through the back-door as already we see with land under the Resource Management Act now extended over the whole of the foreshore and seabed.  
To that extent this is lose-lose legislation. It breaches due process. It denies iwi the rights to pursue whether they do hold property rights. That is all the Court of Appeal said in the Ngati Apa case. It said that in some rare and remote instances it may be that they can establish customary title based on having held that land continuously—no more and no less than that. McHugh emphasised that point. He predicted it would be extremely rare. He doubted whether there would be even one or two instances in the country where the High Court would uphold that. But this Government panicked because it was looking at the politics of it not the substance of it.  
There is the Deputy Prime Minister with hands clenched behind his head. He knows that he has the tiger by the tail. He is digging himself deeper and deeper. He knows that he has messed it up. Rather than front up to the country and admit that the Government went down the wrong path the Government is trying to ram it through under urgency and impose this racist and socialist legislation on the whole country.  
The socialists just love it. Here is a way for the Crown to have everything. They would like the Crown to own all the land as well not just all the sea. I have a colleague out on the highways and byways of New Zealand who is fighting this Government because it is trying to find a back-door way to take over all farmers’ land calling it access and taking away property rights on the land. Here we see the Government stripping away potential property rights on the one hand and then creating a new regime that we should all be fearful of and that is this amendment to the Resource Management Act. That is essentially what it is. We are calling it the Foreshore and Seabed Bill. It is actually the “Resource Management Act Amendment (Foreshore and Seabed) Bill.” That is what we should be concentrating on because this mechanism is a disaster. 
 There are expanded powers on the foreshore and seabed in a nebulous form. Spiritualism has been introduced into the management of the foreshore and seabed. There will be taniwha running along the beach in all directions—and who will control it? The Department of Conservation will. We will have all that extra foreshore and seabed all reclamations with that wonderful balanced Department of Conservation controlling it! Can members imagine any developer anyone with a proposal whether it be for a marina or whatever going to the Department of Conservation and getting a fair hearing? 
GORDON COPELAND (United Future) 
: 
 I want to speak entirely on clause 2A which of course is the object clause of the bill and therefore is an overarching clause that is reflected right through the rest of the text of the bill.  
On 18 August 2003 our Prime Minister Helen Clark was interviewed on the  
Holmes 
 show. On that evening she announced to the nation that the Government’s proposal was to put the foreshore and seabed into “public domain” so that no one would own it. Paul Holmes then asked her: “Why on earth are you doing that? Why don’t you just do the straightforward thing and put the ownership of those assets with the Crown?”. I found the Prime Minister’s response on that evening very very interesting indeed. She said: “Well Paul you know that if I were to do that then from a Maori perspective they would have lost and the Crown would have won.” She made it quite clear therefore that the concept of public domain was an attempt to seek a kind of a neutral position in the hope that both the Crown and Maori who are the two partners to the treaty would be able to come to some common understanding and say: “Yes we together can go forward on this issue as a nation.”  
I say to Dover Samuels that I too grew up on the beach. I walked on the beach used the beach swam in the water took mussels from the water ate them on the beach and so forth for all of my boyhood. I frazzled my fair skin almost to obliteration in the process but I say as I think any New Zealander would that each of us desires to have full unfettered access to the beach. The bill achieves that but I do more in sorrow than in anger regret the fact that the Government lost its nerve and moved away from the concept of public domain. I thought it was a very useful concept. I think it could have contributed very positively to this debate and helped us to find a way forward.  
This is the way that I would have worded clause 2A: “The object of this Act is to provide for the guardianship”—and I use the word “guardianship” of course because that term will resonate with the concept of kaitiakitanga—“of the public seabed and foreshore in perpetuity as the common heritage of all New Zealanders for themselves and all future generations by vesting in the public domain the public foreshore and seabed and recognising as appropriate the association of whanau hapu and iwi with the areas of the public foreshore and seabed.”  
United Future really does regret that the concept of public domain was ditched so quickly after the good start the Prime Minister and the Government made in favour of going back to Crown ownership. I think it will therefore continue to be viewed by Maori as a win for the Crown and a loss for them. That is because of course for generations now Maori have regarded the word “Crown” as symbolising not the people of New Zealand but the sovereign of the United Kingdom. We see in treaty settlements for example the Crown even apologising for the confiscation of land and so forth. So that is embedded in Maori thinking and rightly and understandably so. I regret very much that the Government so quickly gave away the concept of public domain.  
My colleague Larry Baldock told me there would have been some legal difficulties. OK there might have been but the bottom line is that where there is a will there is also a way. I think that if the will had been there in the Government to stick with that concept a way could have been found to express the concept that is involved in the term “public domain”. One has only to look at say the Auckland Domain or down the road from where I grew up to the Mapua Domain to know that all New Zealanders understand that a public domain is something that all of us own that all of us have access to and that all of us enjoy egress from and travel across. It is something we can all use for recreation; to carry out our swimming our fishing our sandcastle building and all the other activities that all New Zealanders associate with the beach and with the foreshore and of course the seabed itself as we go out and fish and enjoy other activities of that kind.  
Really if that had been changed then of course all of the rest of the bill would be changed. When we read the bill now it is like a tattoo: a repetition of the word “Crown”. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS (Minister of State) 
: 
 It has been very interesting listening to the claptrap coming from the other side of the Chamber. I would have thought that Opposition members would realise that this is an important issue and they would put a bit of intellectual horsepower into it but I guess when one’s leader is in the deep freeze it is very difficult to defrost him overnight and have him take part in the debate. We have heard all the korero from the members of the National Party who are members of the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee. We have heard them all blah-blahing about not receiving the Supplementary Order Paper at the appropriate time. I just want to say that they began playing games in terms of the process of reporting back to the House. They are the architects of their own destiny yet yesterday we heard enough whingeing and whining because they did not get the Supplementary Order Paper in time. I say to them: “You play your games and that is what you get.” It is called cause and effect. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: Outrageous. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS 
: I know that Nick Smith does not understand what cause and effect is all about. He may have to go to court to find out. But anyway I just want to say that I am interested in the comments about racism that are coming from Richard Prebble and the ACT party. They have been talking about how racist this legislation is. I am reminded of the debate we had here in this House relating to Maori reserve land. ACT members opposed the legislation because they thought it was racist because the rights of Maori in their view overrode the rights of their farmer mates so they organised a hikoi of tractors down to Parliament. They did not think about racism then. They did not call the legislation racist. In fact they actually promoted it. Is it not a bit—I will not say that word because I know it is unparliamentary. But is it not speaking with forked tongue to call this piece of legislation racist? All of a sudden they suffer from some sort of amnesia about their position in terms of their performance during the debate on Maori reserve lands.  
Let me say that I am very clear on the objects of this legislation. All Maori are clear on the objects of this legislation. I say again that in all my lifetime and the lifetime of my tipuna my kaumatua my grandparents my great grandparents we lived beside the sea. Their whole being their wairua was part and parcel of the takutai moana foreshore and seabed. There has never been any recognition in law at all over that period of time of the rights of my people. I want to reiterate that time and time again because somehow somewhere there is a blockage in some people’s thoughts and interpretation of this matter.  
For the first time in the history of this nation there will be some recognition in statute. It is not all that we wanted and not all we fought for but at least at this particular time in the history of this nation this Parliament this Government will recognise the tangata whenua Maori the indigenous people of this country. It is consistent with the world view. It is consistent with international covenants that in fact the customary activities of the indigenous people of this country are recognised.  
I do not know how much more clearly it can be spelt out in terms of the objectives. The objectives quite clearly reconfirm what has already in the last 150 years been the understanding of all New Zealanders including Maori. We never saw a hikoi 20 or 30 years ago in relation to some people’s warped understanding that Maori own all the foreshore and seabed out to Hawaiki nui Rapanui and out to the Cook Islands and everywhere. Those are some of the untruths that have been permeated throughout the Maori community. 
 I say to members that if the other party—the under-party the Green Party—can deliver the foreshore and seabed into the ownership of Maoridom then its members should put their signatures on the line. They know very well that they were not able to deliver. They know very well that they cannot deliver and they know very well that the only party in this Parliament that will deliver is the Labour Party with the assistance of New Zealand First. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (ACT) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. I did not interrupt the previous speaker because I do not believe in raising points of order to break up people’s speeches but I do think we now need a consistent ruling from the Chair. Earlier a National member suggested that the Government had not told the full truth about the bill and his speech was broken up. He was required to withdraw his statement which I would have said was parliamentary but the previous speaker was allowed to say that I had given a forked-tongue speech. Everybody knows that speaking with a forked tongue is saying that a person is lying. I would have said that that was an outrageous statement and was out of order. I drew the matter to your attention Madam Chair but you did nothing. I decided that perhaps we were having another think about this matter and we would have a vigorous debate. However I would not want us to have a situation whereby people can say whatever they like while the Chair waits for members of the Committee to establish order. Left to myself I am in favour of a vigorous debate. I have to say that although I was not greatly upset by the speaker’s comments I think we need some consistent rules during the debate. When you have ruled on this Madam Chair I want to raise a different point of order. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: I thank the member for his point of order but just remind him that it was not the same as the one ruled on previously. However the member is correct. I did not quite hear the context and that is why I discussed it with the Clerk at the Table. We clarified that what Mr Prebble said about the use of the term “forked tongue” was absolutely correct. It is after the event and I know that the member would prefer that the debate was more robust but it is quite clear now we have discussed the context that the matter should be ruled on and that the member be required to withdraw his remark. I ask him to stand and withdraw the remark. 
Hon Dover Samuels 
: I withdraw and apologise. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (ACT) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. Having broken up the debate it seems to me to be an appropriate time to raise this matter which I want to do very early with the Chair. As I mentioned in my own contribution I have never seen a Government introduce what is actually a completely new bill with no explanatory note as this Government has done and then put it into urgency. I want to suggest to you and have it discussed with the other Chairpersons that the appropriate response from the chairmanship to such a ruling is to allow proper and adequate debate.  
I also draw it to your attention Madam Chairperson that on this bill there was no clause by clause analysis by the select committee. Again when I was first a member of Parliament we would have taken this bill clause by clause which would probably have taken a couple of weeks. All I am saying to you Madam Chair is that I notice that the Committee has not even managed to get past proposed new clause 2A because we do not have an explanatory note and I hope that adequate time will be given. Following the usual rules I will get one contribution on one clause—and I was actually criticised because I had not got on to talking about clause 3. I am happy to give the Committee my views on clause 3 but I can do so only if the Chair takes that into account when the inevitable closure motions come. I just raise this matter now so that you can consider it. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: I thank the member for his contribution. I assure him that this has been discussed and that there will be plenty of time for debate. 
METIRIA TUREI (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party has a number of amendments to Part 1. The first one I want to talk about proposes to omit new clauses 2A and 3 from Supplementary Order Paper 302. This legislation is racist. I know that is uncomfortable for people to hear; none the less it is the truth. If there is one thing about the whole process of the foreshore and seabed it is that the truth the facts have been continually denied and fallacies put in their place. There has been purposeful deception of the community and the public which is not the way any good Government in any circumstances can be expected to behave and proceed in a democracy.  
One of the fallacies that have been relied on by this Government and New Zealand First is set out very clearly in new clause 2A. There is a fundamental flaw in its reasoning. I will read out this clause for those who may not have had the opportunity to read it: “The object of this Act is to preserve the public foreshore and seabed in perpetuity as the common heritage of all New Zealanders in a way that enables the protection by the Crown of the public foreshore and seabed on behalf of all the people of New Zealand including”—and here is the problem—“the protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi with areas of the public foreshore and seabed.”  
The Ngati Apa Court of Appeal decision last year clearly dispelled the myth that the Crown has absolute ownership of the foreshore and seabed. There is no such thing as public foreshore and seabed—it is a myth a deception that is being used to drum up support from the public who do not have the full information about the nature of the law and of the common law rights that Maori have had before and since 1840 and that are actually still extant. They may still exist and they are due to be explored in law and rightfully so. The fallacy that the foreshore and seabed are owned by the Crown has been continually challenged by Maori for well over 100 years in all the various forums we have had available to us. We have been pursuing those interests continually—hence the Ngati Apa decision. 
Jim Evans a highly esteemed legal professor from Auckland University law school has also clearly articulated that the Crown must first acknowledge that it and the public have been operating on a false premise. Just because one thinks the foreshore and seabed are in Crown ownership does not make them in Crown ownership. Just because one wants them to be so does not make them so. One has to deal first with the actual realities and truths of the situation which is that the customary rights to the foreshore and seabed have not necessarily been extinguished. Maori customary rights may still be extant and they are entitled to be explored in law. The underlying title is still up for discussion and negotiation in the courts. Those rights may still continue to exist and all citizens of our country are entitled to explore fully their rights in the courts. Maori are citizens of this country too and they are entitled to explore the full extent of their rights in law in the courts. Yet this Government operating on the false premise on the fallacy that the customary rights to the foreshore and seabed have been extinguished are denying Maori the opportunity to go to the courts as other citizens are entitled to do to explore their full rights.  
New clause 2A makes this false presumption that there is such a thing as a public foreshore and seabed but as I have said Maori still have unexplored rights in that foreshore and seabed. Therefore it is not public. The underlying title is still in dispute. It is a deception; it is a redefinition of those areas in order to extinguish Maori rights and to confiscate those areas where the courts may find customary rights are still in existence.  
Our amendment to omit clauses 2A and 3 on the Supplementary Order Paper is an attempt to eliminate the fallacies that the Government and New Zealand First are operating on and restore some status of truth to the situation so that at least members of the public clearly understand what is going on for them. One of the other amendments we have proposed is to omit clause 3 which vests the full ownership of the foreshore and seabed to the Crown making what has been untrue to this point legally true but morally wrong—ethically wrong. It is an unnecessary clause. There is no need for Crown ownership to be vested in this full way in the bill.  
Other options have been proposed by submitters and various people since this issue has come up for discussion. Those options include allowing Maori to proceed to the courts to have their rights explored like other citizens are entitled to do. That exploration would not be confined only to the legal principles from overseas jurisdictions like Canada and Australia. In fact those explorations would occur within the treaty jurisprudence that has already been developed in this country over the last 30 or 40 years. We have a different situation here. Government members continue to argue that this bill will give Maori more than what they would get in the courts. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 After that legal dissertation I want to say that I am going to organise a lunchtime meeting between “Tariana Turei”—[ 
Interruption 
]  
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: I am sorry to interrupt the member but Mr Brownlee will not contest rulings like that. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Particularly when I am his senior. 
Metiria Turei 
: I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. I suspect that the member may have been referring to me; if so he mispronounced my name completely. I ask that he pronounce my name properly. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: It is always best to— 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Who cares! 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: No for order in the Chamber members should always be referred to by their correct name. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Madam Chairperson I have had three interruptions before I have even got going. Can I start now? 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: It is not off the member’s time. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. We have been repeatedly assured that there will be a significant amount of time for debate. The expectation is that a number of members will take more than one call on this debate. That matter has been discussed as you are aware. Can I ask whether it is correct that this is the second call from New Zealand First. I understood that Dail Jones spoke. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: To interrupt a member’s speech for that point of order when the member had already been corrected by the Clerk— 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Not on that point. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: I have already warned members this morning that when I am on my feet giving a ruling there will be silence. I now give another warning on that. I have already indicated quite clearly when ruling on Mr Prebble’s point of order—and I assure the member as I assured Mr Prebble when we discussed this—that plenty of time will be given. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: This is the first contribution from New Zealand First in this debate. We want to bring some sanity to this side of the Chamber. I am offering to organise at lunchtime today a meeting between Tariana Turia Metiria Turei of the Greens and the National Party. It is a very important meeting that I have to organise and I will tell members why. It is because the first two say that Maori are getting nothing and the National members on my right say they are getting everything. So I am going to organise this public meeting in the Beehive so that they can sort this out then come back to the Chamber this afternoon and talk some sense for the first time. I have never heard such a ridiculous debate.  
The second point I want to signal is that I want to know from Dr Cullen where his secret bill is—the covert clandestine bill that the National Party keeps addressing. We have never seen it. It may exist. It may be somewhere out there in the ether. After hearing National members talk last night and today I know that there has to be another bill. It is not this one. There has to be a secret bill somewhere else that Dr Mapp keeps addressing. He said that Maori can get all these things by private arrangement and by private deal but he never admitted that they could not get a thing under this bill in the way that he described. It is not that Maori are not going to get a fair go but he knows demonstrably because he is a law lecturer that they cannot get the things that he is talking about under this legislation. So why on earth does he keep on saying it? Why on earth do the Greens act that way? Why does Tariana Turia keep making those speeches? Why is the National Party doing the same at the other extreme? I hate to say it but I think it is about politics. I think it is about raw venal selfish politics. At a time when the country calls out for a sense of unity on an important matter all they can do is play petty shallow politics. Would they do us a favour— 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: Here’s the expert. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: The expert is Dr Nick Smith. He is a real expert. Do members remember when he was head of the Department of Conservation? He was up there taking land off Maori everywhere. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: Name one. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Rawhiti 2B. These members know full well about the prime paradise of Ngati Wai on the southern reaches of the Bay of Islands and he was going to take the whole lot off them. He said: “Look I’ll give you a deal. I’ll look after the possums and the pests but you give me the land.” That was his idea of a deal. Every fifth acre there would be worth $1 million and there are thousands of acres and he wanted to take the whole lot on behalf of the socialist State that he was then the head of. Talk about—I cannot use the word but it starts with “h”. Where did this mess start? It started with an Act passed by those geniuses after they had thrown me out of the National Party between 1991 and 1993. I remember it. I warned them about their stupidity but no they knew better. They gave Doug Graham a knighthood for it. They all signed up and said: “Yes Doug yes Doug three bags full.” Yet here they come today as some sort of Pontius Pilate saying “We come with clean hands.”  
I am glad that people are not hearing that from New Zealand First. I am glad that they are not hearing that shallowness and banality from New Zealand First. Can I ask the Committee a question? Why would a party that calls itself conservative oppose the Crown having the foreshore and seabed reposed unto it?  
Why would a party that says it believes in one law for everyone oppose this bill? 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: Because it doesn’t have one law for everyone. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: There we go. Here is the genius on law. He is so good on law that he was recently in court and he got done over like a dinner yet he still thinks he is right. The poor guy was told by his colleagues: “Dr Smith don’t say that. It’s illegal. Don’t do it.” But no he knew better. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: That’s not true. He’s making it up. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: No I am not. The member’s colleagues told me. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 This bill is racist. This bill is flawed. The tragedy is that for all those in this Chamber who claim to care about our 18000 kilometres of coastline and beaches this is a bill about politics not a bill about doing the very best for the management of our coast. I want to start by quoting from a former Labour Prime Minister whose words Margaret Wilson likes to regularly trot out. He said this: “The Labour Party opposes the approach that laws are introduced one day and passed the next.” That is what Geoffrey Palmer said. But this is even worse. The Government is introducing and passing a law on exactly the same day. These 135 pages of law were tabled only last night. It is a disgrace that the New Zealand media are not exposing the Government for that sort of abuse of this Parliament. It is an abuse because of what we see in this bill.  
Dover Samuels said earlier that it is OK for the Government to pass 135 pages of law without it ever being debated without it being tabled in the House and without it being distributed to local government and any of the groups that have a substantive interest. He says that that is somehow OK because people have opposed it. He says: “Oh National members on the select committee expressed the opposite view.” So somehow he thinks that makes it OK to abuse Parliament. The member is wrong.  
This part introduces a concept of foreshore and seabed reserves. We have never heard of them before. The concept was introduced only yesterday. I have some questions for the Minister in the chair Margaret Wilson. Can there be marine reserves over the top of areas that are foreshore and seabed reserves? Does the Minister know? I will ask Dover Samuels. I ask any member of the Labour Party to answer this question: can there be a marine reserve and a foreshore and seabed reserve in the same area? It is an important question. Can Winston Peters tell me? Nobody knows! Here we are being asked to pass legislation to create a new form of reserve— 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Of course not you fool. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Sorry? 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Of course not. You’re an idiot. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Where does it say that there cannot be a foreshore and seabed reserve where one of our 14 reserves has been created? Can the member answer this question: can there be a mataitai reserve in the same area that there is a foreshore and seabed reserve? What does Dover Samuels say? 
Hon Dover Samuels 
: We can reserve a plot just for that member. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I asked a serious question. The Minister in the chair has given lectures about unbridled power and about Parliament introducing and passing bills on the same day. That is what she said at the election. What does she do in Parliament? She has not taken a single call to explain any of the 135 pages of law that is being rammed through this Parliament under urgency. Can somebody answer me as to whether there can be an aquaculture management area in the same area in which a foreshore and seabed reserve has been created? Dail Jones says that he has been involved in this bill’s drafting. Can he answer that question? No he cannot. Can Mr Fairbrother?  
Russell Fairbrother 
: Clause 28 is your answer. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: He says it is explained in clause 28. Clause 28 does not exclude any area from being a foreshore and seabed reserve. My point is that this bill will make a diabolical mess of the management of the most precious areas of New Zealand. This is not a sensible way of managing these areas. This bill is solely political. I ask members opposite how they can sign up to this. When they were in Opposition I often heard their bleating about bills being passed under urgency—bills that had been around for weeks or months. Now we have 135 pages of law that was tabled only last night being rammed through Parliament. The Minister in the chair has the cheek to say to the deputy leader of the National Party that he might not understand it all. That is not surprising.  
MAHARA OKEROA (Labour—Te Tai Tonga) 
: 
 I have been moved to rise by the previous speaker’s statements that this bill is racist. Let me remind this House that as a Minister that member Nick Smith took an action against Wakapuaka reserve which already had an existing blue-water title that had been enshrined by the Maori Land Court a number of times and which enabled the Ngati Tama people of that area to get on with their business as the tangata whenua. Oh no! He prefers to lead a charge which I shall call racist amongst the community of Nelson against the inherent tangata whenua rights of the Ngati Tama people which were enshrined in law on the basis that they somehow exclude access to their estuary.  
This is private Maori land and the estuary has a blue-water title. The only reason that Ngati Tama—and I hope Dr Mitchell is listening to this—has put a gate across the access is to ensure that people who want to visit treat the estuary and the foreshore and seabed with respect. It is there so that people do not drive their four-wheel drive vehicles up and down unfettered and leave their rubbish around this estuary that has a blue-water title that is in the ownership of Ngati Tama ki Wakapuaka. The member wonders why under clause 2A we have included the statement “including the protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi with areas of the public foreshore and seabed.” One of the reasons that is included is that misguided influence and ministerial authority leave those tangata whenua in a difficult position. That case is still before the courts.  
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: Because your Government is appealing it. 
MAHARA OKEROA 
: So what do the people do? Because he was the Minister of Conservation. So not only he suffered but so did a certain section of tangata whenua ki Te Tau Ihu o te Waka. I am appalled that some members of the Opposition who are not supporting this bill view clause 2A as being deeply racist. I am absolutely appalled that we started the discussion this morning on that level. It demonstrates for us that there is nothing to fear about this. Maori have for many many years insisted on a right as Maori so that they can protect themselves— 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: A special right. 
MAHARA OKEROA 
: So that they can protect themselves I say to Mr Smith into the future from the misguided views and visions of people of his ilk. One submitter from Nelson came to a submission hearing we had in Christchurch. I must endorse her courage. She stayed even though her message was obviously totally unpopular given the context. She was carrying a message that was very similar to the messages we are hearing this morning about this law being deeply racist. She appended that with her experience of Wakapuaka. How can this law be deeply racist? I fail to understand that when we are discussing whether Maori—whanau hapu and iwi—can be included in clause 2A. To exclude that is racist. So what National left in its wake is a diabolical mess. 
LARRY BALDOCK (United Future) 
: 
 It is not surprising that when the Hon Nick Smith a former Minister of Conservation leaps to his feet to give his first speech in this debate the first question out of his mouth is: “What about marine reserves?”. It seems that whenever people get anywhere near the Department of Conservation they start thinking about grab grab grabbing marine reserves and more estate for the department from all around the country. So that was the first question out of his mouth. 
The answer to his question from my reading of the bill is that it would probably be up to the guardians of the new reserves to determine whether there would be marine reserves within the new reserves. I think that is a jolly good idea. A lot of New Zealanders would like to see more control over their inshore area rather than see the Department of Conservation slapping marine reserves all over the place wherever it thinks it can protect this wonderful environment. So I do not see that it is a bad thing at all that this bill gives more control back to the people of New Zealand. 
In fact that is largely what clause 2A is all about. United Future welcomes the amendment from the Deputy Prime Minister to introduce clause 2A “Object” which states: “The object of this Act is to preserve the public foreshore and seabed in perpetuity as the common heritage of all New Zealanders in a way that enables the protection by the Crown of the public foreshore and seabed on behalf of all the people of New Zealand”. We could almost have taken that statement and put it under the interpretation clause clause 4 with the heading “Public domain”. I think it is a pretty good definition of the concept of public domain that we were talking about in the very beginning. 
So United Future will be supporting this amendment because we think it goes a long way towards calming the people of New Zealand down about what is going on in this legislation and this debate. It is not just about Crown ownership as has been claimed by Winston Peters and New Zealand First. I think the definition has broadened out considerably and that is a good thing. As my colleague Gordon Copeland said earlier the idea of Crown ownership has carried with it some negative connotations. It is important for us to speak about it being for the benefit of all New Zealanders—the common heritage of all New Zealanders. Those are very good words. 
The amendment further provides that the object of the bill is to protect or preserve the foreshore and seabed in perpetuity which is why I have tabled this morning an amendment to entrench clause 12(2)(a) when we come to debate Part 2 later on so that this Parliament does all we can to make sure that it is very difficult for any future Parliament to sell off or transfer the title of the foreshore and seabed to anybody else. It will be held in perpetuity as the common heritage of all New Zealanders. I think that will be a very very good thing. I will be asking all the parties in the Committee to support that Supplementary Order Paper when we vote on Part 2 later on. 
Clause 2A also includes the concept that the Crown is to protect the public foreshore. Crown ownership is for the protection of the public foreshore on behalf of all New Zealanders. I think it is time to begin to discuss that in our debate. There is not enough going on to protect the foreshore and seabed in New Zealand. We are prepared to march to Wellington about the ownership of it but the crucial issue is what is going on there. Pollution is still occurring. Siltation is still occurring from run-off from the land. There is pollution in all sorts of forms. Raw sewage is still going into our sea and siltation occurs every year in the construction season. We create siltation ponds that are not adequately monitored then when we get a bit of extra rain one summer—as happened this year—the entire Tauranga harbour turns brown because suddenly a huge amount of clay goes into it and destroys that pristine foreshore that we all like to walk on and enjoy. Instead of having sand to walk on we have mudflats all over the place. It is a disgrace. 
Instead of having such a huge fight about the title and the ownership we should be having a big debate about doing more to protect these areas. Our regional councils are not monitoring those issues and are not imposing fines on the people who are polluters of the foreshore and seabed area. I hope that when the bill finally becomes law the Crown will take up its responsibility to do a lot more about protection. Protection is not just about imposing marine reserves because there is no point in having marine reserves for the protection of our seabed and marine environment if we have pollution flowing off the land. It is even coming out of the Department of Conservation estate and nothing is being done about it. 
DAIL JONES (NZ First) 
: 
 I have sought a call although it seems almost superfluous for me to speak in this debate my having been mentioned so many times in despatches by members all around the Chamber! It has been a great honour to take part in the work on this legislation to ensure the protection of the national interest and to have the foreshore and seabed in the ownership of all New Zealanders. New Zealand First is prepared to show leadership in this matter among the Opposition and that is embodied in no better form than that of our leader the Rt Hon Winston Peters. 
I particularly wanted to follow on from Larry Baldock because of what he said. He referred to the discussions in the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee on effectively clause 2A. We in the committee said—and I am sure that Dr Mapp will remember—that we wanted a clause in the bill that would state something along the lines of what is in clause 2A: “The object of this Act is to preserve the public foreshore and seabed in perpetuity as the common heritage of all New Zealanders …”. That was a point we wanted to emphasise. We asked the officials whether they could put something together to reflect that view as that was what the members of the select committee wanted. When clause 2A came forward I could see exactly what the officials were getting at. It reflects the views and wishes of the select committee as a whole—including at that time the National Party members on it. But of course National members are always ready to oppose anything even if they might have supported the concept of common heritage and of having something extra in the purpose clause which is what clause 2A achieves. 
Many people might be interested in what the bill actually says. I know that various Kawau Island groups including the Kawau Island ratepayers were concerned—as were others—about for example the definition of “foreshore and seabed”. They may not be able to get a copy of the amended bill immediately but I tell them that we have made an alteration to the meaning of foreshore and seabed. It now: “(a) means the marine area that is bounded—(i) on the landward side by the line of mean high water springs;”. That is the meaning that is now in the bill. We have removed the reference to “high water line at mean high water spring tides”. As I understand it some people were concerned that the previous definition effectively took it too far. We now have a more reasonable definition of what the high-water mark is and what the marine area is on the landward side. On the landward side it will be bounded by the line of mean high-water springs. People who are interested in the bill should perhaps take more note of that. [ 
Interruption 
] 
Mr Mapp keeps chirping away. I was disappointed that he tried to make a personal reflection on me when he spoke. That was quite unusual for him. He had become quite excited by this legislation and I regret that I had to raise a point of order on him about it. Obviously he is concerned that he has been totally unsuccessful on behalf of the people of the North Shore. I can tell him that I am trying to do something about that matter with the Minister now and there might be some improvement in that area before the day is out. The North Shore City Council did not get hold of New Zealand First to deal with that particular issue but I think it has realised its mistake and now we are trying to do something about it. We will see what might happen later on and whether we can achieve something in the meantime. 
There are various new definitions in the bill such as “guardians” and “kaitiakitanga”. [ 
Interruption 
] I thank members; I admit to being an absolute novice but I am prepared to learn even if Georgina te Heuheu’s National Party members are not prepared to learn about Maori matters. That is why they have dismissed her from the National Party altogether. I as a member of New Zealand First a recent immigrant am prepared to learn about Maori things even if— 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: What does it mean? 
DAIL JONES 
: It means guardianship. Mr Shirley does not know what it means so I will help him. The use of that word is extremely important because time and time again Maori submitters to the select committee said they wanted to retain guardianship. It really impressed me and that is why New Zealand First has made sure that any foreshore and seabed reserve is protected by guardians. It is so much common sense really. It is good to see that New Zealand First has been able to achieve that in the legislation. Simply put this bill protects—[ 
Interruption 
] I have to put it simply for some members of the National Party whom I am always willing to help on this legislation—as I did when it was first introduced. 
MITA RIRINUI (Labour—Waiariki) 
: 
 I start by saying that probably the best proposal put to the Committee this morning was the proposition by the Rt Hon Winston Peters that he convene a meeting at lunchtime today of the Opposition parties for their benefit so that they can get their lines right—for that simple reason. 
Most of them oppose this bill but for different reasons. National Party members have described this bill as racist. At the same time its members on the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee supported Crown ownership. They also acknowledged that Maori had customary rights over the foreshore and seabed. If National members did not have that view they would never have passed Tainui’s settlement Act and the Ngai Tahu Claims Settlement Act. Both those Acts refer to the customary rights of those iwi. National Party members also support the concept of public access being protected. Given all of that and given that they still oppose this bill one wonders how they determine their position. 
I shall also comment on the contribution made by the Hon Richard Prebble earlier today. He referred to the object of the bill as being racist. He read out that clause and he seemed to have an issue with that two-part statement. The first part of it acknowledges the common heritage of all New Zealanders and the second part acknowledges the association of whanau hapu and iwi with the foreshore and seabed. Which part of that does he consider racist? Is he suggesting that we take out the first part—the common heritage of all New Zealanders? He did not make that very clear. He did not understand the second part which I find very interesting given that he belongs to a party that acknowledges property rights. Really this matter is about Maori property rights and that is reflected throughout this bill. 
I also want to touch on a matter raised by the United Future speaker Gordon Copeland. Obviously like the Rt Hon Winston Peters the Hon Dover Samuels myself and many other people in this House he has a strong association with the foreshore. Many of us experienced an upbringing in which we enjoyed the leisure time we spent at the beach. Mr Copeland believes that this bill will stop him from doing all those kinds of things that he has done in his life. That is absolute rubbish. He needs to go back to the bill and read it very very carefully. He will find that nothing will change following its enactment. 
I have tried to get a fix on the Greens’ position. I am afraid I am still trying. It seems they share the view of ACT that the bill is racist but ACT believes that any acknowledgment of Maori customary rights is racist because they are rights peculiar to Maori. What is racist about that? Those members also believe that the bill threatens the rights of access of the general public. That is also not true. It is stated quite clearly in the purpose clause of the bill that public access is guaranteed. Throughout the select committee hearings process all the Maori submitters made it very clear that it was not their intention at any time to inhibit public access to the foreshore and seabed. 
Dr Wayne Mapp 
: Actually that is not true. Margaret Mutu said she should deny access. 
MITA RIRINUI 
: I think Mr Mapp is doing Margaret Mutu a disservice. Although she has some very strong views about the bill one thing she was adamant about was that there was not a threat to public access. Mr Mapp needs to get his statements correct. I recall his misquoting a number of the submitters who came to the select committee and suggesting that they were threatening the rights of all New Zealanders when in fact all that they were doing was spelling out their rights very clearly to the select committee. Those rights have been taken into consideration. If we had been given the opportunity to report back in the way that we would have liked with amendments to the bill those points would have been made very clear in the report. But we were denied that opportunity and here we are with a very very lengthy Supplementary Order Paper. 
A lot of attention was given throughout the hearings process to Maori development rights. Like many iwi around the country my people Mataatua and Te Arawa have very very strong links with the foreshore and seabed. We have always been very active in the fishing industry—although this bill is not about fishing or mahinga mataitai; it is in fact about other areas of customary rights. In particular my people Ngati Whakaue have an ancestral connection for want of better words to a particular area on our coast. We have used that area in the past for commercial gain for the benefit of our people. 
Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU (National) 
: 
 That member’s days as the electorate MP for Waiariki are numbered. However it was good to see him on his feet. I am pleased to rise in the debate on Part 1. I want to make some comments about other comments that have been made by members particularly members from the Government side of the Chamber. Dover Samuels showed the arrogance of a Labour Government member when he commented about the Opposition “blah-blahing” on about the late introduction of a significant Supplementary Order Paper. It does not matter whether we got Supplementary Order Paper 302 in the name of the Hon Dr Michael Cullen only yesterday; it matters to the New Zealand public that that Supplementary Order Paper was not open for scrutiny by people outside this House. The only reason we are here is to represent the interests of people outside this House so we need to get it right.  
Dr Cullen had a bit of fun directed at the National Party when he talked about a brown face on the Opposition side of the House having a part in drafting this law. He and the Maori members on the Government side should get with the plot. It is a brown face that will ensure this legislation passes into law—and no credit goes to that person. 
Hon Dover Samuels 
: Where is the brown face in the National Party? 
Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU 
: The brown face I refer to does not sit on the Government side of the House. So no matter how much the Labour Maori MPs puff out their chests and pretend that this is their bill and that they have delivered a lot for Maori it is not a brown face over there on the Government benches that has done that. In fact it is Mr Peters. If Government members look in the mirror they will see his image staring back at them. But of course it is no credit to Mr Peters that he has supported this bill. If this bill is good for Maori why is it that Tariana Turia walked and why is it that Nanaia Mahuta is still hedging her bets? She voted against the bill in the first reading and she is still hedging her bets. So Government members should not puff up their chests and say this legislation is great for Maori. In fact they should not even puff up their chests and say it is great for all New Zealanders because there are uncertainties in it and that is where the rub comes.  
Dr Cullen also wrongly stated that I have said that Maori are not getting enough. That is not a statement of mine. What I have commented on is that Maori are not getting the thing they wanted the most which is due process of law and the right of all New Zealanders to go to the courts—and that comes from a Government that for all but 3 of the last 70 years has enjoyed the overwhelming support of Maori excluding me of course. I am as keen as anyone to ensure that the rights of all New Zealanders to our foreshore and seabed are protected. Of course balances have to be found. That is where we come to the object clause clause 2A which on the face of it sounds good. It states the object is: “to preserve the public foreshore and seabed in perpetuity as the common heritage of all New Zealanders in a way that enables the protection by the Crown of the public foreshore and seabed on behalf of all the people of New Zealand including the protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi with areas of the public foreshore and seabed.”  
On the face of it that it sounds good but when we look into the detail of the bill we see that uncertainties remain. If the Minister in the chair will not clarify some of those uncertainties then perhaps Winston Peters who is actually the main person who is getting this bill through Parliament should be sitting in the chair. The uncertainties are issues like these. When Maori go and get their customary territorial rights what rights will they actually get? When the Labour Government says to New Zealanders that their rights of public access will be protected how will those rights be balanced on the ground? How will they be balanced on the ground when Maori have certain customary rights that will be defined and then the Government also says public access will be guaranteed? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 Whatever Ngati Wai had 2 years ago they have got today and they will still have it this Friday when the Foreshore and Seabed Bill is passed. But does anybody remember the surplus land at Paraparaumu Airport which was taken from the Maori people and then sold under a National Government? Did that Government offer the land back to the Maori people who had a legal right of first option? No. What did the Government do? It sold the land for a pittance to one of its mates denying the Maori people everything in that case. [ 
Interruption 
] The member asks what that has to do with the bill. What it has to do with the bill is that National members should not come and tell us about the National Party’s tutelage in so far as the Maori people are concerned. What has happened up north? All the Poor Knights Islands reserve was taken by a National Government off the Maori people. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: Good reserve. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: The member says it is a good reserve. Right now promoted by him as well is a proposal for 16 times that area at Mimiwhangata—and he would defend that. That area which belongs to the Maori people there in terms of ancestral use he would walk all over. But all of a sudden the Maori people are meant to find some sanctuary in the National Party!  
 I remember that in 1993 and this is very apposite to the bill at 11.30 one day—I was not in the National Party caucus then but I remember the circumstances very well—in came Bill Birch and Jim Bolger and they were going to give the Maori wardens in the tribal zones the right of arrest. There was no notice given of that to any other party or even to the National Party. They were going to hijack the whole organisation. Now somebody here in the Chamber must remember that. Oh the National members are very quiet now. So what happened? That night on the  
Holmes  
show at 7 o’clock one National Party guy blew the whole thing wide open. And on the show later that night Jim Bolger came on and said the proposal had been dropped. That is the National Party. Those members rant and rave about Maori getting everything when their whole background is to have done things for Maori that Maori should not have done for them and not to do things for Maori that they should have done for them.  
I can recall National winding up with $92 million of debt on Maori kiwifruit orchards and when I said I would sue that Government for a failure to exercise a duty of care the National members ran around the gallery saying that I favoured Maoris. I had a whole lot of legal opinions and I said to Ruth Richardson we would sue that Government for the appalling way it had built that debt up over Maori kiwifruit farms. Did the National members say I was right? Oh no! Did they say that the legal opinion I had was irrefutable? Oh no! They just went around and tried to bag me.  
Hon Member 
: What’s that got to do with the bill? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: What it has to do with the bill is this. The National members have never understood this bill. They have never understood the select committee process. They have never understood the fundamentals that they claim to preach—one law and Crown ownership. Oh yes—and here is the rub. They get up talk about clause 2A and want to know why whanau hapu and iwi appear in that object clause. Well that is obvious. It is because Maori have a different perspective from the rest of the country and it differs iwi by iwi.  
Hon Member 
: It’s not obvious at all. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: That is obvious to anybody who understands Maori. But then again if one goes to Orewa and makes a speech in which one says that Maori have no culture at all then one will make the kind of fallacious mistake that those members keep on making.  
Clause 2A is in the bill because there are some people in this world who recognise that cultures are different in the way that they see things. People from different cultures can operate under the same law but the standards by which they may approach a problem or an issue could be in terms of their perspective different. It is as simple as that. So why is the ACT party doing a triple somersault and a side twist and trying to land on its feet? I heard Mr Prebble. He made much of that clause this morning did he not as if it was something incomprehensible that he could not understand. That is what he said—he said that no court would understand it. Well I tell members something. One could leave out the words “including the protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi” but if one adds them in it just demonstrates that one may understand that different people see things in different ways.  
However whilst I am at it I will talk to the Maori Party and ask how many of its leadership have sold Maori land? What is the record on the sale of Maori land by the leadership of the Maori Party? Can that party say like I can that it has never sold an inch ever? The Maori Party should not come here with a whole lot of people and preach about the Maori people and their heritage when its background is ridden with people who have sold Maori land and worse still the people in its leadership have never been off the State’s teat since they left school. They have never been privately employed; they have been on the State’s teat since they left school. [ 
Interruption 
] 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich) 
: I warn Mr Samuels for the last time. 
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. That is his third warning. I just want to know what the process is. We notice that Mr Peters has had two calls New Zealand First has had I think four— 
Opposition Members 
: Three! 
GERRY BROWNLEE 
: I am sorry; I thought that that party had had more than that. I thought that party had more competent members. With no disrespect intended to Mr Prebble I notice that he is now getting a second call. A number of our members want to make contributions on this part. After all unlike the ACT party we do represent constituencies and have a direct association with voters. Further I would like to say that I intend to take a second call. I would like to have an assurance that the Committee as we approach the second hour of debate on this particular part will not suddenly be bombarded by requests for closure motions. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich) 
: Thank you for raising that issue. I am quite conscious of it. All parties will have their opportunity to take part. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (ACT) 
: 
 Let me make it quite clear to Gerry Brownlee that as a list member I represent constituents—every New Zealander both Maori and non-Maori—and I intend speaking in that way. 
I have to say to Mr Peters that his last contribution really sounded like that of an old man going back and talking about his past grievances. He is stuck in history telling us all about what happened to him in the National Party caucus. He lost. He should get over it and start again. He was booted out and he should move on. 
Let me take up the matter that Mr Peters raised with the Committee: how can people say this bill is racist and how can people say that Maori have lost everything and they have gained everything? I will take him through that. 
Let me first explain why the bill is racist because Mr Peters’ claim that Maori will next week have everything they had last week is simply not true.  
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: It is. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE 
: In this bill I say to Mr Peters no non-Maori lose any freehold right that they have over the foreshore; no non-Maori lose that. But the Court of Appeal said there may well be iwi in New Zealand who actually do own freehold foreshore. They lose that. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: No they don’t. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE 
: Yes they do. Under this bill Maori—and Maori alone—lose that title which they now have. The court does not create it; it just recognises it. The court does not create it; it says: “No Maori own it.” That is why the bill is racist—because only Maori lose that property right under the bill.  
Hon Member 
: Tell that to the people of Matauri Bay. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE 
: Thank you very much. The next point that I want to make is why people can say that Maori gain enormously under the bill. One has to look to Supplementary Order Paper 303 which came in so late that it is not even in the redline copy. It says that the actual title of the bill will be changed; part of the legislation will be called the Resource Management (Foreshore and Seabed) Amendment Act. Why is that? Because when we look through the bill we discover that under the Resource Management Act a whole lot of new rights have been created for Maori—and only for Maori. They are not for anyone else; they are only for Maori. Yes there will be some Maori who do well. If I might use Mr Peters’ own colourful phrase when criticising the Treaty of Waitangi fisheries settlement—he said that no ordinary Maori had seen a snapper which was true—under this Resource Management (Foreshore and Seabed) Amendment Bill no ordinary Maori will get a pipi but the “Browntable” to use another of his colourful phrases will do well under it. For the people who have made a fortune out of the grievance industry this bill is a new gold mine. The lawyers the accountants and the white-shoe brigade will do well. 
That is why there is the irony that Maori lose under this bill; they alone lose their property rights. That is why the bill is deeply racist and a disgrace to this Parliament. How on earth can we be starting this century with racist legislation that removes property rights but only from one race in this nation? That is a disgrace! I cannot understand how the great Labour Government could possibly be introducing such a bill. 
Then it goes and introduces something that my friend Mr Shirley calls socialism and that is what it is. There is a new saying of socialists: one does not have to actually own it—just regulate it.  
Hon Ken Shirley 
: Control it. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE 
: This bill does hand over control but not to all Maori—only to those Maori whose activities we have already seen on the Treaty of Waitangi settlements on the Treaty of Waitangi gravy train. The gravy train has just been turned into an express by this bill. This bill will cause legal uncertainty and there will be case after case. This bill actually solves nothing; it makes things far worse. 
Hon MARGARET WILSON (Attorney-General) 
: 
 I rise to make a clarification in the light of the previous member’s presentation of the bill as being racist on the grounds that no non-Maori loses private property rights. It is true that no Maori or non-Maori who has private property rights loses them under the bill so it is not discriminatory in that sense.  
Hon Richard Prebble 
: Rubbish! 
Hon MARGARET WILSON 
: If the member would just bear with me for one second so that we can go through—as he has been kind enough to raise it—what the Court of Appeal actually said and what it was deciding. The Court of Appeal was deciding whether there should be a process for determination by the Maori Land Court of a common law customary title. At common law those titles are not alienable; they are not fee simple titles. It is true however that the only jurisdiction that the Maori Land Court has is under the Te Ture Whenua Maori Act which does provide for fee simple title but not for a customary common law title. Therein lay the dilemma because when that Act was enacted there was no intention that it should cover wetland—only dry land. 
Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay Of Plenty) 
: 
 I would like to speak to the various purposes of this bill and just observe that there are many many contradictions confusions and conundrums in this bill which will be causing never-ending problems for Parliament in the years to come. 
The issue with the legislation is this: the problems will not be seen next week they will not be seen before Christmas and they will not be seen next year; but 2 or 3 years later the problems caused by this legislation will be seen at Mount Maunganui Papamoa Maketu and throughout the rest of this country. New Zealanders will ask why Winston Peters travelled up and down the country telling the people of New Zealand that this legislation was OK. Government members must be laughing all the way back to their offices. They have brought in this legislation and Winston Peters is going to sell it for them. He is going to lose whatever shreds of credibility he has left when he has to go around New Zealand defending this legislation. He is the man the Government is looking to to sell this legislation.  
Marc Alexander 
: The poodle. 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: No Winston Peters could never be described as a poodle. This bill will haunt Parliament in generations to come. Only a few of us in this Chamber will still be here when Parliament has to wipe this legislation and start again. This legislation is going to be a weeping sore in this country in generations to come because it lays nothing but confusion and division before the people of this country. 
This Government cannot answer basic questions like this: if we can have a foreshore and seabed reserve and a marine reserve and an aquamarine management area and a mataitai and a taiapure how do they all fit with each other? If we have a foreshore and seabed reserve can we also have a marine reserve? Mr Peters said that we cannot. The officials say that we can. That tells us we will have no end of confusion over who runs these things. It is fine for a few city members to come down to the Chamber and argue why we should have this divisive legislation but for those of us who represent coastal New Zealand who are at the forefront of where the conflicts will be I want to tell this Government that this bill is a recipe for disaster and division. And the problems will not be seen in the next couple of years. It is in the next few years that people will see them. It is in 2 3 or 4 years’ time that the conflicts and the division will come forward. 
They will come forward for this reason: when people are given rights to exercise control they will eventually want to exercise those rights. It may not happen tomorrow but it will happen. What that will mean is that regardless—[ 
Interruption 
] Government members may laugh but I say to Mr Fairbrother that he will not be here when Parliament has to deal with the mess that this Government and the New Zealand First Party are leaving this country. Mr Peters is being used by this Government to try to sell to this country what is a divisive and ineffective policy. If Mr Peters has read this bill as well as he read his Cabinet papers then I am worried.  
NANDOR TANCZOS (Green) 
: 
 I am ashamed to be witnessing what is happening in this Parliament today. What we are seeing is a new raupatu—a new confiscation—in this Parliament in the year 2004. Government members can argue about it trying to convince themselves and the rest of the country that that is not what is going on but this bill is nothing other than a confiscation of Maori property rights. I find it curious that at a time when we are spending hundreds of millions of dollars trying to patch up injustices from the past trying to address ongoing suffering and grievance arising from confiscations of the past we are about to perpetuate the same thing in Parliament today. I am ashamed to see that. 
I do not doubt that there are members on the Government side who also feel shame at what is going on. I find it curious when I hear intelligent members of the Government talking about this measure—people like John Tamihere who has fronted the Government campaign on this issue—and saying it is not taking away rights from Maori. I fail to understand how the member can say that. I heard Russell Fairbrother who chaired the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee talking about his mokopuna last night and I challenge him to think about the legacy he is leaving for his descendants when it comes to this bill—the legacy that he and this Government are leaving. 
I know that this bill is passing with the support of New Zealand First. I do not doubt that some New Zealand First members also feel ashamed of what is happening today although we would not know it because most of them clearly are not allowed to speak on this bill and are leaving it to only Winston Peters and Dail Jones to do so. I debated on  
Marae 
 with Winston Peters on this very issue and I challenged his position on this— 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Where? 
NANDOR TANCZOS 
: On the  
Marae 
 programme. Maybe Mr Peters does not remember but if he checks the video he will see it there.  
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Which one? 
NANDOR TANCZOS 
: He tried to deny it on Maori television but his own website showed that the New Zealand First position was to confiscate not only foreshore and seabed but waterways mountains and forests as well. Of course he tried to deny it on Maori television but his own website showed it. 
It is telling that New Zealand First put Dail Jones in charge of negotiating this issue. Dail Jones is a man who follows the Justice Prendergast interpretation of the treaty. He believes that the treaty is a nullity. How could New Zealand First put him in charge of negotiating the New Zealand First position on this bill? 
The Government has ended up relying on New Zealand First because it has got itself in a very difficult position with its knee-jerk overreaction to the finding of the Court of Appeal. It is true as Dover Samuels has said that there has been a lot of misinformation about what the Court of Appeal said. It did not say that Maori own all the foreshore and seabed but that does not take away from the power of what it actually did say. What it said was that the Government the Crown in general did not own the foreshore and seabed and that Maori could go to court to prove their customary ownership. The Court of Appeal stated that that would be difficult to prove and it implied that there would not be many places in the country that would be affected but it recognised that Maori had that right. But the Government for its political advantage chose to rark up Pakeha fear about Maori closing off access to the beaches. It knew that was wrong and false but it chose to do it for political advantage. 
The really interesting thing is that since the introduction of the bill I have come across at least one example of a Maori landowner who previously from goodwill had been totally happy to allow general access to the beach that that person’s land adjoined but who is now closing it off because of anger and disgust at what the Government is doing with this bill. That is a shame on the House and it shows that the Government is setting back relationships between Maori and Pakeha and other New Zealanders considerably by the passage of the bill. 
It is not about going to the beach or access for a beach barbecue. The areas that those kinds of things are concerned with are very unlikely to be covered by court recognition of customary ownership because of the conditions of exclusive and uninterrupted use. It is not about Maori denying Pakeha access to the beach for a barbecue; it is about the fact that the Government does not want Maori to have control. This bill is about putting control back into the hands of local councils. The Government does not want Maori to have real power in relation to these issues particularly when it comes to commercial activity. It especially does not want Maori to have any kind of veto right because it knows that one of the strongest voices for environmental protection is tangata whenua. 
JOHN TAMIHERE (Labour—Tamaki Makaurau) 
: 
 I have listened with interest to a number of contributions in the Committee today. The difficulty that a number of members have in getting their minds round this legislation comes from their inability to understand the key cultural drivers behind Maori thinking so I want to express those in regard to their application to Part 1. 
At no time have Maori ever wanted ownership in the sense of freehold title fee simple title. When we talk about rangatiratanga kaiwhakahaeretanga and matters of kaitiakitanga and the like we do not talk about the type of fee simple freehold title system that has been implemented under this and a whole range of Governments. We do not talk of that. At no time have our people ever wanted the level of ownership expressed here. This legislation acknowledges and recognises that. It recognises the fact that we are stewards and guardians. It recognises the fact that those rights have been tuku to us from our ancestors. It recognises the fact that in no circumstances should we be able to alienate those and lose our customary heritage that has been handed to us. 
We were faced with the challenge of having to encapsulate our cultural requirements for the very first time in a piece of legislation. I say to the Committee that I commend the legislation to it because it is the first attempt at writing that manual—in actually evidencing Maori customary rights. It is the first attempt on this scale ever conducted by a Parliament in this country. We are doing the best we possibly can in that regard. 
The next point is about the way in which the law must work. Much ado has been made about the legislation being racist. It is not racist legislation on the basis of—solely—the law. One cannot rock up to Parliament as the Hon Ken Shirley or Gerry Brownlee have said and say that this legislation is racist because it deals only with Maori. It is legislation that deals with Maori because Maori solely have the rights. If we take away those rights and walk across them we destroy the whole constitution. We would not have law; we would not have order. There is a difference between law order and justice and Maori have the right of equality of opportunity before the law under article 3 of the Treaty of Waitangi. Maori have a right to good governance under article 1 of the treaty. Maori have a right to the retention of our cultural processes as endorsed and encompassed within this legislation under article 2 of the treaty. So for the very first time in this country we are starting to see the merging and the converging of our great Waitangi Tribunal jurisprudence on the one hand and our constitutional bedrock on the other based on the common law. We walk across those at our own peril. 
The Opposition does that. Opposition members confuse this very simple process and in trying to confuse it are confusing the rights that Maori have—which are different rights just as the Fens people in Great Britain and a whole range of other indigenous folk have different rights—which are bonded in our constitution of the common law. The fact that Maori have those rights in a larger sense of the word is just a fact of history. It is a fact of the settlement and it is a fact of the law. We either uphold the law in this country or we do not. The foreshore and the seabed—[ 
Interruption 
] It is a quote from hell I tell the member; the stench on him will be pungent in the next few months I can assure him—particularly from the allegations he has made. I move to more important matters on the foreshore and seabed. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I am not sure whether you were listening to that tract of the former Minister’s speech but I believe that what he actually did was issue a threat across the Chamber which is quite unparliamentary and he should be required to either explain himself or withdraw and apologise. 
Darren Hughes 
: I did not take that inference from what the member for Tamaki Makaurau said at all. He talked about the future in the same way the Hon Tony Ryall talked in his address about the future political fortunes of people in this House. Mr Tamihere was doing the same. There is a lot of sensitivity on the other side of the Chamber. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: There should be recognition that when a member makes those sorts of comments there is clearly a sinister aspect behind them. I am sorry but there is. It does not matter how much the gender-confused Labour junior whip wants to titter away there; that remains a fact. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich) 
: The member should stick to the point of order. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I think Mr Tamihere should be required to explain himself or to withdraw. He will not apologise—that would be too much to expect of him—but perhaps he could at least withdraw the remark. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich) 
: I thank the member for all the options he offered me. I heard what Mr Tamihere said. He moved on very quickly from it but if you object to it I ask Mr Tamihere to withdraw only. 
JOHN TAMIHERE 
: I withdraw. I bring the Committee’s attention back to new clause 2A “Object”. More particularly I indicate that the Government has actually affirmed the “protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi with areas of the public foreshore and seabed.” which is to be cemented into the object of the bill. Secondly as a reinforcement of that new clause 3(b) provides for the “recognition and protection of ongoing customary rights to undertake or engage in activities uses or practices in areas of the public foreshore and seabed;”. 
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 The previous speaker made a great plea on behalf of Maori for their rights to be recognised. We teased a lot of those issues out with Mr McHugh who is recognised as an expert on those matters.  
Tariana Turia 
: Is he a Maori expert? 
GERRY BROWNLEE 
: There was an interjection there that was worth recording but I did not hear it. Mr McHugh claims to be an expert on those matters. He was brought before the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee to give us the benefit of his expertise and one of the most interesting things I think that we got out of him in the 3-odd hours that we listened to his interesting view on how those things are constructed within the law was the acceptance that anything to do with a customary law title is understood by us only in the context of the British common law.  
One of the things that fascinates me about all of this is that if Maori have those rights and claim them why do they need to have them affirmed in the law in this way if in fact there is not some intention to constrain those rights? That is the contradiction in the Labour Party’s argument. Maori member after Maori member stands up and says what a great thing they have done for their people. Well that is just not right.  
On the other side of it is my strong objection that as somebody who is from the fifth generation of his family in this country I continue to be told that I will never be the same in this country as someone who is Maori. So I ask myself what the purpose is of this particular bill. It does not satisfy Maori it does not satisfy the people I represent and it does not show much direction for the future. Mr Prebble is absolutely right when he says that in new clause 2A as soon as the qualification is expressed that is put in there in the words “including the protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi with areas of the public foreshore and seabed.” it separates out— 
Russell Fairbrother 
: It is inclusive. 
GERRY BROWNLEE 
: It would be inclusive if that sentence stopped at the words “the common heritage of all New Zealanders”. That would be the end of it.  
A whole lot of questions are raised in this newly renamed bill and they will not get the sort of scrutiny or public attention that they deserve. For example if we get very practical some of them would be the questions that the Hon Dr Nick Smith asked. How can we create new reserves inside reserves and over areas where other arrangements are in place? What will be the relationship between the Minister of Fisheries the Minister of Conservation and the Minister of Maori Affairs under the new arrangements? The beneficial owner—if one likes the nominal owner—of the foreshore and seabed under this bill will be the Hon Chris Carter. What will happen when it comes to fisheries legislation or regulation? Will he negotiate with Parekura Horomia or will he negotiate with the Minister of Fisheries the Hon David Benson-Pope? 
Russell Fairbrother 
: What’s this got to do with it? 
GERRY BROWNLEE 
: That is exactly the sort of confusion that has been put in this bill—there is total confusion in the bill. I do not think anybody on the Government benches has worked out at this stage how difficult it will be to achieve the reserves for Maori. That will be very difficult. That is why we know that there is a clause in the first part that talks about the requirement when a reserve is not able to be put in place that the Government must then engage in looking for redress. That means getting out the chequebook. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS (Minister of State) 
: 
 Once again I say this is certainly an interesting debate. It is interesting to hear the deputy leader of the National Party say very clearly to the people of this nation why the National Party does not support this bill. Now we are getting to the nitty-gritty. All the rain-dancing around the bill is peripheral to the real crux of the matter. Now we have a bit of horsepower in terms of the bill when National asks why it should support the bill and why it should have to recognise Maori customary right. Therein lies the issue. Why do we have to recognise Maori customary right? I want to repeat again— 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Mr Chairperson. I seek leave of the Committee to repeat my speech because quite clearly Dover Samuels was not listening to it. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich) 
: Leave has been sought for that course of action. Is there any objection? There is objection. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS 
: I just want to repeat again what my experience and the experience of my people has been. The fact is that over years and years—over generations—the customary rights of my people have never been recognised in the law. It is as simple as that.  
It is absurd to suggest that Maori customary right does not need to recognised. To those people who say that when they get back into power they will repeal this legislation I say God help the nation if they ever do. I tell those people that legislation will not repeal what is inherently that of Maori the indigenous people of this nation. Maori are entitled to have their customary rights recognised and this legislation spells that out very clearly. Let me say very clearly to the Opposition members that I have had no access and neither have the generations of my forebears to actually even go to the court to have our customary rights recognised. This bill provides access for our people not only to obtain a customary right order but to go to the High Court and get recognition of a territorial customary right—in fact an aboriginal title. That is unprecedented in the history of this nation.  
I say again to the people of this country both Maori and Pakeha that my mokopuna and their mokopuna will stand side by side on the foreshore of this nation—our mokupuna both Maori and Pakeha—and look towards the future. Under this legislation future generations of our people will stand side by side proud to be New Zealanders. They will recognise their different origins but will be proud to stand together on the beach. I say “Merry Christmas” to the people of this nation; it is not too far away. Maori and Pakeha will be able to go down to the beach and nothing will be changed. They will be able to have their barbecues. Even Gerry Brownlee will be able to go down there with his bikini and try to get a suntan. Even the deputy leader of the National Party will be able to put on his swimming togs go down to the beach put a bit of slip-slop on—a bit of oil—and try to turn the same colour as my colleague Parekura Horomia. Nothing will change but God help them if they have any observers.  
I am here to tell the truth not to tell a bunch of lies. New Zealanders will be able to go down to the beach and do the things that they have always done. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: Not true. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS 
: Who is the apparition who made a comment? I cannot understand who he is. Maori will be able to go down to the beach and I repeat pick their pipis dive for their tuatuas go to their favourite rock go snapper fishing and do all the things that they have been doing in the past. The members who have got up and said that people will not be able to do so are a bunch of liars. They have not told the truth outside this Parliament because this bill does not change anything except by recognising the rights of our people. I come back and say again that I have heard claptrap from the parties on the Opposition side of the Chamber. I can understand the Green members talking like that. They are hallucinating; they cannot help it. They smoke too much psychedelic puha so I can understand that. 
Metiria Turei 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I take personal offence to the description of the Green members as hallucinating. I ask the member to withdraw and apologise. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I heard that ruling this morning. The member will withdraw and apologise. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS 
: I withdraw and apologise. I am just trying to make the point that groups of people out there spin untruths to our people. I appreciate what the Rt Hon Winston Peters said. That is politics but sometimes one actually has to tell the truth. I go out there and tell the truth. 
SHANE ARDERN (National—Taranaki-King Country) 
: 
 I have been seeking this call since about 10 past 9 so I intend to use my 5 minutes very wisely. At the outset when MMP was introduced I could see only one good thing about it which was that for the first time it brought to this Parliament about the right number of Maori in terms of the population represented. I think that is very good and it should be upheld. That is the only good thing I can see about MMP and here are the bad things. 
 Today the Government aided and abetted by New Zealand First is passing legislation that has tried to please all the people. There is an old cliché that goes: “You can please some of the people some of the time but you can’t please all the people all the time.” This socialist Government has done that helped by New Zealand First—which I hasten to add brought more Maori members into Parliament than the Labour Party did. Labour has had a proud history of association with the Maori people through the Ratana Church. That proud record was broken by the New Zealand First members who swept it to one side.  
Today New Zealand First is aiding and abetting a socialist Government to pass legislation that is divisive. This legislation will bring about only divisive outcomes. There is no other way of looking at it. The Maori members over there on the Government benches have made some fine contributions to the debate but they are muddled. If any more of them jump out of the waka it will tip over. That is what will happen here. A Cabinet Minister and one well-known Maori family have already jumped out of the waka. If any more people jump out the waka will tip over. Even New Zealand First will not be able to help them. We have here today something that is very divisive.  
This legislation has been described as racist. That is a very strong word—it is an awful word. Racism is awful. It is up there with hate and I hate it. I hate racism. I have seen it I have experienced it and it is awful. It is something we should never ever tolerate—not for a moment. But racism is what is being inflicted by those who would normally oppose it—that is what is happening. I say to the Minister in the chair Damien O’Connor that he should get the Attorney-General to explain to the Maori members of the Labour caucus why she did not let the issue of the foreshore and seabed go through the due court process. Why did the Attorney-General step in and say to Maori that although we have laws in this land and allow things to go through the court process that is not the case for Maori. Because of Margaret Wilson’s loony-left activists in the Maori Land Court—her hand-chosen loony-left activists—she would not let Maori take the issue through the court process. Why not? That is what I ask Government members. I ask Mr Fairbrother the chairperson of the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee a lawyer who understands the detail of that to explain why the issue was not allowed to go through the court process.  
I can understand the reasons that would have been given and the debates and the arguments that would have gone on in the caucus but I will not and cannot understand how the Labour Party with its proud history of association with the Ratana Church and with the support from Maori that it has always enjoyed could do that to its own voters. That is beyond comprehension and no Minister has stood in this Chamber so far and told us why the Government would not let that process take place—other than of course the fact that the court is stacked with Labour’s own loony-left activists. That is the only explanation we can see. I say to the members who have stood up and said this legislation will be good for Maori that it will not be. There is a well-documented history that Maori have not been well served by Labour. That is the reality. More has been done for Maori by National and over a very long period of time than by Labour. All that this legislation really is about is a back-door amendment to the Resource Management Act. This whole problem came about as Mr Fairbrother well knows when that Act overlooked what had been prescribed in law under previous Acts like the harbour boards Act and other such Acts. That is all it is—and what does it do? This legislation brings about a opportunity for Maori and non-Maori to stand apart in the eyes of the law. That is what it does and it does not matter how much the Hon Dover Samuels and others stand up and talk about Maori culture. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 I remind Shane Ardern that there is an old saying that goes like this: “You can fool some of the people most of the time and you can fool most of the people some of the time but you can’t fool all the people all the time.” He raised the issue of the Resource Management Act. Who passed the Resource Management Act? It was his predecessor when he was an electorate chairman. 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: And when you were in Cabinet. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: No no. It is like striking a nerve. The National Party ought to be reminded that noise and bombast is no substitute for debate and analysis. Gerry Brownlee wanted to know why there were two bills. He was on the select committee yet he got up and asked everyone else why there were two bills. There have been since day one but he does not know. So it gets worse. The real issue with regard to this debate today and yesterday is this: where on earth is the great communicator? This should have been the day he had a field day. This is his issue. This is his time. This is his chance. So where is the great communicator? Where is the great debater? 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The member will speak to the bill. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson.  
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The matter has been dealt with. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I just want to make it clear that the great communicator the Prime Minister Helen Clark is swanning around the country looking for another photo opportunity. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The member has been here a long time. I suggest that he look at Speaker’s ruling 23/7. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I have to admit that if I were out there in radioland or if I were in the gallery I would be saying to myself: “Surely this has to be the day when the great communicator sheets home his point.” But of course all he does is copy New Zealand First. That is why we do not understand why he is not backing us on this bill. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The member will speak to the bill. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I am getting to it. 
Dail Jones 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. This debate is wide ranging. The purpose clause includes ownership of the foreshore and the seabed and everything that is in the bill. So the member is perfectly entitled to make the comments he is making. They are consistent with the bill. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The member said he is getting to the bill. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I am getting to it but I should make this point. On Saturday he did not know whether National would be part of the committee that will consider the constitution but he followed our lead and now he is out. So will Rodney Hide be shortly. They do not know what they are doing. They just go around copying another party that does know what it is doing. I ask the National Party this: which port authority is complaining now? 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: Port Nelson. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Oh I see.  
Hon Ken Shirley 
: Ports of Nelson. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Oh ports of Nelson are complaining. About what? In Whangarei Auckland the Bay of Plenty Napier Gisborne New Plymouth and everywhere they are happy because we said that whatever they had they will go on having. There will be no imposition or attack on any rights they might have. But of course Nick Smith has probably gone down there and misinformed the local ports of Nelson. What port authority is complaining? Nick Smith’s port authority is complaining.  
I heard Nandor Tanczos talking about confiscation and I want to ask him this: why would it be right as his party advocates to have every foreigner come to this country yet not try to preserve what is here for ourselves in the form of this law? He said he knew of an example of a Maori closing off access to the beach. He was asked which one and he could not say. He did not know. He does not understand that when we talk about riparian rights we are not talking about the foreshore and seabed. He should go away and see his colleague Metiria Turei and get her to get somebody who knows something about the law to tell him because he is talking absolute humbug.  
There is just one last thing I want to say and it is in reply to Richard Prebble. Why was the Maori wardens case important when the National Party wanted to give them rights of arrest?  
Gerry Brownlee 
: Get back on the wicket! 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: It is to do with fishing law. That is why it is relevant. That is why I get sick and tired of that party over there that has lost every semblance of principle and consistency. They stand for nothing anymore. They cannot even hold an argument together for one day let alone one year or one decade. They are just riddled with contradiction and dispute amongst themselves scrapping as they do to try to gain power. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY (Whip—ACT) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I did not want to interrupt the member who has just resumed his seat. He said there had always been two bills and I raise this as a matter of procedure not as a matter of debate. We have before us Supplementary Order Paper 303 which was tabled yesterday and is titled “Foreshore and Seabed Bill”. It is a proposal only—a motion—to divide the bill into two bills. I seek clarification on whether there have always been two bills or whether there has been one bill and there is now a proposal to divide it. I would hate the Committee to be misled by the claim made by Winston Peters that there have always been two bills. I seek clarification that my understanding is correct: that there is one bill and a proposal has been made to divide it. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The member has made his point. 
DAIL JONES (Junior Whip—NZ First) 
: 
 I think that even someone like Mike Ward a member of this House would know that it was always intended to have two Acts of Parliament— 
Metiria Turei 
: Point of order— 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: There is a point of order already on the floor.  
DAIL JONES 
: I am responding to a point but I apologise to the member: I did not mean what I said to be so harsh. I meant that any first-term member as opposed to Mr Shirley who has been in Parliament for about six or seven terms would know that when a bill contains amendments to the Resource Management Act—as this one contains in Part 5—a procedural motion would always be moved later on in the debate to have two bills. In this case one would be a Foreshore and Seabed Bill and the other would be a bill to amend the Resource Management Act. That has always been the case. Mr Shirley has also been a member of the select committee and if he does not know that then we can understand what a hopeless case he and the National Party have been presenting today. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: That is not a debating issue. The member has made his point well. 
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 I just want to say that a comment was directed at me which was designed to cast a bit of an aspersion. It was a derogatory comment. Of course technically Mr Jones is always right. I asked questions about “a bill” in front of the select committee and quite reasonably so. The thing is we should move on. We all know that the New Zealand First Party cannot make any points without getting personal. We know that Mr Peters is going through some sort of a reminiscence of past grievances this morning demonstrating exactly the problem with Maori in this country and I just want to say that I forgive him. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: We have all had our fun. It is time we moved on. 
MAHARA OKEROA (Labour—Te Tai Tonga) 
: 
 This morning I was appalled at notions of racism. I am now absolutely amazed. So I have moved from being appalled to being amazed. 
Mark Peck 
: Not a bad start. 
MAHARA OKEROA 
: No not bad. I am amazed at a comment made by the shadow Minister of Maori Affairs who asked why Maori would want to include their customary rights in legislation. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I didn’t say that. 
MAHARA OKEROA 
: Yes the member did—why would Maori want to go through that process to enshrine it in legislation? That demonstrates to me quite clearly that as a shadow Minister of Maori Affairs the member has very little knowledge of the historical reality. If nothing else one of the driving motivations for Maori members to be here is to make a difference in terms of legislation that affects the constituency—in spite of what Shane Ardern says about divisiveness. He should know about divisiveness. He comes out of Taranaki. That demonstrates to me as well that he does not know anything about the history of Taranaki. Who drove the divisiveness in Taranaki? 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: Tainui. 
MAHARA OKEROA 
: No not at all. What I am saying in the context of this discussion [ 
Interruption 
]—and we do not want any interruptions from that member from Ngati Raukawa because we know what happened to those people as well. That member demonstrates very clearly that he does not understand the notion of divisiveness and the forces of early legislation that caused that divisiveness in the community of Taranaki.  
I will give here a bouquet which is overdue to New Zealand First. Mr Ardern said that we had made a lot of progress with legislation for Maori. The biggest piece of legislation I will mention in that regard is the legislation on the reserve lands issue. Who was in coalition? It was not the National Party but in fact New Zealand First where the initiative came from. So I would not be about claiming kudos for one party; I am about to give a bouquet to the most effective leader of the Opposition.  
When we get asked why we are here I tire of listening to speeches that continue to serve the marginalisation of our people. If these things are not enshrined in legislation and apparent there then iwi hapu and Maori in general will continue to be marginalised. That is a lesson of history. It is a lesson that we have learnt at our own cost.  
In conclusion it is my view that this bill supported by New Zealand First will put an end to any further marginalisation because it also protects—and it takes vision and courage. I have not heard yet what the shadow Minister of Maori Affairs may promote as his party’s policy for a solution rather than it creating a problem. So it is my absolute honour to stand here today and give my— 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. Yesterday the Prime Minister became very upset because a member suggested she had pleaded the Nuremburg defence when it came to the incident of her speeding from Waimate to Christchurch and to the subsequent charging of five policemen and one civilian while she it would seem is escaping any question. I have just heard Mr Tamihere suggest in response to Mr Mahara Okeroa’s suggestion that he had not heard what the shadow Minister of Maori Affairs might offer as his solution that that would be “the final solution”. That is even more offensive than suggesting that someone is pleading a Nuremburg defence. It think it is a waste of time asking that man to withdraw and apologise. It is evident that he does not have much sense of what is right and wrong. But I do ask Mr Chairperson that you keep your ears open and make sure that that sort of thing does not occur again. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The member has made his point. One unparliamentary remark does not justify another. I call the member to order. 
MAHARA OKEROA 
: I was attempting to bring a conclusion to what I had to say. We need to avoid any suggestion of the interpretation by the shadow Minister of Maori Affairs because in fact I doubt whether the member on my right was being negative about what he was saying. We need to bring this issue to a positive end. We need to be a reflection of the community as it is today not as it was in the 19th century. So I applaud this bill. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 Let us remind ourselves of the sort of parliamentary skulduggery that is going on this morning with Parliament under urgency and passing major legislation that will impact hugely on this nation and with that member who has spoken somehow believing that that will resolve this issue. I want to highlight the major provision included in this part—that is the creation of a new legal instrument: a foreshore and seabed reserve. On the front page of this morning’s  
New Zealand Herald 
 the Maori caucus is quoted as saying that they expect 10 percent of New Zealand will be set aside as foreshore and seabed reserves. I would be interested to know from the Minister in the chair the Hon Dr Michael Cullen whether he thinks that is a fair estimate. I ask again of the Minister in the chair: is it a fair estimate as recorded on the front page of the  
New Zealand Herald  
that 10 percent of our coast will be set aside as foreshore and seabed reserves? That is attributed to the Maori caucus. Is that correct? 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: They did not say that. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Is the expectation the report reasonable? 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: They didn’t say that. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Well do the people of New Zealand have any idea as to the proportion of our coast—our precious beaches and our precious coastline—that will be set up in the new legal instrument provided in these amendments? Does the Minister have any idea at all as to what area of New Zealand will be set aside in these new foreshore and seabed reserves? The Minister in the chair Dr Cullen shakes his head and says he has no idea. So am I to draw the conclusion that we are being asked to pass legislation that will set aside according to the Maori caucus—that is the promise he has obviously made in secret to the Maori members—10 percent of New Zealand’s coastline which is 2000 kilometres or 4 million hectares to be vested in new foreshore and seabed reserves? I heard the last Maori member who spoke say that this will not change anything. Members can bet it changes things! It changes and moves the control of 4 million hectares—2000 kilometres—from locally elected councils to a new special committee appointed exclusively by Maori. We are to expect— 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: It doesn’t say that either. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Well what does it say? 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: The court directs people to go and discuss the composition of the board. Read the bill. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Registers it with the court! Parliament does not get a say. It is to be registered by the Minister. This is a Trojan Horse for transferring the say— 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: No wrong again. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Would the Minister like to take a call? 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I say to the Minister that it is generally accepted that when Ministers are in the chair they do not use the live microphone. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: The Minister cannot expect to table legislation on this very day introduce a whole new concept of foreshore and seabed reserves and say that the Government is not allowed to answer any questions and that it cannot tell us how much the area is. If we take the equivalent marine reserves were first introduced in 1974. They make up only 0.3 percent not 10 percent as the Maori caucus says the figure will be. Those marine reserves have been debated over years and years and years. They were first introduced in 1974 and they have been debated extensively yet the Minister in the chair thinks it is kosher to introduce a new concept of foreshore and seabed reserves today and pass it all in 1 parliamentary day. Dover Samuels said that it would not make any difference to families wanting to go down to the beach and have a barbecue. Well yes it does and I will tell members why. In relation to the 10 percent that his Maori caucus claims will now be foreshore and seabed reserves it will be for the management committee to decide who will be able to have a barbecue and where.  
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: No that’s nonsense. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: It is true. Can the Minister in the chair explain why it is that the management committee of the foreshore and seabed reserves will be guardians. The guardians will be able to have those controls. 
Stephen Franks 
: If they can’t why are they guardians? 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Exactly. As my colleague Stephen Franks says if the guardians who are going to manage 10 percent of our foreshore and seabed cannot decide whether a barbecue is allowed or whether there will be a gate or boat access what the heck are the guardians? Is it just a big fraud on Maoridom? I suggest that it is not that it is real. It is a Trojan Horse for taking control away from councils and passing it over to these guardians. 
LARRY BALDOCK (United Future) 
: 
 I begin my comments by thanking the honourable member Dail Jones who in his speech some time ago gave us an explanation of why the new clause 2A had appeared in the Supplementary Order Paper 302 proposed by the Deputy Prime Minister. He took ownership of the fact that it was New Zealand First members who went to the officials and discussed broadening the definition of Crown ownership to be what we now read there which is a pretty good description of what was conveyed by the term “public domain”. I thank the member for that and I thank New Zealand First and the Rt Hon Winston Peters for doing so. 
But it does the beg the question of the Rt Hon Winston Peters as to who is copying whom which he raised earlier. It seems very clear that the concept of public domain has been copied by New Zealand First. While United Future is happy that that is occurring because it is a useful concept we believe that there should be some recognition of it. It is not only the concept that is being copied but also the behaviour. I do not know whether anyone has noticed in the House but New Zealand First is becoming very reasonable very constructive and very cooperative with the Government. I think Winston Peters must be becoming very worried because he is morphing into United Future. Progressively week by week and month by month New Zealand First is morphing into United Future and that must be of concern to Winston Peters. He has sat here for 2 years and watched the way that we have operated constructively with the Government and I am sure that on many occasions he has thought: “Gee I wish we had done that in 1996 when we were in a relationship with the National Party. We would not have got into so much trouble.” But many people are still holding their breath as to how long that attitude will last. Time will tell whether New Zealand First can truly morph into a party that is able to work constructively on behalf of all New Zealanders. 
I want to make some comments about clause 3 the purpose clause because it is of course a crucial part of the bill. It gives effect to the object stated in clause 2A which has been discussed quite a bit already then goes on to establish the purpose of this legislation. It is important that we debate this matter in the Committee today and possibly into tomorrow but I believe that it is even more important that after the debate has occurred here it goes out into the community. I want to put forward a suggestion to the Minister and the Government this morning which I hope they will take up and that is that they take steps to ensure that communication is carried out from this Chamber. Not everybody tunes into the radio and listens to the debate—for obvious reasons if anybody listens to it for any length of time! But it is important that this bill in its new form with this huge Supplementary Order Paper be communicated through hui throughout the country and to Pakeha New Zealanders so that everyone is brought up to speed. It is not enough to rely upon what is reported in the newspapers and in 60-second or 30-second sound bites on television and radio to convey information about this important legislation which is now being improved in many ways by the Minister’s proposed amendments. 
So I offer that suggestion to the Government. It is important that it find some independent people who are not affiliated with any particular political party and who can go around the country and give a good explanation of what this legislation now means. A number of Government members who have spoken in the debate have said that there was a long consultation process and have asked why everyone is complaining about the House taking urgency this week. It seems that they have completely missed the point. The fact that they went around the country talking to people does not necessarily mean that they were heard. It does not necessarily mean that they conveyed anything through all the hui that they held. The fact that 4000 submitters came to the select committee is fairly clear evidence that those members were not heard as well as the Government thought they were. 
It somewhat reminds me of the trouble that parents sometimes get into with their teenagers when they tell them everything then wonder why the teenagers go off and do the complete opposite. They scratch their heads and say: “Well we told them. Weren’t they listening?”. No they were not listening; often teenagers do not listen to parents because parents are not listening to teenagers. The Government needs to understand that it was not enough to go around the country and simply tell everybody what its policy was going to be and how it was going to solve this problem. It also needed to be listening. That is why we attempted to have the select committee produce an interim report; we wanted more opportunity for some dialogue which may have resulted—we hope it still will if it is initiated by the Government—in the bringing together of people in New Zealand over this legislation. 
NANAIA MAHUTA (Labour—Tainui) 
: 
 I want to speak on Part 1 and to highlight a couple of clauses that I believe provide some clarification in terms of the intention of Supplementary Order Paper 302. 
There has been a lot of talk today about the objects clause clause 2A. Implicit in that clause is the fiduciary obligation of the Crown to look after the foreshore and seabed for all New Zealanders after it having first recognised that it has a role to protect the association of whanau hapu and iwi with the public foreshore and seabed. That implicit obligation will in time help to develop the thinking and the context of how the common law has been provided for in this bill. It is a good clause and a good addition in the Government’s Supplementary Order Paper. 
The member before me made a couple of comments on the purposes clause. It sets out quite clearly the intention of the bill. Rightly or wrongly—whatever people may think about the content of the rest of the bill—the purposes clause gives a very good description of what is provided for in the legislation. I will highlight clause 3(c) which enables “applications to be made to the High Court to investigate the full extent of the rights that may have been held at common law and if those rights are not able to be fully expressed as a result of this Act enabling a successful applicant group—(i) to participate in the administration of a foreshore and seabed reserve; or (ii) to enter into formal discussions on redress;”. I think that sets out very clearly that there are provisions within the bill that enable the full extent to be explored. 
There were some issues raised within the debate about whether the common law rights applied to all New Zealanders. My friends in the Opposition will know that in the interpretation clause the devil is in the detail. The definition of “applicant group” could apply to anybody. Anyone who can pass the threshold test that is provided for later on in the bill has the opportunity to go to the High Court to find out whether he or she has a territorial customary right. So it is not race-specific as members in the Opposition would have people believe; the way in which “applicant group” has been defined in the interpretation clause opens it up. 
There are other points about Part 1 that I would like to comment on—notably what is not there and that is ancestral connection. All members will recognise that ancestral connection has been removed from Part 1 because a lot of submissions as I understand it had asked what it achieved. In effect because of the way in which the ancestral connection has been provided for throughout the rest of the bill it is a given that Maori have a very strong association with the takutai moana. Implicitly within the other parts of the bill the ancestral connection becomes very relevant and is a given. That is a credit to some progressive thinking on both sides of the House about the nature of the relationship of Maori to the takutai moana. 
There were also comments and I think they were quite wide ranging about whether a marine reserve would be affected—whether a mataitai would be prohibited by this bill. Well if the test is passed in the High Court and a takutai moana reserve or foreshore and seabed reserve is created then it is up to the management committee to determine that. Through its management plan it may determine whether it wants a mataitai within a marine reserve—it is up to it. Under the laws of this land which apply to all citizens of New Zealand it will follow the due process of law to lodge a marine reserve application. It is all up to it. I think that shows the depth of thinking that has gone into the possibilities that can be created within this bill that also uphold some of the interests that Maori have promoted in this area. 
In times to come there will be some extensive thinking about what another part of this bill means. I am happy to see that the recognition of kaitiakitanga is the same as that referred to in the Resource Management Act. Why? Because it is consistent it is something that people already have an understanding of and it is not departing from some of the principles of resource management that we are all concerned about. 
There has been a mishmash of understanding about what is not protected. I want to say in my contribution that the existing private property rights of all New Zealanders will be protected. The definition of “specified freehold interest” applies to all New Zealanders including Maori. 
STEPHEN FRANKS (ACT) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I do not know what rule is governing the debate on this part. I am aware that normally there are tight limits but I have now been here for nearly an hour and a half and have seen the call go to National members and to Winston Peters. The National members have all had a round and Mr Peters has had two speeches while I have been here. I do not raise this point of order only for myself; there are two members of Mr Peters’ party who have been calling throughout the time I have been here and who have not had a go. As I understand it the Standing Orders suggest that the call should be available at least once to each member for a debate of this nature. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 The format of the debate is that the contrary side of the argument is given first and the supporting side second or vice versa. It goes from side to side. In respect of the defence of my colleagues’ rights being put by another party’s member let me say that my colleagues will get a chance to speak in this debate and they will do so shortly. It is not for Mr Franks to decide what their rights are. We have organised that because I cannot be here all day I will speak at the appropriate time. That is a fact. The second part of his argument was nebulous and nonsense. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I thank all the members for their contributions. I say to Mr Franks that I look at proportionality within the House. He is within my radar at the present stage. 
Dr LYNDA SCOTT (National—Kaikoura) 
: 
 I have also been waiting for a long time to take a call on this bill and I wish to do so because I am the MP for Kaikoura which includes all of Marlborough and North Canterbury and this whole debate began with the decision about the foreshore in the Marlborough Sounds. The drawing of that line in the sand was what led us to the discussions we have had in the select committee and to our debating today in the Chamber a Supplementary Order Paper that nobody had a chance to see and digest until very very recently. 
I listened to the speeches that have gone before me. John Tamihere said that Maori have not wanted freehold title. That is certainly not my understanding of what was happening with the Marlborough Sounds seabed. Maori definitely wanted freehold title. I had people come into my office and say that when there was no land and no fish no one cared but now they did care they did want that land and they did want title—it was not just about guardianship. People have now moved to the concept of guardianship for about 10 percent of the foreshore and seabed but there was definitely an intention to have freehold title. When the  
Attorney-General  
v 
 Ngati Apa 
 decision provided that there was a possibility that private ownership of the foreshore and seabed could be granted—that it could go to the Maori Land Court—action had to be taken. That had never been the intention in the past in our history. Until the Resource Management Act came in most New Zealanders had supposed that the foreshore and seabed were in Crown ownership. It had not been an issue until that time. 
I heard Mahara Okeroa talking about people being denied access to a certain area of Maori land in Nelson because he said people were not treating it correctly. When my own parents-in-law were down in the Arahura Valley on the West Coast where pounamu is gathered they were denied access one time when they were just wanting to take a stroll along the river. That is what has been beginning to happen around New Zealand. People have been denied access. I was in the Chatham Islands and went out for a run on the beach and was told I was on private property. I and all other New Zealanders have grown up with the concept of the Queen’s Chain the concept that we can walk down a beach without restriction so it was a huge surprise to me to be told in the Chatham Islands that someone else owned the foreshore and seabed. 
When one travels overseas one realises that a lot of the foreshore and seabed is privately owned. It brings us back to what it means to be a New Zealander. What it means to be a New Zealander for all the people I talk to in my electorate is to have that access and not be denied it. A huge amount of consternation was generated by the decision to allow Ngati Apa to go to the Maori Land Court because it definitely would have led to a possibility of private individual ownership of and title to that land—or even collective title to that land but one that would deny others access. 
The select committee process did not manage to return a new bill to this House and we now have Supplementary Order Paper 302 which creates in Part 1 a new legal scheme. A new system is being created. The amendment states that legal ownership is in the Crown—preserved in perpetuity for the people of New Zealand—but it is very uncertain about what will happen with the guardianship that can be given if Maori can show continuous rights. That is uncertain. It will be a reserve but will Maori be able to deny access? I ask members to consider the Department of Conservation. Does it allow open access? No it often shuts up areas of land. We will not know. 
METIRIA TUREI (Green) 
: 
 I was quite distressed to hear Nanaia Mahuta’s speech in which she lauded clause 3 “Purposes” as providing Maori with access to the courts to get territorial customary rights orders. I wonder whether she is aware—we will talk about this later in the debate on Part 2—that New Zealand First has negotiated a clause that means that contiguous land ownership is a condition of being able to get a territorial customary rights order. That is in effect the reinstatement of the 90 Mile Beach decision which legal academics have known and continually said since that decision was made was wrongly decided. The Ngati Apa decision overturned it because it was wrongly decided. Clause 3 will mean that those South Island iwi who took the Ngati Apa case to court will not qualify for a territorial customary rights order. That is the effect of clause 3. It is not about providing access to the court; it is about denying specifically and directly those iwi who might well be able to establish some form of exclusive use and possession the right to attend court. 
Mr Tamihere talked earlier about how the challenge for the Maori Labour MPs was to find ways to incorporate Maori rights into the bill. Their challenge was not to find ways to integrate Maori into this bill. Their challenge was not to find ways to assimilate Maori rights into this bill. Their challenge was to protect Maori customary rights to protect the common law rights of iwi whanau and hapu in this country and to protect tipuna title. By supporting this bill the Maori Labour MPs and Maori New Zealand First MPs have failed in that challenge. They have failed to protect Maori rights. They are allowing the continual confiscation and extinguishment of those rights and the further taking of land. 
Those MPs try to justify this bill by saying it will give Maori more rights than they would get in the courts. That is a completely wrong justification. It is not true. They try to say that this bill incorporates the common law tests from other jurisdictions such as Canada and Australia and that Maori would be subject to those tests in the courts. But in fact Maori would be subject to tests in the courts that include our own treaty jurisprudence which has been in development now for 30 40 or more years. That treaty jurisprudence acknowledges that the common law rights of Maori are in a form set out in the Treaty of Waitangi—that that document has force and is relevant to these decisions. Of course the Canadian tests do not have that issue and the Australian tests do not take it into account. But the New Zealand courts would enabling Maori to have better access to justice and enabling the formation in our own country of our own jurisprudence about what common law rights might actually be. By putting forward this bill this Government is preventing the courts from exploring those issues and preventing Maori from being able to explore the full scope and spectrum of what their common law rights might be in accordance with international jurisprudence and our own treaty jurisprudence here. 
One of the real failures of this bill and of the whole process—including the select committee process—was the fact that so many alternative options were not explored. The most obvious of those would be to allow Maori to proceed to the courts to have the full scope of their common law rights determined. Yes there would be some uncertainty for the Government but it would leave an opportunity for that exploration and development of the law to continue. There were no problems last summer when this issue had not been decided. The esoteric kinds of academic questions that go on in the courts do not have a huge impact at all on New Zealanders’ ability to enjoy the beach in the summertime. There is no urgency. There is no need to rush this decision. We could allow the courts to proceed and develop the law in accordance with New Zealand jurisprudence. 
It is urgent only for Labour and New Zealand First. They want this bill dealt with before the election because they see votes in it. They do not see the injustice of it. They do not see and understand the extinguishment and confiscation of Maori rights. They do not see that they are undertaking a return to the 19th century. 
NANAIA MAHUTA (Labour—Tainui) 
: 
 In my previous contribution I outlined that in new clause 2A there is an implicit fiduciary obligation on the Crown. I want to pick up on a point in clause 3 “Purposes” relating to subclause (a): “vesting the full legal and beneficial ownership of the public foreshore and seabed in the Crown;”. As the debate has progressed over time I see that people have misconstrued the concerns of Maori as an issue of sovereignty. Although at the extreme end of the debate there is a strong view about the sovereignty interests of Maori it is irreconcilable to some extent with the treaty arguments that are then put up. If we move towards the middle ground in order for the Crown to exercise its fiduciary obligation it has to be quite clear on what basis it does that. New clause 2A provides that level of clarity and does that.  
For the extreme ends of this debate I think that new clause 2A will make very clear that there is an ongoing fiduciary obligation and will bring people more towards the middle of where this argument sits. The Crown will have a full expression of its ability to be able to assert on the one hand the common law interests of Maori within the context of this bill and outside of this bill another pathway that is more fitting and aligned to the Treaty of Waitangi settlements process. That understanding has been missed quite a bit in the debate probably because people like to play around on the edges of it.  
On the issues that were raised by the previous speaker with regard to the common law I think those are more apt for the Part 2 debate. That is the context for them. In saying that I point out in response that Dr Paul McHugh said that for the development of common law within New Zealand we cannot get away from the issues of tikanga and the Treaty of Waitangi. I think there is a debate to be had that can probably be extended in Part 2. My contribution is very brief in this respect but I highlight that there has been a lot of game-playing on the edges of this debate around the question of sovereignty.  
Coming from a tribe that signed the Declaration of Independence only—from a group of people who can say that they did not sign the treaty but have been treated as though they were signatories and have suffered the most—I will say that it is our responsibility as parliamentarians in this country to try to bring people together notwithstanding the historical facts that have occurred over time. It requires a lot of effort and commitment to act in good faith as responsible parliamentarians and leaders of this country. Although I accept that there is a lot of emotion around this issue I also accept that if we are to have a nation that works together and commits to that we basically have to look at the realities of what we can achieve here today and move from that point. I look forward to more cooperation within the Government on this question. I think it is important that we really put to rest some ridiculous expectations that are out there. 
 The member from Marlborough who will not be with us next year made the point that there are interests amongst Maori who want to go for freehold title. The reality is that under the Maori Land Court and Te Ture Whenua Maori Act that is all they could have been awarded had they gone along that track. So when that presented itself I guess it presented the real question of us all in the domain of Tangaroa or the foreshore and seabed which is what it was that we were really trying to achieve here. Yes interests exist—customary property rights I believe—but was there a general view amongst New Zealanders that anyone owned the foreshore and seabed? I do not think that had been contemplated very clearly within any statute. In so far as it affects Maori there was general agreement throughout the submission process that Maori accepted that access to the foreshore and seabed the inalienability of title and the rights of navigation are public rights for all New Zealanders.  
I think balancing up where the meeting-point was those were the three clear points we had in working out how to find a way through this. Clearly the laws that could affirm title presented some difficulties. We may not be there yet. However those difficulties have forced us into a situation where we have had to reconsider just what are the customary property interests and rights of Maori to the foreshore and seabed. That is what this bill is moving towards. 
STEPHEN FRANKS (ACT) 
: 
 I wish to point out that Nanaia Mahuta has in fact voted against this. The comments made earlier about New Zealand First speakers still apply. I would like to know just what their reasons are. The Rt Hon Winston Peters has spoken many times and has given us no substantive reasons. He goes into history but gives us no substantive reasons for his support of this bill. We have had the benefit however of Government contributions—unusually in a debate of this kind.  
In particular the contribution from John Tamihere was interesting. He assured us that at no time have Maori ever wanted ownership of the seabed and foreshore. What were the 80 or so cases filed—which this bill cancels without replacement—about? I think John Tamihere has become accustomed to dealing with his colleagues those people who exhibit the bigotry of false expectations and allow Maori claimants to spout pure racism—the notion that Maori are somehow different from everyone else in the world in the sense that if they are offered an opportunity they will not take it.  
The opportunity this bill offers them is very clear. They can become guardians of public land and nothing in this bill will stop the guardians from becoming beach trolls. That is what this bill will justify. It will generate expectations among Maori—and it has already as we can tell by the agitation that has made the life of the Hon Michael Cullen so miserable for the last year. The expectation is that this is a soft substitute for genuine ownership. When they are given guardianship with no definition of what a guardian is or does they will treat guardianship as equivalent to ownership. If it is not they will think they have been robbed. And if they think they have been robbed they will feel justified in slashing car tyres and doing the other kinds of things we have already seen people do when they do not accept that the rights they have been given are the rights they are entitled to.  
I have looked for evidence that what is really intended here is a consolidation of proper legal rights. As a lawyer of course I note that in this part we have the definitions. The definitions show just how racist this bill is. It is racist because they are not law; they are a set of slogans and duplicitous words designed just to postpone definition until later.  
Let us look at a few. Clause 4 says “tikanga Maori” has the meaning it is given in section 4 of Te Ture Whenua Maori Act. When we go there and see what tikanga Maori means we see that it means “Maori customary values and practices”. That is not law. Any people can expect their customary values and practices to move as they want them to. Law is something you can know in advance. Law is something by which people can order their lives by looking at it and saying: “Here is the boundary.” A custom or practice does not have a boundary. Maori are not going to forgo the right to shift to move and to develop. We have heard that in this Chamber. So the definition of tikanga Maori is not a legal one.  
What else do we have? We have a definition of “recognised customary activity”. This bill tells me to look at the Resource Management Act where it is “an activity use or practice carried on exercised or followed under a customary rights order”. Where is “customary rights order” defined? It is defined in this Act. So we are deliberately sent in a circle because they do not want us to know that there is actually no definition. There is no statement anywhere of what a customary activity is so people can invent it and with the collusion of the Maori Land Court make it up as they go along.  
Because there is so much agitation from Tariana Turia the Greens and Maori about not getting real ownership New Zealanders are being encouraged to think that this settles it—that the Crown ownership in this bill is what it says. It is not; it is simply a platform for the assertion of completely undefined rights and interests that will enable kaitiakitanga—guardianship—to be set up with all the rights of beach trolls. The Government anticipates now that this will apply to 10 percent of the coastline. I venture to say that it will be all of the coastline. Why would it not be when this bill which looks as if it defines the terms does not even do so? One of the drafting conventions is that one does not define— 
PITA PARAONE (NZ First) 
: 
 From the outset of the debate today I have wondered whether I was actually sitting in the Parliament of New Zealand given some of the vitriolic expressions in this Chamber towards the intent of the bill. As a New Zealander I reflect the face of our country in the sense that one part of me is Maori and the other part of me is of Irish and Scottish descent. This bill is all about New Zealanders. It ensures that the ownership of the seabed and foreshore that part of our country that lies between the high-water mark and the low-water mark is vested in the Crown for everybody—for Maori and Pakeha New Zealanders. The previous speaker wondered why New Zealand First was giving its support to this bill. That is the very reason we support the bill—because it is for everybody. It ensures that the ownership of that part of our country is vested in the Crown for and on behalf of every New Zealander Maori or non-Maori.  
We have heard in the debate this morning about the various descriptions the bill has introduced. I noticed that the speakers from ACT made particular reference to the last part of new clause 2A “Object” which states: “… including the protection of the association of whanau hapu and iwi with areas of the public foreshore and seabed.” I wonder whether in order to minimise that source of criticism we should have included “families extended families and clans” to describe the non-Maori make-up of our community. All that the wording in the bill does is to ensure that we recognise the connection Maori had with that part of our country before we were colonised. As I have used that word some of our Maori critics may feel that we have been colonised. But if it means that all New Zealanders can be assured of having access to that part of our country and of knowing that its ownership is vested in the Crown on their behalf then I am quite happy to say that I am colonised. 
 I just want to refer to the definition in clause 4 of “foreshore and seabed reserve”. In the discussions leading up to Supplementary Order Paper 302 in the name of the Hon Dr Michael Cullen it was suggested to us that we should include the phrase takutai moana in recognition of the belief that Maori had over that issue. New Zealand First and particularly its Maori members suggested that phrase should not be included and I will tell members why that was. I suggest to the Minister of Maori Affairs that when we talk to our relations about takutai moana 99.9 percent of my relatives and his relatives talk about where the sand begins and where the seabed ends on someone else’s coastline. By saying foreshore and seabed reserve we are quite clear as to the part we are talking about.  
The question was also asked of why New Zealand First supports this bill. One reason is that the legislation ensures the public foreshore and seabed is vested in the Crown. It ensures the rights of access and navigation of the public. 
MARK PECK (Labour—Invercargill) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
Dr the Hon LOCKWOOD SMITH (National—Rodney) 
: 
 In speaking to Part 1 of the Foreshore and Seabed Bill I must observe that I just know what the Minister’s former colleague Sir Geoffrey Palmer would think of what is going on in this Parliament. He would consider this I suspect to be a constitutional outrage—and that is what it is. As we look at this bill we see at least 50 percent of it has been amended and that amendment was dumped on this Committee when the debate started. The consultation with the public of New Zealand on this legislation has been almost non-existent. Sure Maori have had a lot of say but the ordinary people who are members of the public in Rodney—where there is a huge coastline and foreshore in the Kaipara Harbour—have had no say on it.  
Today I have heard members of this Parliament refer to this bill as being deeply racist legislation. Members of the Government have denied that but when I look at the wording in Part 1 I see there is no way to escape that conclusion. Members of the Government have suggested that the bill is not racist because in applying to be involved in the administration of a foreshore and seabed reserve the applicant group is open to anyone under clause 4. Sure the definition of “applicant group” does not specify that the applicant group has to be Maori but the courts will have to try to interpret this law and that is why I think what we are doing today is so serious.  
This is new complex law and the way that the courts interpret it could have huge implications for New Zealand. How are they to interpret what an applicant group is? As I understand it a court would look back to the object of the legislation. Let us look back at clause 2A “Object”. We see nothing in that clause to suggest that anyone other than Maori can have any specific interests because what is protected under the object is “the association of whanau hapu and iwi with areas of the public foreshore and seabed”. How is a court to interpret that that means anything other than Maori? My family is not whanau or hapu. Those terms relate to Maori families and extended families. So clearly as we look at the object of this bill—even though it does not state this because the Government is trying to make it look as though this is not deeply racist legislation—we see an applicant group will have to be Maori.  
I look further in clause 4 at the issue of who is to administer those foreshore and seabed reserves. I think I even heard the Minister in the chair say that the High Court will be involved in the appointment of the members of the boards—the governors. When I look at clause 4 I see it states the members “are appointed in accordance with section 34E”. Does clause 34E spell out how the members of those boards are to be appointed? No it does not. All that clause states is that the High Court confirms appointments. This kind of law I believe is quite new for New Zealand and to be ramming it through under urgency even though it will provide huge opportunity for the courts to interpret what this Parliament is saying is a new kind of arrogance that surpasses even that of Dr Cullen who was certainly not dealt a short suit when it came to arrogance. This surpasses anything that I have seen.  
I come back to the fundamental concern I have with this bill which is that it is a new kind of law because the object makes it very clear that some of these measures are designed for Maori yet some of the specific clauses try to pretend that that is not the case. How the courts will balance up the conflicting elements of this legislation and sort that out in the future is something that this Parliament clearly cannot know. For us to be passing legislation under urgency when we have no idea how a court will interpret what we are doing is dangerous for the future of our country and it should be opposed. 
Hon CHRIS CARTER (Minister of Conservation) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the question be now put. 
Ayes 66 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Progressive 2. 
Noes 53 
New Zealand National 27; Green Party 9; ACT New Zealand 8; United Future 8; Maori Party 1. 
Motion agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Metiria Turei to clause 4 be agreed to: 
to omit paragraph (c) of the definition of  
foreshore and seabed. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 9 
Green Party 9. 
Noes 109 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand National 27; New Zealand First 13; ACT New Zealand 8; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Metiria Turei to clause 4 be agreed to: 
to omit from paragraph (b) of the definition of  
public foreshore and seabed 
 the word “but”. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 9 
Green Party 9. 
Noes 109 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand National 27; New Zealand First 13; ACT New Zealand 8; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Metiria Turei to proposed new clauses 2A and 3 set out on Supplementary Order Paper 302 in the name of the Hon Dr Michael Cullen be agreed to: 
to omit these clauses. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment to the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 17 
Green Party 9; ACT New Zealand 8. 
Noes 101 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand National 27; New Zealand First 13; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Amendment to the amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Metiria Turei to the amendment to clause 4 set out on Supplementary Order Paper 302 in the name of the Hon Dr Michael Cullen be agreed to: 
to omit the omission of the definition of  
ancestral connection order 
. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment to the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 17 
Green Party 9; ACT New Zealand 8. 
Noes 101 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand National 27; New Zealand First 13; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Amendment to the amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 302 in the name of the Hon Dr Michael Cullen to Part 1 be agreed to. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendments be agreed to. 
Ayes 74 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 45 
New Zealand National 27; Green Party 9; ACT New Zealand 8; Maori Party 1. 
Amendments agreed to. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That Part 1 as amended be agreed to. 
Ayes 66 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Progressive 2. 
Noes 53 
New Zealand National 27; Green Party 9; ACT New Zealand 8; United Future 8; Maori Party 1. 
Part 1 as amended agreed to. 
Part 2 Public foreshore and seabed  
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 This Part 2 is entitled “Public foreshore and seabed” and it deals with access rights navigation rights fishing rights and a number of other aspects of activity in the public foreshore and seabed. One of the first things it does is to start to scope the limits of those access rights. It starts to talk about how authorities may be empowered to limit access to the public foreshore and seabed. We might say that that is reasonable. If the authority were a port company it would not want everybody strolling through the container yards; if it were a marina then clearly the operators at the marina would need to have some security for the craft located there. There would be other places too where we might say that it is perfectly reasonable for the public to have some limited access.  
We are fascinated by the references in clause 6(2) to issues granted under clause 21. Clause 21 directs us to new clause 62B Protection of sites of significance". There will be sites of significance around New Zealand there is no doubt about that and there might be a place where we might want to say it was not appropriate to go on to the foreshore and seabed. I can think of Maud Island in the Pelorus Sound where there are considerable bird-recovery programmes. Naturally we would want to see that access was somewhat limited—everyone benefits by the limitations put on such access.  
But the “sites of significance” becomes interesting when we start to consider the issue of the reservations that are likely to be set up for Maori. It is a fascinating prospect actually in the 21st century for a country like New Zealand to be creating reservations for Maori—a fascinating way for them to be treated. However when it comes to those reservations we find they are going to be administered by a governance group. The bill is absolutely silent on the structure of those groups—it is left open for the Minister to negotiate with the people who are the beneficiaries of those reserve areas.  
The question then becomes why a group would be administering an area if there were no capacity for them to make some rules about the usage of that area. Quite clearly what we see in new clause 62B is the power that those groups will have to restrict access to what we are now told will be 10 percent or more of the New Zealand coastline. Clause 62B talks about “sites of significance”. Surely any one of those reservations will be considered a site of significance—[ 
Interruption 
]—it is in this part. I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. This just shows what a huge mess Parliament is in and how poorly constructed this legislation is. What I am referring to is a reference from clause 21—so we have clause 6 that sends us to clause 21. Clause 21 to be understood requires one to understand what is in new clause 62B.  
 It is new clause 62B(3) that I am most interested in canvassing. It cannot be discussed without a cross reference and for Dr Cullen to sit there and say that we are on the wrong part simply means that he does not have a clue what is in his own bill and it shows what a huge mess Parliament is in because it has not had the time to scrutinise the bill properly. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: That is not a point of order. The member will please continue. 
GERRY BROWNLEE 
: So members can see that the powers given to the governance or the governors of those reserves is quite considerable and implicit in subsequent provisions of the bill.  
We can also see an interesting little piece here about existing fishing rights reserved. What does that mean? Does it mean that the Ministry of Fisheries can no longer change catch limits around the coastline of the country? Does it mean that the Ministry of Fisheries will have to consult the new nominal owner of the foreshore and seabed the Department of Conservation which has in turn to discuss the matter with the Minister of Maori Affairs and will we see different catch limits made available in reservation areas for the beneficiaries of those areas compared with the rest of the country? The answer is almost certainly yes. Why would any people want to say that although something is theirs and they have governance over it anybody can come and stomp all over it and that even though they sit and meet and charge they still have to do just as they are told by the Minister of Fisheries the Minister of Conservation or the Minister of Maori Affairs? Everyone knows that is not how it will work. Those bodies will see themselves very much as mini - local authorities and in so many ways—although I will acknowledge before Dr Cullen races to his feet that we have not got to this part—this is also the first indication that the veto powers which the National Party has been so concerned about for so long remain in the bill. 
RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I am sorry to raise this but I just need your clarification. We are discussing Part 2. Does that include new Part 2A or will that be separate? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Deputy Prime Minister) 
: 
 I can help on that matter. The member will see that there is a Supplementary Order Paper 304 in my name. In Supplementary Order Paper 302 which is also in my name the draftsperson put in an amendment to insert a new heading Part 2A but did not provide the necessary other wording to actually have a separate part. It has been redrafted. The exact wording of the operative clauses is all the same in both Supplementary Order Papers except that two typos have been corrected so members can read either version in terms of the meaning. It is now all part of Part 2. It is a single debate so the last clause in Part 2 is clause 34G.  
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 When I listen to this unholy confused alliance and when I listened to the last speech which was mistaken on every point it brings to mind the famous words of Jonathan Swift who said: “When a true genius appears in the world you may know him by this sign that the dunces of the world are all in confederacy against him.” That is the case with this bill. As clear as daylight in the bill are the fundamental things that matter: the rights of access in clause 6 the right to be on the public foreshore and seabed the right to enter remain in and leave it the right to pass and repass—all those rights are there as clear as daylight except where they are changed by some other Act under clause 6(3). It is the same in clause 7 which sets out the rights of navigation the right to pass and repass and the right of passage except where some other Act circumvents or forecloses on that right. The right even to “remain temporarily in a place until wind or weather permits departure or until cargo has been obtained or repairs completed” is a total right when it comes to navigation. New clause 7A “Existing fishing rights preserved” states: “Nothing in this Act affects any rights of fishing recognised immediately before the commencement of this section by or under an enactment or a rule of law.” It is as plain as daylight. Any right that people may have had they still have under this legislation or it lies in other legislation. How about clause 11 “Public foreshore and seabed vested in the Crown”? What could be clearer than that?  
Why would National not support that? Why would National line up with the Maori Party or the Greens or any other group out there that has no interest in national unity or cohesion? Members should go to clause 12 “Public foreshore and seabed not to be alienated”. That is the reason why National is not happy with this legislation. National has always been dead keen on flogging off this country’s assets to anybody and everybody whether foreign or local. Public foreshore and seabed—[ 
Interruption 
] Mr Prebble says that that is his policy and he is right. The public foreshore and seabed is not to be alienated—it is not to be sold. That is why National opposes the bill. It has always been after the privatisation of somebody else’s resources.  
Clause 34B(3) sets out the issue of reserves. It concerns the issue of status in respect of the seabed and foreshore and the issue of access and the rights of navigation. I have mentioned all those provisions. There is a total assurance to any and every New Zealander that the rights of access and use will not be threatened at all. So why does the National Party put up its least-qualified person who has the least understanding of the issue and make him the No. 1 defender of its position? Where is the great communicator to lead the charge? Do members know why he is not here? He is not here because he cannot front it. He does not have a case or an argument and he does not have any contentious— 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. The member cannot talk about the absence of another member. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I thought the member might raise that. The member has been here a long time. I suggest he look at Speaker’s ruling 23/7. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Mr Chairperson to whom do you think I was referring when I referred to the “great communicator” or the great debater? I did not refer to the person National jacked up with the Toastmasters club in June of this year to be called the great communicator. I have not referred to any name or personality at all. The assumption that the person who does not have the guts to get down here and show himself is the “great communicator” is beyond me— 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The member has gone too far now. To infer that someone lacks courage is out of order. It is a personal reflection. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: But who is it? 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I do not know who some people may think Mr Peters is referring to. I know that he is referring to the Prime Minister and I think it was very offensive for him to refer to the Prime Minister as “he” in this Chamber. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: We have had our fun. We have a serious debate here and members should take a deep breath and get back to it.  
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: It is as clear as daylight to any doubting Thomas that the rights of access the rights of navigation and the personal fishing rights of New Zealanders are not attacked or interrupted in any way. The bill specifically sets that out. Just because it clarifies Maori rights and has greater definition as to what they may be does not mean that every other person is threatened. That is fundamental to the bill. It means that there can be some national cohesion and unity on this critical issue.  
Not one National Party supporter out there could possibly be happy with the argument that is being mounted by the National Party in the Chamber today—or rather the lack of it. That is why the great communicator would not come and communicate. He would not come and debate this legislation. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. The member may be referring to the Prime Minister or he may be referring to the Leader of the Opposition but he was clearly referring to a member of Parliament because only members of Parliament can come here. Therefore his statements are out of order. I think given the fact that he is now a repeat offender you should terminate his speech so we can all go and have lunch.  
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Mr Prebble always has something to add. I thank him and again refer the member who was speaking to Speaker’s ruling 23/7. He must not refer to the absence of members.  
Sitting suspended from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. 
Dr WAYNE MAPP (National—North Shore) 
: 
 Part 2 is of course one of the major parts of the Foreshore and Seabed Bill and I anticipate an extensive debate and more than one call on it. In this particular call I shall focus on one particular issue only which concerns clause 11 on ownership clause 12 on the fact that the area is not to be alienated and then how that is tied into new clause 115A on the issue of treaty settlements. I heard this morning on the radio that Mr Peters claims—and I use the word “claims” advisedly—to be protecting the public interest and that there will be no alienation of the foreshore and seabed. We know from answers given by the Prime Minister in this House that that is a false statement. The Minister in the chair the Hon Dr Michael Cullen also knows that that is a false statement. We know that the Government has made its deal with its own internal opponents in the Maori caucus—a special deal that is contained effectively in clause 115A.  
I want to say this. Clause 11 purports to provide for Crown ownership of the foreshore and seabed. That clause then immediately states that it is subject to the customary rights provisions of clause 28 and other clauses thereafter. So straight away the idea of absolute ownership on behalf of all the people of New Zealand is immediately compromised—hugely compromised by a whole panoply of customary rights orders. They will be the territorial customary rights orders and the Government’s management plans that go with that. That will hugely compromise the reality of Crown ownership and it is all set out in subclause (3). So the first point is that when the Government states in clause 11 that it provides for absolute ownership on behalf of the Crown that is of itself compromised within the very same clause by the provisions of subclause (3).  
The next issue—and this is more serious—is the link to clause 12 “Public foreshore and seabed not to be alienated”. That of itself seems to be a grand promise. After all this Government and New Zealand First in particular have gone up and down the country and said they will protect the public interest by guaranteeing ownership of the foreshore and seabed on behalf of all New Zealanders. They are not true to their word. They have knowingly set up a device whereby the foreshore and seabed will be alienated. They heard in May of this year that the Prime Minister intends to settle treaty grievances by transferring foreshore and seabed to Maori owners. OK I know that the New Zealand First speakers will say that that takes a special Act of Parliament and that they will not consent to it. They will say that but of course they know perfectly well that the Labour Government will go along to the Green Party the United Future party or the Maori Party and get votes from those parties for the alienation of foreshore and seabed for those settlements so there will be a majority.  
What has really happened in effect is that New Zealand First has set a process in place in this bill to enable the alienation of the foreshore and seabed. That is actually not some kind of secret. The Prime Minister directly told the nation through her answers to parliamentary questions in this Chamber that that is exactly what will happen. I am prepared to bet that the Government will transfer ownership of the west coast harbours—Kawhia Aotea and Raglan—together with much of the East Cape the Eastern Bay of Plenty and the far north estimated by the Maori members to be 10 percent of the New Zealand coastline to Maori. That will require special Acts of Parliament; I acknowledge that. But that is what the Government will do—and the Green Party will vote for that absolutely consistently as will the Maori Party. The Labour Party knows that. The reality is that New Zealand First has been duped. It has been duped and is duping its supporters as a consequence. New Zealand First’s supporters have trusted it. 
Debate interrupted. 
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