te Heuheu Georgina: Maori Purposes Bill (No 2) — Second Reading Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
te Heuheu Georgina: Maori Purposes Bill (No 2) — Second Reading Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
[Volume:607;Page:4804] 
Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU (NZ National) 
: 
 I have much pleasure in rising to make a contribution to the report back of this bill. I note that it is rather ironic that the Minister of Maori Affairs said he hoped this bill would proceed with some urgency. We are in urgency but I note that this bill has been ready for report back for some months now. That is why we in National are very pleased to be in the House to progress the bill to its conclusion. 
In respect of the first part of the bill which deals with changes to the Treaty of Waitangi Act there is a clause that validates the constitution of the Waitangi Tribunal for three inquiries. I have a bit of personal understanding of the difficulties that can be posed by the fact that there have been changes of membership in relation to the Kaipara Hauraki and Wellington Tenths inquiries so I am pleased to see that this bill moves to validate those inquiries. In a sense there is a slight—but only slight—modification under clause 4 to the rights to challenge but in all other respects the existing rights to challenge remain in place. I think it is not only sensible but proper that that be done and it will enable the release of the Wellington Tenths inquiry report which was one of the main issues that submitters came to the committee about. It was a real concern that a report has been waiting to be issued. Hopefully the minute that this bill is passed into legislation that report will be brought out. So the validation clause is supported. 
There are also changes promoted to the Treaty of Waitangi Act to give the chairperson the power to replace presiding officers and to replace members. There was an issue there which we covered reasonably exhaustively in the select committee and that of course was the issue of natural justice—the underlying principle being that only those who hear should decide—and the right to a fair hearing. Again advice was sought first of all by the Minister before the bill came to the select committee and we also satisfied ourselves that those changes were necessary. 
They are proposed on the basis of a quite strict set of criteria and I want to refer to those from the bill itself. The chairperson may appoint a replacement presiding officer and may also appoint a replacement member but as I said there are strict conditions applying before those appointments can occur. The power can be used only if the presiding officer concerned has ceased to hold office—and that is in relation to his or her actual appointment—if the personal circumstances of the presiding officer or member holding the office are such in relation to his or her physical or mental condition that he or she ought to be replaced; and if in the opinion of the chairperson it would be unreasonable to expect the presiding officer or member to continue to participate in an inquiry. There is also an additional criterion which is that the chairperson must not exercise that power unless there is an adequate record of the part of the 
inquiry that has already been heard. That is pretty important. The tribunal is to make sure as it proceeds with claims and hearings that there is an adequate record in existence and the provision also states that it is reasonable to expect that the replacement officer review that record. 
Although clause 5 does throw up an important underlying issue the issue of natural justice it is the conclusion of the National caucus that on balance provided that the strict criteria are followed and provided that the power is used only in relation to those criteria the clause probably makes sense the set of changes are appropriate and we support them. 
One other matter in relation to clause 5 is the provision for the chairperson to appoint an acting presiding officer. The original proposal could have brought into the chair a person or persons with no legal background. There was agreement by all committee members that that probably was not appropriate in the context of a semi-judicial body so the power to appoint an acting presiding officer will occur only when it results in a replacement presiding officer who is a barrister or solicitor of 7 years’ standing. That proposal in relation to that part of the bill is supported by all of the committee’s membership. On that basis National is very happy with that amendment as well. 
In terms of Part 2 and the Broadcasting Act National has some problems with this part. It has been signalled that we will be voting against this part. It may be a technical amendment in that as the Minister said pursuant to a Cabinet minute the responsibility for Te Mangai Paho has been with the Minister of Maori Affairs rather than with the Minister of Broadcasting. But we are tending to look at this amendment in relation to all of the debacle that has occurred over the last 2 years with regard to Maori television Maori broadcasting generally and the inability of this Minister to get that television service up and running. It has seemingly been one set of unfortunate circumstances after another. It is now understood that that television service might be up and running by the end of the year. This change might be a proper change to make but we do not have a lot of confidence—not that the Minister of Broadcasting always engenders confidence either I might add—that the change is actually warranted. 
In relation to the third part of the bill there is a note in the select committee report about my standing at a distance from this provision. I do not intend to refer to it at all in any of these comments and neither do I intend to vote on it. 
So in all the National Opposition is very pleased to see that at long last this bill has come up and that the intention is to pass it through all stages today. We are very supportive of the changes to the Treaty of Waitangi Act particularly the change that validates the three inquiries. Although the changes are sensible and appropriate they do raise an underlying issue that this Government must address—though it is not addressable in this context—and that is the chronic underfunding of the Waitangi Tribunal and its lack of resourcing. These changes are necessitated by the fact that Waitangi Tribunal inquiries are lengthy complex and take a number of years to progress. I was one of the original members on the Wellington Tenths inquiry which started in the early 1990s. I am now here in Parliament so I will be very pleased to see the report on that being issued. 
But I think this Government has put maybe half a million dollars of funding in the last 4 years into the operations of the tribunal. That is an underlying issue that must be addressed. It is not right. Justice delayed is justice denied. Some of these claims are taking too long and I ask the Minister to needle his colleague the Minister for Courts and see whether there is an opportunity to get some more funding to the tribunal. 
I just raise again the issue of the potential conflict of interest for me in relation to Part 3.