Harawira Hone: Meat Board Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
Harawira Hone: Meat Board Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:633;Page:4960] 
HONE HARAWIRA (Maori Party—Te Tai Tokerau) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Speaker. Tena tatou katoa i te Whare. Up north we have a little town with a big reputation: Moerewa or “tuna town” as we used to call it back in the day when the big AFFCO freezing works were up and running and every man and his dog from all over the north had some connection with the place whether as a worker farmer cuzzy bro running a few shady meat raffles truckie or whanau. Everyone knew everyone and Moerewa was a pumping little town. Then they shut the works down and Moerewa turned to dust. Over the years old “tuna town” became more and more run down and fewer and fewer people stopped there. Soon people were going faster in order to get through the town and on to where they were really going. 
Then a few years back a crazy wild-eyed preacher man called Ngahau Davis decided to move back to Moerewa and put it back on the map. I can remember him bailing me up on the street and telling me that Moerewa was going to do this and do that and that Moerewa sparkled and rocked. I looked at him and I remember saying: “Brother stop. What are you on man? Moerewa is dead—it is history. Moerewa ain’t going anywhere.” But with his raging enthusiasm and a desire from some of the locals to rebuild the community Moerewa has blossomed. 
Moerewa ain’t quite the bustling metropolis that Kaitaia is but boy it has changed. Now we can drop in at the world famous Tuna Cafe go to Lori’s Cookery for its gourmet garlic chicken and kumara pies and get a beer at the Klondike Tavern. Moerewa has a skateboard park an art gallery a weaving workshop a surf shop and an inland Northland work trust He Iwi Kotahi Tatou Trust. Ngahau Davis and company are building a multimedia production house to graft on to their little radio station. As Ngahau says: “The tools have changed. We do not have knives any more and now instead of making money for somebody else we own our own tools and we are building our own future.” It is a long way from the bad old days after the works closed when violence crime alcohol and drugs unemployment youth problems social problems and low levels of achievement suffocated the town. Welfare dependency was rife and powerlessness and anger dominated the town. 
All over Aotearoa little towns and communities suffered the same fate as Moerewa as the big corporates like AFFCO Borthwicks and the rest bailed out. In Wanganui the Wairarapa Hicks Bay Tokomaru Bay and Patea the derelict remains of old freezing works are sad reminders of good days gone by. The closure of the works was the catalyst for many of the social problems suffered in those communities. Some like Moerewa bounced back and with amazing community resilience have injected vitality back into their worlds. But for most the radical downsizing of those industries has led to massive deprivation dislocation and depression. 
It is against that background that the Maori Party comes to this bill asking exactly how Maori will benefit from the amendments to the Meat Board Act 2004. As the independent Maori voice in Parliament we take seriously our role of defending Maori rights and advancing Maori interests for the benefit of the whole nation and we want to make sure our communities are not dragged through the despondency of those days gone by this legislation or by any other legislation. This bill means the New Zealand Meat Board can grant access to quota markets to meat exporters whether registered or not. We support the intention of the bill because the financial benefits of preferential access to quota markets will still be available to the wider New Zealand meat industry and that in turn should mean positive economic outcomes and jobs here at home. Yes that may be a little optimistic but we have to be. Our history in the meat industry is not one of stability so mindful of the risks we still strive to improve our whanau’s future job security. 
Back in the heydays of the 1960s and 1970s Maori were the predominant workforce in the works and the works benefited from cheap skilled Maori labour. We were there in large numbers and with the 21st century agribusiness sector we want to be there in big numbers as well. But this time we do not want to be just the drones who carry out somebody else’s decisions. Like Ngahau Davis and the people of Moerewa we want to have plans in place and to build on the experience and expertise of Maori from the Maori meat industry association and of meatworkers AgResearch the Federation of Maori Authorities and Maori meat producers. 
The sudden closures of both the Hawke’s Bay Farmers Meat Co. works at Whakatu in 1986 and the Weddel Tomoana freezing works in Hastings in 1994 figured in the study  
Mauri Mahi: Does Being Made Unemployed Affect Health? The Closures of Whakatu and Tomoana 
. It was the largest study of its kind in the world. Since then Ngati Kahungunu and Te Roopu Rangahau Hauora a Eru Pomare have been conducting another study  
Mauri Tanga: Long Term Effects of Involuntary Job Loss on Mortality and Morbidity 
. It involves around 6000 people and looks at hospital admissions cancer registrations and deaths among freezing workers who lost their jobs. Such are the massive impacts of forced unemployment on communities that both studies have been keenly watched by world experts. 
But it is not just communities that have suffered from the effects of freezing works; it is also the environment. In one case the Waitangi Tribunal reported the disastrous environmental damage of the Borthwicks freezing works in Waitara which used to dump its sewage straight into the Waitara River and discharge its waste 500 metres out to sea without any treatment. The river-mouth area and surrounding coastal reefs became badly polluted and no shellfish could be taken. 
In the second reading of this bill we ask that any financial returns from meat quota allocation also be considered in light of possible environmental impact. We know that the annual contribution of Maori primary sector producers to GDP is now very significant. Maori agribusinesses are performing well commercially and the AgResearch Maori strategy aims to help Maori farms to double their productivity so we are talking big bucks here. But even so the very significant stake that Maori now have in this sector must still be balanced against practices such as environmental damage health impacts and the possible threat of economic downturn. 
The report of the Primary Production Committee noted that many submitters took the opportunity to raise concerns about the current quota allocation system although it is outside the scope of this bill. In the same way we need also to consider how the long-term projected outcomes in the primary sector can be measured alongside other costs and benefits because this emerging economy is not just about economic performance but about social responsibility as well. Along with the promotion of markets in the meat industry Meat and Wool New Zealand is supporting a series of governance workshops to help Maori farmers to achieve their production potential. We welcome these initiatives because they help us to plan for future wealth and to take seriously the need for succession planning. 
Although the focus of this bill is to ensure participation in and access to quota markets the Maori Party is also aware that there were no submissions from anyone representing Maori interests in the industry. That is hugely important because this House needs to consider how Maori may be affected by opening up the access to quota markets along with training and recruitment strategies to enable more Maori to benefit from the industry. 
During the passage of this bill through the House we received a letter from a Maori landowner who told us that Maori involvement as freezing workers—some 80-plus percent of them—was a huge economic contribution to the success of the meat industry. He suggested that the quota allocation should reflect that contribution by awarding meat industry quota to Maori in the same way as fishing quota was allocated to Maori based on prior involvement in the industry. That is an interesting idea and is one we would hope that the Minister along with the Minister of Maori Affairs will consider. 
Maori primary sector producers land trusts and incorporations would benefit from improved business certainty. On that basis the Maori Party will support this bill. But we will forever hold the symbolic association of places such as Patea Hicks Bay Waitara Wairarapa Moerewa and other places like those uppermost in our minds as we look to properly count the cost of progress.