Donnelly Brian: National Library of New Zealand (Te Puna MAtauranga o Aotearoa) Bill — Second Reading 
Donnelly Brian: National Library of New Zealand (Te Puna MAtauranga o Aotearoa) Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:607;Page:4728] 
Hon BRIAN DONNELLY (NZ First) 
:  
I could spend most of my 10 minutes talking about my “mate” from Northland who keeps confidences so well! What he was saying is not true. 
During the select committee stage of this particular bill one of the things that the Education and Science Committee did—and it really took the issue very seriously—was to take a tour of the National Library. Many of us had never been there and it just gave us a context for the bill and allowed us to see what we were working with. At this stage I have to say that the experience was mind-blowing. 
John Carter 
: It’s got a lot of books in it. 
Hon BRIAN DONNELLY 
: It has more than books in it. The member could go and look at the pictures over there. It is a real national treasure and I am not certain whether many members of the House fully understand its monumental nature. 
There is another treasure within it and that is the Alexander Turnbull Library. New Zealand First will be supporting this bill because we believe that it is important to fix up some of the tensions that exist around the 1965 Act in relation to how those particular parts of the library operate—the functions and roles etc.—and how they relate to other external legislation such as the Financial Responsibility Act. We believe that it is very important that this bill does go forward for the protection of our national assets. The bill clarifies some of those relationships and sorts out things. It will allow all those tensions to dissipate and for both elements of the National Library the National Library itself and the Alexander Turnbull Library within it to move forward and to protect our heritage in the way that they should. 
The bill does another very important thing which the Minister responsible for the National Library only alluded to and it is to do with oral histories in relation to the Official Information Act. The interpretation of the Official Information Act has been made in such a way that it really curbs the potential for the nation to be able to archive some oral histories that could explain very clearly what actually happened. For example this nation has absolutely no idea of what actually happened during the coalition talks in 1996. The public has been presented with myths produced by those in the media who have no idea what went on behind closed doors. The Official Information Act has put a real limitation upon the people who were actively involved in those decisions by preventing them from presenting their oral histories. If we are going to be able in the future to really know about the history of our nation it is important that we are able to get former Prime Ministers or Deputy Prime Ministers to tell it as it was from their perspective. That is a quite important element of this bill. 
The third element relates to electronic deposit and that was a toughie—we really worked through it. So that people can understand the meaning of “electronic deposit” I will explain the problem we had with the Newspaper Publishers Association. The association’s members often contract other agencies to feed them electronic information. Their concern was that if the law required them to make that information available to the National Library on an ongoing basis which would then make it available to the general public what would prevent other news agencies from being able to tap into what they had been purchasing? It was a quite important issue and I thank Mr Peck because he came up with the idea of bringing the protagonists and the antagonists into a debate situation to really get to the nitty-gritty of it. I believe that did allow the members of the select committee to conclude that with the processes that are in place there is no reason for the National Library to do that sort of thing; the systems that the legislation is putting in place which we are confident will proceed will not allow that to happen. It is not in the interest of the National Library for that to take place nor is it the purpose of the National Library to do that. 
We have some discomfort with some elements of the bill. We raised those at the select committee but did not always get particularly good answers. I want people to think seriously about this issue because it is not just a case of bashing around and playing politics. It is about addressing Maori interests in the National Library. We talked through a lot of those things. The explanatory note to the introductory copy of the bill talked about providing “a presence for a Maori world view within the National Library by the inclusion of the existing Maori name of the National Library Te Puna Matauranga o Aotearoa in the title of the Act.” That raises a whole lot of other questions. Is that what we are doing or is it just tokenism? For example if Aotearoa was the name of New Zealand that was utilised prior to the missionaries coming along can anyone explain to me why both the Declaration of Independence and the Treaty of Waitangi use the words “Niu Tirini” not “Aotearoa”? Has our belief in Percy Smith created another myth which we are now codifying in legislation? 
We asked some other questions. For example one way that this bill is honouring the Treaty of Waitangi is by having the guardians of the Alexander Turnbull Library and the commission appointed after consultation with the Minister of Maori Affairs. One could say that is tino rangatiratanga in action that is partnership in action but we have to ask a very serious question. The Minister of Maori Affairs was put into that position by not Maori but the Prime Minister. How can it be tino rangatiratanga unless the Minister of Maori Affairs is elected to that role by all Maori? It is just tokenism. It is an attempt but I think one has to be prepared to look through the issues and see what exactly is going on here. 
The third part of this is the introduction of Maori language into English texts as if that is the way it should go. We do not have a Library and Information Advisory Commission but the following unusual expression: Library and Information Advisory Commission Nga Kaiwhakamarama i nga Kohikohinga Korero. That is what the body is called. Let us ask ourselves what we are doing with the English language with that text because this bill is in English not Maori. If it was in Maori that name would be quite justified. It would be quite acceptable if it were an alternative expression for the Library and Information Advisory Commission but it all runs into one. 
I have no difficulty with the expression “taonga” which is used here because it obviously means those things that are valued by Maori. But what is the difference between “matauranga” and “matauranga Maori”? Why do we put the word “Maori” on it? The very use of the word “matauranga” in an English text means Maori knowledge Maori understanding. We asked the members of the National Library what they meant by “matauranga”. For example if we had the works of Euclid translated into Maori would that be matauranga Maori? Is Witi Ihimaera’s  
Pounamu Pounamu 
 matauranga Maori? It is very much matauranga Maori as far as I am concerned but it is in English. They could not tell us the answer. They actually said it is very fuzzy. I therefore put it to the House that we need to think through some of those issues very clearly and with a fair bit of rigour or we will end up with warm fuzzy tokenism and not much happening. 
I do not think those issues are strong enough for us to vote against this bill because they are outweighed by the positive elements. We are just raising questions and have an element of discomfort with the idea of middle-class Pakeha bureaucrats washing away their guilt about their ancestors’ actions by putting some fuzzy stuff into legislation. We asked questions about some of those things and the library said it had consulted Maori. We asked whom it had consulted and were told it had consulted the one Maori librarian in the National Library. We are putting in place legislation based on that level of consultation! The Maori Language Commission has also criticised the wording of this legislation because it also has concerns that it is only paying lip service and is not genuinely getting to the underlying depth of what we need to be doing to truly consider addressing Maori interests in the National Library. If it is just on the surface just superficial we may as well not be going through it and that is the discomfort that New Zealand First has; we believe that at this particular stage there are real dangers that it is just on the surface.